‘I will heap disasters on them; I will spend My arrows on them.
Parallel translations
- WEB “I will heap evils on them. I will spend my arrows on them.
- KJV I will heap mischiefs upon them; I will spend mine arrows upon them.
- BSB I will heap disasters upon them; I will spend My arrows against them.
- NASB ¶‘I will add misfortunes to them; I will use up My arrows on them.
- NLT I will heap disasters upon them and shoot them down with my arrows.
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
God declares He will heap disasters on them and spend His arrows against them. It matters because it announces the certainty and severity of coming judgment.
Overview
The 'arrows' picture God's varied and inescapable instruments of judgment, detailed in the verses that follow. The piling up of calamities reflects the weight of Israel's accumulated sin. This warning of judgment underscores the seriousness of forsaking God and points to the deliverance found only in the One who shields His people from wrath.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 12
- Ezek 5:16when I send on them the evil arrows of famine that are for destruction, which I will send to destroy you. I will increase the famine on you, and will break your staff of bread.
- Isa 24:17–18Fear, the pit, and the snare, are on you who inhabitant the earth.
- Ps 7:12–13If a man doesn’t relent, he will sharpen his sword; he has bent and strung his bow.
- Lev 26:24then I will also walk contrary to you; and I will strike you, even I, seven times for your sins.
- Deut 28:15But it shall come to pass, if you will not listen to Yahweh your God’s voice, to observe to do all his commandments and his statutes which I command you today, that all these curses will come on you, and overtake you.
- Lam 3:13He has caused the shafts of his quiver to enter into my kidneys.
- Ezek 14:21For thus says the Lord Yahweh: “How much more when I send my four severe judgments on Jerusalem, the sword, and the famine, and the evil animals, and the pestilence, to cut off from it man and animal!
- Lev 26:18“‘If you in spite of these things will not listen to me, then I will chastise you seven times more for your sins.
- Matt 24:7–8For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom; and there will be famines, plagues, and earthquakes in various places.
- Jer 15:2–3It shall happen, when they tell you, ‘Where shall we go out?’ Then you shall tell them, ‘Yahweh says: “Such as are for death, to death; and such as are for the sword, to the sword; and such as are for the famine, to the famine; and such as are for captivity, to captivity.”’
- Isa 26:15You have increased the nation, O Yahweh. You have increased the nation! You are glorified! You have enlarged all the borders of the land.
- Deut 29:21Yahweh will set him apart for evil out of all the tribes of Israel, according to all the curses of the covenant that is written in this book of the law.
Themes, concepts, people & topics
Resources, by level
Commentaries & study tools
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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 32:23 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.