When I send against them the deadly arrows of famine which were for the destruction of those whom I will send to destroy you, then I will also intensify the famine upon you and break off your provision of bread.
Parallel translations
- WEB when 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.
- KJV When I shall send upon them the evil arrows of famine, which shall be for their destruction, and which I will send to destroy you: and I will increase the famine upon you, and will break your staff of bread:
- BSB When I shower you with the deadly arrows of famine and destruction that I will send to destroy you, I will intensify the famine against you and cut off your supply of food.
- NKJV When I send against them the terrible arrows of famine which shall be for destruction, which I will send to destroy you, I will increase the famine upon you and cut off your supply of bread.
- NLT “I will shower you with the deadly arrows of famine to destroy you. The famine will become more and more severe until every crumb of food is gone.
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 will send the deadly arrows of famine to destroy and break the staff of bread. Hunger is depicted as God's aimed weapon of judgment.
Overview
The Lord describes famine as arrows He fires deliberately, intensifying it until the support of bread is shattered. The military image shows that even natural disasters serve God's just purposes. This sobering picture of God's sovereignty over scarcity calls people to seek the One who alone can supply true and lasting bread.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 9
- Ezek 4:16Moreover he said to me, “Son of man, behold, I will break the staff of bread in Jerusalem. They will eat bread by weight, and with fearfulness; and they shall drink water by measure, and in dismay;
- Deut 32:23–24“I will heap evils on them. I will spend my arrows on them.
- 2 Kgs 6:25There was a great famine in Samaria. Behold, they besieged it, until a donkey’s head was sold for eighty pieces of silver, and the fourth part of a kab of dove’s dung for five pieces of silver.
- Lev 26:26When I break your staff of bread, ten women shall bake your bread in one oven, and they shall deliver your bread again by weight. You shall eat, and not be satisfied.
- Ps 91:5–7You shall not be afraid of the terror by night, nor of the arrow that flies by day;
- Lam 3:12He has bent his bow, and set me as a mark for the arrow.
- Isa 3:1For, behold, the Lord, Yahweh of Armies, takes away from Jerusalem and from Judah supply and support, the whole supply of bread, and the whole supply of water;
- Ps 7:13He has also prepared for himself the instruments of death. He makes ready his flaming arrows.
- Ezek 14:13“Son of man, when a land sins against me by committing a trespass, and I stretch out my hand on it, and break the staff of its bread, and send famine on it, and cut off from it man and animal;
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Original language
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