The Fallible · Synthetic · Study Bible
Curses Pronounced from Ebal
Deuteronomy 27:11–26 — Curses Pronounced from Ebal. Each verse below carries the full apparatus: the Berean Standard Bible, the vocalized original (tap any word), and a parsed breakdown of every term transcribed from the interlinear. Synthesized commentary, canonical threads, and the reading of Christ gather at the end, over the whole unit.
11On that day Moses commanded the people:
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
ha·hū lê·mōr bay·yō·wm mō·šeh ’eṯ- way·ṣaw hā·‘ām
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And Moses commanded the people on that day, saying:
Where the English smooths the original
Those long, rocky ridges lay in the province of Samaria, and the peaks referred to were near Shechem (Nablous), rising in steep precipices to the height of about eight hundred feet and separated by a green, well-watered valley of about five hundred yards wide. The people of Israel were here divided into two parts.
Compare Joshua 8:32-35 . The solemnity was apparently designed only for the single occasion on which it actually took place.
Note also the phrase, Moses charged the people , not elsewhere in D, while E most frequently uses the term the people to designate IsraelCambridge's source-critical inference (J/E/D/H documents) is a 19th-century scholarly hypothesis, reported here as one voice, not as the unit's own reading.
12“When you have crossed the Jordan, these tribes shall stand on Mount Gerizim to bless the people: Simeon, Levi, Judah, Issachar, Joseph, and Benjamin.
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
bə·‘ā·ḇə·rə·ḵem ’eṯ- hay·yar·dên ’êl·leh ya·‘am·ḏū ‘al- har gə·ri·zîm lə·ḇā·rêḵ ’eṯ- hā·‘ām šim·‘ō·wn wə·lê·wî wî·hū·ḏāh wə·yiś·śā·š·ḵār wə·yō·w·sêp̄ ū·ḇin·yā·min
Literal — word-for-word from the original
When you cross over the Jordan, these shall stand on Mount Gerizim to bless the people: Simeon, and Levi, and Judah, and Issachar, and Joseph, and Benjamin.
Where the English smooths the original
All these were the children of the free-women, Leah and Rachel, to show both the dignity of the blessings above the curses, and that the blessings belong only to those who are evangelically free, as this is expounded and applied, Galatians 4:22 , even to those that receive the Spirit of adoption and liberty.
It was natural that the utterance of the blessing should be assigned to the tribes which sprang from Jacob's proper wives, since the sons of the wives occupied a higher position than the sons of the maids - just as the blessing had pre-eminence over the curse.
Amid the silent expectations of the solemn assembly, the priests standing round the ark in the valley below, said aloud, looking to Gerizim, "Blessed is the man that maketh not any graven image," when the people ranged on that hill responded in full simultaneous shouts of "Amen"; then turning round to Ebal, they cried, "Cursed is the man that maketh any graven image"; to which those that covered the ridge answered, "Amen."JFB's reconstruction of the antiphonal ceremony draws its choreographic detail (priests in the valley, alternating shouts) from the Mishnah tractate Sotah, not from the bare text of Deuteronomy; offered as a plausible historical staging, not as something the verses themselves describe.
13And these tribes shall stand on Mount Ebal to deliver the curse: Reuben, Gad, Asher, Zebulun, Dan, and Naphtali.
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
wə·’êl·leh ya·‘am·ḏū bə·har ‘ê·ḇāl ‘al- haq·qə·lā·lāh rə·’ū·ḇên gāḏ wə·’ā·šêr ū·zə·ḇū·lun dān wə·nap̄·tā·lî
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And these shall stand on Mount Ebal for the curse: Reuben, Gad, and Asher, and Zebulun, Dan, and Naphtali.
Where the English smooths the original
Of the former tribes, it is said, they stood to bless the people: of these, that they stood to curse. Perhaps the different way of speaking intimates, that Israel in general were a happy people, and should ever be so, if they were obedient.
he saith to bless the people, Deu 27:12 , but here only to curse , not expressing whom, either because he was loth to mention the people as objects of the curse; or because he presumed and hoped that though some particular persons might deserve the curse, yet the generality of the people would keep out of the reach of it
Which was dry and rocky, barren and fruitful, and like the earth, that bears briers and thorns, is rejected and nigh unto cursing, and so a proper place to curse, and a fit emblem of those to be cursed; see Hebrews 6:8Gill writes "barren and fruitful" — almost certainly a printer's slip in the source text for "barren and unfruitful"; quoted verbatim as it stands in the public-domain edition.
14Then the Levites shall proclaim in a loud voice to every Israelite:
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wə·‘ā·nū hal·wî·yim wə·’ā·mə·rū rām qō·wl ’el- kāl- ’îš yiś·rā·’êl
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And the Levites shall answer and say to every man of Israel with a raised voice:
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The Levites, i.e. some of the Levites, to wit, the priests, which bare the ark, as it is expressed, Joshua 8:33 , for the body of the Levites stood upon Mount Gerizim, Deu 27:12 ; but these stood in the valley between Gerizim and Ebal, looking towards the one or the other mountain as they pronounced either the blessings or the curses
answer ] As in Deuteronomy 21:7 , solemnly pronounce . with a loud voice ] Lit. a high voice , not elsewhere in the O.T.
