Leviticus 26:31
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I will reduce your cities to rubble and lay waste your sanctuaries, and I will refuse to smell the pleasing aroma of your sacrifices.
Commentaries
Excerpts gathered from published commentaries to ground the reading.
Their towns and their sanctuaries He would destroy, because He took no pleasure in their sacrificial worship. מקדּשׁים are the holy things of the worship of Jehovah, the tabernacle and temple, with their altars and the rest of their holy furniture, as in Ps. 68:36; Psa 74:7. ניחח ריח (Lev 1:9) is the odour of the sacrifice; and ריח, to smell, an anthropomorphic designation of divine satisfaction (cf. Amo 5:21; Isa 11:3).
Open source ↗This chapter is a solemn conclusion of the main body of the levitical law. The precepts that follow in this and the following book either relate to some particular matters or are repetitions and explications of the foregoing institutions. Now this chapter contains a general enforcement of all those laws by promises of reward in case of obedience on the one hand, and threatenings of punishment for disobedience on the other hand, the former to work upon hope, the latter on fear, those two handles of the soul, by which it is taken hold of and managed. Here is, I. A repetition of two or three of the principal of the commandments (Lev 26:1, Lev 26:2). II. An inviting promise of all good things, if they would but keep God's commandments (Lev 26:3-13). III. A terrible threatening of ruining judgments which would be brought upon them if they were refractory and disobedient (v. 14-39). IV. A gracious promise of the return of mercy to those of them that would repent and reform (Lev 26:40, etc.). Deu. 28 is parallel to this.
Open source ↗Original language
The Hebrew and Greek words behind this passage, with Strong's numbers — from openscriptures (CC BY-SA).
Cross-references
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and replied to the king, “May the king live forever! Why should I not be sad when the city where my fathers are buried lies in ruins, and its gates have been destroyed by fire?”
The Lord has rejected His altar; He has abandoned His sanctuary; He has delivered the walls of her palaces into the hand of the enemy. They have raised a shout in the house of the LORD as on the day of an appointed feast.
A lion has gone up from his thicket, and a destroyer of nations has set out. He has left his lair to lay waste your land. Your cities will be reduced to ruins and lie uninhabited.
Slaughter the old men, the young men and maidens, the women and children; but do not go near anyone who has the mark. Now begin at My sanctuary.” So they began with the elders who were before the temple.
If we deliberately go on sinning after we have received the knowledge of the truth, no further sacrifice for sins remains,
When the LORD smelled the pleasing aroma, He said in His heart, “Never again will I curse the ground because of man, even though every inclination of his heart is evil from his youth. And never again will I destroy all living creatures as I have done.
The adversary has seized all her treasures. For she has seen the nations enter her sanctuary— those You had forbidden to enter Your assembly.
Therefore, because of you, Zion will be plowed like a field, Jerusalem will become a heap of rubble, and the temple mount a wooded ridge.
then I will make this house like Shiloh, and I will make this city an object of cursing among all the nations of the earth.’”
And when they ask, ‘Why are you groaning?’ you are to say, ‘Because of the news that is coming. Every heart will melt, and every hand will go limp. Every spirit will faint, and every knee will turn to water.’ Yes, it is coming and it will surely happen, declares the Lord GOD.”