Leviticus 26

NEW JERUSALEM	NEW AMERICAN BIBLE
1 ' "You wil not make idols for yourselves; you will not erect statues or cultic stones, or erect carvedstones in your country, for you to worship: for I, Yahweh, am your God.	1 "Do not make false gods for yourselves. You shall not erect an idol or a sacred pillar for yourselves, nor shall you set up a stone figure for worship in your land; for I, the LORD, am your God.
2 You will keep my Sabbaths and revere my sanctuary. I am Yahweh.	2 Keep my sabbaths, and reverence my sanctuary. I am the LORD.
3 "If you live according to my laws, if you keep my commandments and put them into practice,	3 "If you live in accordance with my precepts and are careful to observe my commandments,
4 I shal give you the rain you need at the right time; the soil wil yield its produce and the trees of thecountryside their fruit;	4 I will give you rain in due season, so that the land will bear its crops, and the trees their fruit;
5 you wil thresh until vintage time and gather grapes until sowing time. You wil eat your fill of bread andlive secure in your land.	5 your threshing will last till vintage time, and your vintage till the time for sowing, and you will have food to eat in abundance, so that you may dwell securely in your land.
6 "I shall give peace in the land, and you wil go to sleep with no one to frighten you. I shal rid the land of beasts of prey. The sword wil not pass through your land.	6 I will establish peace in the land, that you may lie down to rest without anxiety. I will rid the country of ravenous beasts, and keep the sword of war from sweeping across your land.
7 You will pursue your enemies and they wil fal before your sword;	7 You will rout your enemies and lay them low with your sword.
8 five of you pursuing a hundred of them, one hundred pursuing ten thousand; and your enemies wil falbefore your sword.	8 Five of you will put a hundred of your foes to flight, and a hundred of you will chase ten thousand of them, till they are cut down by your sword.
9 "I shall turn towards you, I shal make you fertile and make your numbers grow, and I shal uphold mycovenant with you.	9 I will look with favor upon you, and make you fruitful and numerous, as I carry out my covenant with you.
10 "Having eaten al you need of last year's harvest, you will throw out the old to make room for the new.	10 So much of the old crops will you have stored up for food that you will have to discard them to make room for the new.
11 "I shal fix my home among you and never reject you.	11 I will set my Dwelling among you, and will not disdain you.
12 I shall live among you; I shall be your God and you will be my people,	12 Ever present in your midst, I will be your God, and you will be my people;
13 I, Yahweh your God, who brought you out of Egypt so that you should be their slaves no longer, andwho broke the bonds of your yoke and made you walk with head held high.	13 for it is I, the LORD, your God, who brought you out of the land of the Egyptians and freed you from their slavery, breaking the yoke they had laid upon you and letting you walk erect.
14 "But if you wil not listen to me and do not put all these commandments into practice,	14 "But if you do not heed me and do not keep all these commandments,
15 if you reject my laws and detest my customs, and you break my covenant by not putting al mycommandments into practice,	15 if you reject my precepts and spurn my decrees, refusing to obey all my commandments and breaking my covenant,
16 this is how I shal treat you: "I shal subject you to terror, consumption and fever, making you dim ofsight and short of breath. You wil sow your seed in vain, for your enemies wil eat it.	16 then I, in turn, will give you your deserts. I will punish you with terrible woes--with wasting and fever to dim the eyes and sap the life. You will sow your seed in vain, for your enemies will consume the crop.
17 I shall turn against you and you wil be defeated by your enemies. Your foes wil have the masteryover you, and you wil flee when no one is pursuing you.	17 I will turn against you, till you are beaten down before your enemies and lorded over by your foes. You will take to flight though no one pursues you.
18 "And if, in spite of this, you will not listen to me, I shal punish you seven times over for your sins.	18 "If even after this you do not obey me, I will increase the chastisement for your sins sevenfold,
19 I shall break your proud strength. I shal make the sky like iron for you, and your soil like bronze.	19 to break your haughty confidence. I will make the sky above you as hard as iron, and your soil as hard as bronze,
20 You wil wear out your strength in vain, your land will not yield its produce, nor the trees of the countrytheir fruit.	20 so that your strength will be spent in vain; your land will bear no crops, and its trees no fruit.
21 "And if you go against me and wil not listen to me, I shall heap seven times more plagues on you foryour sins.	21 "If then you become defiant in your unwillingness to obey me, I will multiply my blows another sevenfold, as your sins deserve.
22 I shall send wild animals to attack you and rob you of your children, destroy your cattle and reduceyour numbers until your roads are deserted.	22 I will unleash the wild beasts against you, to rob you of your children and wipe out your livestock, till your population dwindles away and your roads become deserted.
23 "And if that does not reform you, and you stil go against me,	23 "If, with all this, you still refuse to be chastened by me and continue to defy me,
24 then I shal go against you and punish you another seven times over for your sins.	24 I, too, will defy you and will smite you for your sins seven times harder than before.
25 I shall bring the sword on you, which will avenge the covenant, and when you huddle inside yourtowns, I shal send pestilence among you, and you will fal into the enemy's clutches.	25 I will make the sword, the avenger of my covenant, sweep over you. Though you then huddle together in your walled cities, I will send in pestilence among you, till you are forced to surrender to the enemy.
