“The foreigners living among you will become stronger and stronger, while you become weaker and weaker.
Parallel translations
- WEB The foreigner who is among you will mount up above you higher and higher, and you will come down lower and lower.
- KJV The stranger that is within thee shall get up above thee very high; and thou shalt come down very low.
- BSB The foreigner living among you will rise higher and higher above you, while you sink down lower and lower.
- NKJV “The alien who is among you shall rise higher and higher above you, and you shall come down lower and lower.
- NASB The stranger who is among you will rise above you higher and higher, and you will go down lower and lower.
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
The foreigner among them will rise higher while Israel sinks lower and lower.
Overview
The social order is overturned as resident aliens gain ascendancy over Israel. This reverses Israel's promised position as the head among nations. It pictures the humiliation that follows the abandonment of God's covenant.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 14
- Deut 28:13Yahweh will make you the head, and not the tail. You will be above only, and you will not be beneath; if you listen to the commandments of Yahweh your God, which I command you today, to observe and to do,
- 1 Sam 13:19–23Now there was no blacksmith found throughout all the land of Israel; for the Philistines said, “Lest the Hebrews make themselves swords or spears”;
- 2 Kgs 17:20Yahweh rejected all the offspring of Israel, afflicted them, and delivered them into the hands of raiders, until he had cast them out of his sight.
- 2 Kgs 24:14–16He carried away all Jerusalem, and all the princes, and all the mighty men of valor, even ten thousand captives, and all the craftsmen and the smiths. No one remained, except the poorest people of the land.
- Judg 2:11–15The children of Israel did that which was evil in Yahweh’s sight, and served the Baals.
- John 18:31Pilate therefore said to them, “Take him yourselves, and judge him according to your law.” Therefore the Jews said to him, “It is not lawful for us to put anyone to death,”
- Judg 14:4But his father and his mother didn’t know that it was of Yahweh; for he sought an occasion against the Philistines. Now at that time the Philistines ruled over Israel.
- 2 Kgs 17:23until Yahweh removed Israel out of his sight, as he said by all his servants the prophets. So Israel was carried away out of their own land to Assyria to this day.
- Judg 2:3Therefore I also said, ‘I will not drive them out from before you; but they shall be in your sides, and their gods will be a snare to you.’”
- Judg 10:7–10Yahweh’s anger burned against Israel, and he sold them into the hand of the Philistines, and into the hand of the children of Ammon.
- Judg 4:2–3Yahweh sold them into the hand of Jabin king of Canaan, who reigned in Hazor; the captain of whose army was Sisera, who lived in Harosheth of the Gentiles.
- Judg 15:11–12Then three thousand men of Judah went down to the cave in Etam’s rock, and said to Samson, “Don’t you know that the Philistines are rulers over us? What then is this that you have done to us?” He said to them, “As they did to me, so I have done to them.”
- John 19:15They cried out, “Away with him! Away with him! Crucify him!” Pilate said to them, “Shall I crucify your King?” The chief priests answered, “We have no king but Caesar!”
- 1 Sam 13:3–7Jonathan struck the garrison of the Philistines that was in Geba, and the Philistines heard of it. Saul blew the trumpet throughout all the land, saying, “Let the Hebrews hear!”
Themes, concepts, people & topics
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Hebrew/Greek interlinear, word definitions, and cross-references for this verse.
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 28:43 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.