From the expression "all the men of Israel," it is perfectly evident that in this particular ceremony the people were not represented by their elders or heads, but were present in the persons of all their adult men who were over twenty years of age
15‘Cursed is the man who makes a carved idol or molten image—an abomination to the LORD, the work of the hands of a craftsman—and sets it up in secret.’ And let all the people say, ‘Amen!’
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
’ā·rūr hā·’îš ’ă·šer ya·‘ă·śeh p̄e·sel ū·mas·sê·ḵāh tō·w·‘ă·ḇaṯ Yah·weh ma·‘ă·śêh yə·ḏê ḥā·rāš wə·śām bas·sā·ṯer ḵāl hā·‘ām wə·’ā·mə·rū wə·‘ā·nū ’ā·mên
Literal — word-for-word from the original
Cursed is the man who makes a carved image or molten image, an abomination to the LORD, the work of the hands of a craftsman, and sets it up in secret — and all the people shall answer and say, Amen!
Where the English smooths the original
It is easy to understand the meaning of amen to the blessings. But how could they say it to the curses? It was both a profession of their faith in the truth of these curses, and an acknowledgment of the equity of them. So that when they said amen, they did, in effect, say, not only, it is certain it shall be so, but, it is just it should be so.
The blessings and the form of them are not recorded, because they were not to be had from the law, and through obedience to it; and therefore there is a profound silence about them, to put men upon seeking for them elsewhere, and which are only to be had in Christ, especially spiritual ones
the office of the law is shown in this last utterance, the summing up of all the rest, to have been pre-eminently to proclaim condemnation. Every conscious act of transgression subjects the sinner to the curse of God, from which none but He who has become a curse for us can possibly deliver usKeil here quotes O. v. Gerlach; the words are reproduced as they stand in Keil's text.
the sins specially denounced are selected by way of specimen, and also, perhaps, because they are such as could for the most part be easily concealed from judicial inspection.
16‘Cursed is he who dishonors his father or mother.’ And let all the people say, ‘Amen!’
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
’ā·rūr maq·leh ’ā·ḇîw wə·’im·mōw kāl- hā·‘ām wə·’ā·mar ’ā·mên
Literal — word-for-word from the original
Cursed is the one who treats lightly his father or his mother — and all the people shall say, Amen!
Where the English smooths the original
We have duty to parents enforced ( Deuteronomy 27:16 ) and the rights of neighbours ( Deuteronomy 5:17 ), the blind ( Deuteronomy 27:18 ), and the unprotected ( Deuteronomy 27:19 ) come next. The next four precepts are all concerned with purity, first in the nearer, afterwards in the more distant relations ( Deuteronomy 27:20-23 ). The last two precepts concern slander and treachery ( Deuteronomy 27:24-25 ). Evidently the offences specified are examples of whole classes of actions; and the twelve curses may have some reference to the number of the tribes.
if he publicly cursed them, that was cognizable by the civil magistrate, and he was to be put to death, Leviticus 20:9 . This follows next, as in the order of the ten commands, to that which respects the fear and worship of God; honouring parents being next to the glorifying of God, the Father of all
17‘Cursed is he who moves his neighbor’s boundary stone.’ And let all the people say, ‘Amen!’
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
’ā·rūr mas·sîḡ rê·‘ê·hū gə·ḇūl kāl- hā·‘ām wə·’ā·mar ’ā·mên
Literal — word-for-word from the original
Cursed is the one who moves back his neighbor's boundary — and all the people shall say, Amen!
Where the English smooths the original
Twelve curses against transgressions of the covenant. The first eleven are directed against special sins which are selected by way of example, the last comprehensively sums up in general terms and condemns all and every offence against God's Law.
18‘Cursed is he who lets a blind man wander in the road.’ And let all the people say, ‘Amen!’
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’ā·rūr ‘iw·wêr maš·geh bad·dā·reḵ kāl- hā·‘ām wə·’ā·mar ’ā·mên
Literal — word-for-word from the original
Cursed is the one who makes a blind man go astray in the road — and all the people shall say, Amen!
Where the English smooths the original
“He that is in the dark upon any matter, when one deceives him with evil counsel” (Rashi).Ellicott is quoting the medieval Jewish commentator Rashi; reproduced as Ellicott prints it.
That misleadeth simple souls, giving them pernicious counsel, either for this life or for the next.
Meaning, that does not help and counsel his neighbour.
19‘Cursed is he who withholds justice from the foreigner, the fatherless, or the widow.’ And let all the people say, ‘Amen!’
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
’ā·rūr maṭ·ṭeh miš·paṭ gêr- yā·ṯō·wm wə·’al·mā·nāh kāl- hā·‘ām wə·’ā·mar ’ā·mên
Literal — word-for-word from the original
Cursed is the one who turns aside the justice of the foreigner, the fatherless, and the widow — and all the people shall say, Amen!
