Leviticus 26:18

And if ye will not yet for all this hearken unto me, then I will punish you seven times more for your sins.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(18) And if ye will not yet for all this hearken unto me.—Better, and if up to these ye will not hearken unto me, that is, if they should persist in their disobedience to the very end of those punishments mentioned in Leviticus 26:16-17. This verse, therefore, introduces the second degree of punishments, which ends with Leviticus 26:20.

I will punish you seven times more.—That is, indefinitely or unceasingly; many more times. Seven being a complete number is often used to denote thoroughness (see Note on Leviticus 4:6), a large or indefinite number. Hence the declaration “He shall deliver thee in six troubles; yea, in seven there shall no evil touch thee” (Job 5:19), and “if he trespass against thee seven times in a day” (Luke 17:4), that is, an indefinite number of times. (Comp. also Psalm 119:164; Proverbs 24:16, &c.)

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

26:14-39 After God has set the blessing before them which would make them a happy people if they would be obedient, he here sets the curse before them, the evils which would make them miserable, if they were disobedient. Two things would bring ruin. 1. A contempt of God's commandments. They that reject the precept, will come at last to renounce the covenant. 2. A contempt of his corrections. If they will not learn obedience by the things they suffer, God himself would be against them; and this is the root and cause of all their misery. And also, The whole creation would be at war with them. All God's sore judgments would be sent against them. The threatenings here are very particular, they were prophecies, and He that foresaw all their rebellions, knew they would prove so. TEMPORAL judgments are threatened. Those who will not be parted from their sins by the commands of God, shall be parted from them by judgments. Those wedded to their lusts, will have enough of them. SPIRITUAL judgments are threatened, which should seize the mind. They should find no acceptance with God. A guilty conscience would be their continual terror. It is righteous with God to leave those to despair of pardon, who presume to sin; and it is owing to free grace, if we are not left to pine away in the iniquity we were born in, and have lived in.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

For all this - i. e. for all the afflictions in Leviticus 26:16-17.

Seven times - The sabbatical number is here proverbially used to remind the people of the covenant. Compare Genesis 4:15, Genesis 4:24; Psalm 119:164; Proverbs 24:16; Luke 17:4.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

18. if ye will not yet for all this hearken unto me, then I will punish you seven times more—that is, with far more severe and protracted calamities.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

No text from Poole on this verse.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

And if ye will not for all this hearken unto me,.... If such corrections by diseases of body, and by giving them up into the hands of their enemies, should be ineffectual to reform them, and bring them to obedience to the statutes and commandments of God, but should continue in their disobedience to him, and rebellion against him:

then I will punish you seven times more for your sins; that is, abundantly more, with sorer punishments, and these more frequently repeated.

Geneva Study Bible

And if ye will not yet for all this hearken unto me, then I will punish you {h} seven times more for your sins.

(h) That is, more extremely.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Pulpit Commentary

Verses 18-20. - Punishment in its second degree. I will make your heaven as iron, and your earth as brass; the result of no rain in a land scorched by the fiery Eastern sun. Your land shall not yield her increase, neither shall the tress of the land yield their fruits. Cf. 1 Kings 8:35; Haggai 1:10, 11. Leviticus 26:18

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

First stage of the aggravated judgments. - If they did not hearken אלּה עד, "up to these" (the punishments named in Leviticus 26:16, Leviticus 26:17), that is to say, if they persisted in their disobedience even when the judgments reached to this height, God would add a sevenfold chastisement on account of their sins, would punish them seven times more severely, and break down their strong pride by fearful drought. Seven, as the number of perfection in the works of God, denotes the strengthening of the chastisement, even to the height of its full measure (cf. Proverbs 24:16). עז גּאון, lit., the eminence or pride of strength, includes everything upon which a nation rests its might; then the pride and haughtiness which rely upon earthly might and its auxiliaries (Ezekiel 30:6, Ezekiel 30:18; Ezekiel 33:28); here it signifies the pride of a nation, puffed up by the fruitfulness and rich produce of its land. God would make their heaven (the sky of their land) like iron and their earth like brass, i.e., as hard and dry as metal, so that not a drop of rain and dew would fall from heaven to moisten the earth, and not a plant could grow out of the earth (cf. Deuteronomy 28:23); and when the land was cultivated, the people would exhaust their strength for nought. תּמם, consumi.