26 When I take away the bread which supports you, ten women wil be able to bake your bread in oneoven and wil then dole your bread out by weight; you wil eat but not be satisfied.	26 And as I cut off your supply of bread, ten women will need but one oven for baking all the bread they dole out to you in rations--not enough food to still your hunger.
27 "And if, in spite of this, you will not listen to me but go against me,	27 "If, despite all this, you still persist in disobeying and defying me,
28 I shall go against you in fury and punish you seven times over for your sins.	28 I, also, will meet you with fiery defiance and will chastise you with sevenfold fiercer punishment for your sins,
29 You wil eat the flesh of your own sons, you wil eat the flesh of your own daughters.	29 till you begin to eat the flesh of your own sons and daughters.
30 I shall destroy your high places and smash your incense-altars; I shal pile your corpses on thecorpses of your foul idols and shall reject you.	30 I will demolish your high places, overthrow your incense stands, and cast your corpses on those of your idols. In my abhorrence of you,
31 I shall reduce your cities to ruins; I shal lay waste your sanctuary and refuse to inhale from yousmel s intended to please.	31 I will lay waste your cities and devastate your sanctuaries, refusing to accept your sweet-smelling offerings.
32 I shall make such a desolation of the country that your enemies who come to live there wil beappal ed by it.	32 So devastated will I leave the land that your very enemies who come to live there will stand aghast at the sight of it.
33 And I shal scatter you among the nations. I shal unsheathe the sword against you, reducing yourcountry to desert and your towns to ruins.	33 You yourselves I will scatter among the nations at the point of my drawn sword, leaving your countryside desolate and your cities deserted.
34 Then the country wil indeed observe its Sabbaths, al the while it lies deserted, while you are in thecountry of your enemies. Then indeed the country wil rest and observe its Sabbaths.	34 Then shall the land retrieve its lost sabbaths during all the time it lies waste, while you are in the land of your enemies; then shall the land have rest and make up for its sabbaths
35 And as it lies deserted it will rest, as it never did on your Sabbaths when you were living there.	35 during all the time that it lies desolate, enjoying the rest that you would not let it have on the sabbaths when you lived there.
36 I shall strike such fear into the hearts of those of you who survive in the countries of their enemiesthat the sound of a fal ing leaf will set them fleeing; they wil flee as though fleeing from the sword, and fal whenno one is pursuing.	36 "Those of you who survive in the lands of their enemies I will make so fainthearted that, if leaves rustle behind them, they will flee headlong, as if from the sword, though no one pursues them;
37 They will stumble over one another as though fleeing before the sword, when no one is pursuing. You wil be powerless to stand up to your enemies;	37 stumbling over one another as if to escape a weapon, while no one is after them--so helpless will you be to take a stand against your foes!
38 you wil perish among the nations, and the land of your enemies wil swal ow you up.	38 You will be lost among the Gentiles, swallowed up in your enemies' country.
39 Those of you who survive wil pine away in their guilt in the countries of their enemies and, bearingthe guilt of their ancestors too, wil pine away like them.	39 Those of you who survive in the lands of their enemies will waste away for their own and their fathers' guilt.
40 "Then they shal admit their guilt and that of their ancestors and their infidelities against me, andfurther, their setting themselves against me.	40 "Thus they will have to confess that they and their fathers were guilty of having rebelled against me and of having defied me,
41 "I in my turn wil go against them and bring them into the land of their enemies. Then theiruncircumcised hearts wil grow humble and then they wil accept the punishment for their guilt.	41 so that I, too, had to defy them and bring them into their enemies' land. Then, when their uncircumcised hearts are humbled and they make amends for their guilt,
42 I shall remember my covenant with Jacob, I shal remember my covenant with Isaac and mycovenant with Abraham; and I shal remember the country too.	42 I will remember my covenant with Jacob, my covenant with Isaac, and my covenant with Abraham; and of the land, too, I will be mindful.
43 "Abandoned, the country wil keep its Sabbaths, as it lies deserted in their absence, and they wilhave to accept the punishment for their guilt, since they detested my customs and rejected my laws.	43 But the land must first be rid of them, that in its desolation it may make up its lost sabbaths, and that they, too, may make good the debt of their guilt for having spurned my precepts and abhorred my statutes.
44 "Yet, in spite of al this, when they are in the land of their enemies, I shall not so utterly reject ordetest them as to destroy them completely and break my covenant with them; for I am Yahweh their God.	44 Yet even so, even while they are in their enemies' land, I will not reject or spurn them, lest, by wiping them out, I make void my covenant with them; for I, the LORD, am their God.
45 For their sake I shall remember the covenant I made with those first generations that I brought out ofEgypt while other nations watched, so that I should be their God, I, Yahweh." '	45 I will remember them because of the covenant I made with their forefathers, whom I brought out of the land of Egypt under the very eyes of the Gentiles, that I, the LORD, might be their God."
46 Such were the decrees, customs and laws which Yahweh established between himself and theIsraelites on Mount Sinai through Moses.	46 These are the precepts, decrees and laws which the LORD had Moses promulgate on Mount Sinai in the pact between himself and the Israelites.