The fruit of your womb will be cursed, as well as the produce of your land, the calves of your herds, and the lambs of your flocks.
Parallel translations
- WEB The fruit of your body, the fruit of your ground, the increase of your livestock, and the young of your flock will be cursed.
- KJV Cursed shall be the fruit of thy body, and the fruit of thy land, the increase of thy kine, and the flocks of thy sheep.
- NKJV “Cursed shall be the fruit of your body and the produce of your land, the increase of your cattle and the offspring of your flocks.
- NASB “Cursed will be the children of your womb, the produce of your ground, the newborn of your herd, and the offspring of your flock.
- NLT Your children and your crops will be cursed. The offspring of your herds and flocks will be cursed.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
Children, crops, and livestock, once fruitful, will instead be cursed with barrenness.
Overview
The blessing of fertility in verse 4 is here reversed into loss and decline. Disobedience touches family, field, and flock with futility. This sobering picture shows that life apart from God's favor cannot flourish.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 13
- Lev 26:26When I cut off your supply of bread, ten women will bake your bread in a single oven and dole out your bread by weight, so that you will eat but not be satisfied.
- Ps 109:9–15May his children be fatherless and his wife a widow.
- Deut 28:16You will be cursed in the city and cursed in the country.
- Deut 28:4The fruit of your womb will be blessed, as well as the produce of your land and the offspring of your livestock—the calves of your herds and the lambs of your flocks.
- Job 18:16–19The roots beneath him dry up, and the branches above him wither away.
- Lev 26:19–20I will break down your stubborn pride and make your sky like iron and your land like bronze,
- Hab 3:17Though the fig tree does not bud and no fruit is on the vines, though the olive crop fails and the fields produce no food, though the sheep are cut off from the fold and no cattle are in the stalls,
- Deut 5:9You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on their children to the third and fourth generations of those who hate Me,
- Lam 2:20Look, O LORD, and consider: Whom have You ever treated like this? Should women eat their offspring, the infants they have nurtured? Should priests and prophets be killed in the sanctuary of the Lord?
- Lam 2:11–12My eyes fail from weeping; I am churning within. My heart is poured out in grief over the destruction of the daughter of my people, because children and infants faint in the streets of the city.
- Hos 9:11–14Ephraim’s glory will fly away like a bird, with no birth, no pregnancy, and no conception.
- Mal 2:3Behold, I will rebuke your descendants, and I will spread dung on your faces, the waste from your feasts, and you will be carried off with it.
- Luke 23:29–30Look, the days are coming when people will say, ‘Blessed are the barren women, the wombs that never bore, and breasts that never nursed!’
Themes, concepts, people & topics
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Christ at the center
Moses promised a Prophet like himself to whom Israel must listen (18:15); Jesus is that Prophet, the one who keeps the covenant we broke and becomes the curse for us by hanging on a tree (Gal 3:13).
How Deuteronomy 28:18 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
Each word below is tagged with its Strong’s number — tap one to see the underlying Hebrew word, its meaning, and every verse that uses it.