“And let the peace of God reign in your hearts, to which you also were called in one body; and be thankful.” — Colossians 3:15
Part Four: The Twelve Curses
The twelve curses recorded in Deuteronomy 27:15-26—the ones the Israelites were to pronounce from Mount Ebal as they entered the Promised Land—are worth reviewing: 1
Curse 1:
“Cursed be the man who makes a carved or cast image, an abomination to the Lord, the work of the hands of a craftsman, and sets it up in secret.” And all the people will respond and say, “Amen.” 2 (verse 15; emphasis ours throughout)
The source of curses mentioned in the first place is not public or institutionalized idolatry, as practiced by the world’s religions, but hidden idolatry, that clandestine, perhaps subliminal, elevation of anything before the true God. The reference is to the breaking of the first and second commandments ( Exodus 20:2-6 ). In a modern context, such covert idolatry would include placing career, family, pleasure, or even more subtly, social status in the church, above the worship of the true God.
Curse 2:
“Cursed be he who dishonors his father or his mother.” And all the people will say: “Amen”. (verse 16)
The second curse revolves around the fifth commandment (Exodus 20:12). Exodus 21:17 commands the death of anyone who curses either of his parents. It is to be noted that disobedience to parents is usually not secret, but open, often brazen. However, the word here is not “disobey” but “disgrace”. 3 Shame may be a disguised response to parents. The hypocrite may pretend to honor parents, while he secretly detests them. 4
In this sense, Mark 7:1-13, where hypocrisy is a major theme, becomes instructive. Some scribes and Pharisees from Jerusalem traveled north to ask Christ why his disciples do not follow the oral tradition. They refer to halakhah, which Peter, addressing the apostles at the Jerusalem Council years later, calls “a yoke.” . . which neither our fathers nor we have been able to bear” (Acts 15:10).
In his response to the Pharisees, Jesus calls their inquisitors hypocrites, who honor God with their lips while their hearts are far from Him. 5 They worship God in vain, he says, since they have abandoned “the commandment of God the tradition of men” (Mark 7:8). The sin of the Jewish leadership is hidden, not obvious to the population, who often considered the Pharisees and scribes to be pious. However, his sin remains one of grave consequences. Christ concludes in verse 13: “Thus the word of God is null and void because of your tradition which you have handed down.”
Significant here is the fact that Christ cites the fifth commandment as His example in this discussion (verses 10-12), namely, the tradition that a man is freed from the obligation of caring for his elderly parents if he dedicates the funds to the Temple. . Christ says that doing so is hypocritical and amounts to dishonoring parents and violating God’s law.
Curse 3:
“Cursed be he who moves the boundary of his neighbor.” And all the people will say: “Amen”. (verse 17)
Landmarks are usually nocturnal creatures. When they do move, they often do so at night, in secret. 6
The continued use of land obtained through the subterfuge of clandestine landmarks is a superb image of “making a lie” 7 , that is, living a lie. As such, it is a picture of hypocrisy. Those who make use of land that is not theirs by falsifying boundaries could well benefit from theft for generations. (For more details, see Deuteronomy 19:14).
Curse 4:
“Cursed is he who deceives a blind man on the way.” And all the people will say: “Amen”. (verse 18)
See Leviticus 19:14 for more information on this deceitful act, one of deception. Over the centuries, how many seemingly sincere teachers have misled uninformed and unsuspecting members of God’s church? Secularly, the phenomenon of “confidence men” defrauding the elderly of their savings is a manifestation of this sort of thing.
Curse 5:
“Cursed be he who perverts the right due to the foreigner, the orphan and the widow.” And all the people will say: “Amen”. (verse 19)
For more details, see Deuteronomy 24:17.
Curse 6:
“Cursed be he who lies with his father’s wife, because he has discovered his father’s nakedness.” And all the people will say: “Amen”. (verse 20)
This is the first of four curses pertaining to sexual misconduct. The example here is that of (usually) covert incestuous relationships (see Leviticus 18:8; 20:11).
Curse 7:
“Cursed is he who sleeps with any kind of animal.” And all the people will say: “Amen”. (verse 21)
This is probably a general reference pointing to all types of sexual deviation. In today’s world, such sexual misconduct can be quite open, “in your face”, so to speak. These days, people really put such conduct on display. In the context of God’s people, such practices remain highly “closet.” (For more details see Exodus 22:19; Leviticus 18:23; 20:15).
