“Adonai your God will cause you to be defeated before your enemies; you will advance on them one way and flee before them seven. You will become an object of horror to every kingdom on earth. Your carcasses will become food for all the birds in the air and the wild animals, and there will be no one to scare them away.”-Deuteronomy 28:25-26
In our study of the curses God will cast upon a rebellious Israel, we next come to the aspect of war.
When going over the “blessings”, we were told if Israel is obedient, the Lord would rout their enemies in battle.
But now we’re told if Israel is disobedient, it is Israel who will be routed and humiliated at the hands of their enemies.
Recall the phrase to “advance on them one way and flee before them seven” is a Hebrew idiom that means to go to war in one organized battle column but end up scattering and running for the hills in every direction when overtaken by the enemy.
The Lord further goes on to say that instead of being respected, Israel will be looked upon with scorn.
The descriptive word Scripture uses here is that Israel will be viewed as a “horror”.
Looking back in history, there were other times when Israel was viewed as a horror.
Recall when Jacob’s sons launched an attack on all the men of Shechem while they were recovering from their mass circumcision ceremony.
This unusually cruel and violent action was the response to the king’s son raping Jacob’s daughter Dinah.
As a result, Jacob seething with anger and sorrow told his sons…
…”you have troubled me to make me to stink among the inhabitants of the land, among the Canaanites and the Perizzites: and I being few in number, they shall gather themselves together against me, and slay me; and I shall be destroyed, I and my house.”
This was just another way of saying that Israel had become a “horror” among the surrounding tribes and nations.
We’re told in the end-times the world will once again regard Israel as a “horror” and this will play into all the nations gathering against Israel for the final battle known as Armageddon.
Onward.
Just when it seems like things couldn’t get any worse, it does.
We’re told the number of dead Israelite soldiers will be so huge that those left standing won’t even be able to bury the dead bodies before they’re eaten by wild animals and scavenger birds.
While this image of having our dead bodies chomped up by wild animals may strike us as terrifying, to the ancient Hebrew mindset, there was something even more terrifying that would occur.
The REAL nightmare scenario the ancient Hebrews harbored was if they were not properly buried, their very spiritual existence would be snuffed out and thus any chance of enjoying an afterlife existence would be gone.
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