Courses 8 and 9:
“Cursed be he who sleeps with his sister, be it his father’s daughter or his mother’s daughter.” And all the people will say: “Amen”. “Cursed is he who sleeps with his mother-in-law.” And all the people will say: “Amen”. (verses 22-23)
These two curses, the third and fourth curses relating to sexual behavior, are related. The fact that God devotes a third of Ebal’s curses to such matters, usually perpetrated surreptitiously, may indicate his emphasis on sexual purity (see also Leviticus 18:9, 17; 20:14).
Curse 10 :
“Cursed be he who hurts his neighbor in secret.” And all the people will say: “Amen”. (verse 24)
On view here he is sneakily stalking (indicating “premeditated malice”) with the intent to commit murder. See the sixth commandment in Exodus 20:13, as well as the prohibition of this specific type of murder in Exodus 21:12. (For more details on the murder, see Numbers 35:16-34.)
Curse 11:
“Cursed be he who accepts a bribe to shed innocent blood.” And all the people will say: “Amen”. (verse 25)
The reference is to accepting bribes that lead to the death of innocents, most often in a judicial context. Such bribes are by nature “under the counter”, since the cornerstone of any properly functioning jurisprudence is impartiality ( Leviticus 19:15 ; Deuteronomy 10:17-18 ; I Timothy 5:21 ; James 2:1 , 9 ). Judges must be impeccably honest, disinterested. This is, of course, in reference to the ninth commandment, which prohibits bearing false witness (see Exodus 20:16 and more specifically, Exodus 23:7-8).
Curse 12:
“Cursed be he who does not confirm the words of this law by putting them into action.” And all the people will say: “Amen”. (verse 26)
The latter is a deal breaker, with a much broader scope than the other curses. By both its substance and position, it serves to point out that the above eleven curses collectively serve as a summary of all of God’s laws. In fact, the curse will come upon anyone who violates any of the precepts of God’s law. There is no place for hypocrisy. The apostle Paul may have had the twelfth curse in mind when he wrote to God’s people in Rome: “For it is not the hearers of the law who are righteous before God, but the doers of the law who will be justified” (Romans 2 ). :13).
The confirmation of the law does not take place by word but by works, works of manifest obedience. As a second witness, he considers God’s own commands to his prophet Jeremiah:
The Lord told me: “Listen to the terms of the covenant. Tell the people of Judah and Jerusalem that I, the Lord God of Israel, have put a curse on all who do not obey the terms of this covenant. It is the covenant I made with their fathers when I brought them out of Egypt, the land that was to them like a fiery furnace. I told them to obey me and to do everything I told them to do. I told them that if they obeyed, they would be My people and I would be their God. Then I would keep the promise I made to your ancestors that I would give them the rich and fertile land that they now have.” ( Jeremiah 11:1-5 , Good News Translation 8 )
Through the prophet himself, God tells us that appearances do not deceive God. He sees through the mask, clearly recognizing reality: “For My eyes are on all his paths. They are not hidden from me, nor is their iniquity hidden from my eyes” (Jeremiah 16:17). 9
In the last part of this series, we will bring home the Ebal/Gerizim split, so to speak, looking at its implications for the people of God’s church.
final notes
1 Verse 14 also provides important information: “And the Levites shall declare to all the men of Israel with a loud voice.” Commentators agree that probably only men over the age of twenty took their places in the mountains. After each curse, all men, not just their elders, responded, “Amen,” thus transferring the curses listed in Deuteronomy 28 to the Israelites in the Promised Land. For more information on the use of the word “amen,” used to ratify a vow, see Numbers 5:22.
2 Unless otherwise noted, all Scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®, ESV® Text Edition: 2016. Copyright © 2001 by Crossway, an editorial ministry of Good News Publishers.
3 The Hebrew verb is qalah (Strong’s #7034), which occurs only six times in the Old Testament, the first time in Deuteronomy 25.3. The translators of the King James Version have translated it as “seem ile” (once), “will be condemned” (once), “esteemed lightly” (once), “despised” (once), “vile” ( once), and “turn on light” (once).
4 The parable of the two sons ( Matthew 21:28-32 ) may be applicable here. The son who told his father that he would go to work in the fields but did not comply was a hypocrite.
5 Christ is quoting Isaiah 29:13:
“And the Lord said, ‘For this people draw near with their mouth and honor me with their lips, while their hearts are far from me, and their fear of me is a commandment taught by men.’
6 The protection of landmarks provided by God’s law speaks of the private ownership of property. When they wandered in the desert, the Israelites did not own land. The boundaries had no real meaning to them, other than the boundary of the camp in general. Now, as we enter into the heritage of the Promised Land and its attendant subdivision among the tribes, the sanctity of the cairns becomes vital…