Where the English smooths the original
Who have none to assist them, and take their part, and therefore judges may be tempted to do an unjust thing; but God is the patron of them, and takes notice of every injury done them, and is the avenger of all such
See on Deuteronomy 24:17 ; E, Exodus 22:21-24 ; Exodus 23:9 ; H, Leviticus 19:33 f.
20‘Cursed is he who sleeps with his father’s wife, for he has violated his father’s marriage bed.’ And let all the people say, ‘Amen!’
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
’ā·rūr šō·ḵêḇ ‘im- ’ā·ḇîw ’ê·šeṯ kî ḡil·lāh ’ā·ḇîw kə·nap̄ kāl- hā·‘ām wə·’ā·mar ’ā·mên
Literal — word-for-word from the original
Cursed is the one who lies with his father's wife, for he has uncovered his father's skirt — and all the people shall say, Amen!
Where the English smooths the original
21‘Cursed is he who lies with any animal.’ And let all the people say, ‘Amen!’
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
’ā·rūr šō·ḵêḇ ‘im- kāl- bə·hê·māh kāl- hā·‘ām wə·’ā·mar ’ā·mên
Literal — word-for-word from the original
Cursed is the one who lies with any beast — and all the people shall say, Amen!
Where the English smooths the original
22‘Cursed is he who sleeps with his sister, the daughter of his father or the daughter of his mother.’ And let all the people say, ‘Amen!’
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
’ā·rūr šō·ḵêḇ ‘im- ’ă·ḥō·ṯōw baṯ- ’ā·ḇîw ’ōw ḇaṯ- ’im·mōw kāl- hā·‘ām wə·’ā·mar ’ā·mên
Literal — word-for-word from the original
Cursed is the one who lies with his sister, the daughter of his father or the daughter of his mother — and all the people shall say, Amen!
Where the English smooths the original
Which is forbid, Leviticus 18:9 , the daughter of his father, or the daughter of his mother; whether his sister by father or mother's side: and all the people shall say Amen; detesting such uncleanness.
In earlier times marriage with a half-sister was apparently allowed, Genesis 20:12 , 2 Samuel 13:13 b ; but is condemned in Ezekiel 22:11 .
23‘Cursed is he who sleeps with his mother-in-law.’ And let all the people say, ‘Amen!’
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’ā·rūr šō·ḵêḇ ‘im- ḥō·ṯan·tōw kāl- hā·‘ām wə·’ā·mar ’ā·mên
Literal — word-for-word from the original
Cursed is the one who lies with his mother-in-law — and all the people shall say, Amen!
Where the English smooths the original
24‘Cursed is he who strikes down his neighbor in secret.’ And let all the people say, ‘Amen!’
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’ā·rūr mak·kêh rê·‘ê·hū bas·sā·ṯer kāl- hā·‘ām wə·’ā·mar ’ā·mên
Literal — word-for-word from the original
Cursed is the one who strikes down his neighbor in secret — and all the people shall say, Amen!
Where the English smooths the original
”Spoken of a backbiting tongue” (Rashi).Ellicott quoting Rashi; the opening typographic quote-mark is reproduced as printed.
Smiteth — That is, killeth. This includes murder under the colour of the law, which is of all others the greatest affront to God. Cursed therefore is he that any way contributes to accuse, or convict, or condemn an innocent person.
25‘Cursed is he who accepts a bribe to kill an innocent person.’ And let all the people say, ‘Amen!’
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
’ā·rūr lō·qê·aḥ šō·ḥaḏ lə·hak·kō·wṯ nā·qî ne·p̄eš dām kāl- hā·‘ām wə·’ā·mar ’ā·mên
Literal — word-for-word from the original
Cursed is the one who takes a bribe to strike down a person of innocent blood — and all the people shall say, Amen!
Where the English smooths the original
As an assassin, to murder him privately; or as a judge, that takes a bribe to condemn to death an innocent person: so Aben Ezra observes, that according to the sense of some a judge is meant; but, says he, in my opinion a false witness; one that swears a man's life away for the sake of a reward given him
Cp. Deuteronomy 16:19 , and E, Exodus 23:8 , both against all bribes; Ezekiel 22:1-2 , bribes to shed blood .
26‘Cursed is he who does not put the words of this law into practice.’ And let all the people say, ‘Amen!’
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
’ā·rūr ’ă·šer lō- yā·qîm ’eṯ- diḇ·rê haz·zōṯ hat·tō·w·rāh- la·‘ă·śō·wṯ ’ō·w·ṯām kāl- hā·‘ām wə·’ā·mar ’ā·mên
Literal — word-for-word from the original
Cursed is the one who does not raise up the words of this law to do them — and all the people shall say, Amen!
Where the English smooths the original
From this verse St. Paul also reasons that “as many as are of the works of the law are under a curse.” For no man can do all of them. And therefore it is impossible to secure the blessing of Gerizim except through Him who bare the curse of Ebal. “Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us, as it is written, cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree.”
Confirmeth not — Or, performeth not. To this we must all say, Amen! Owning ourselves to be under the curse, and that we must have perished for ever, if Christ had not redeemed us from the curse of the law, by being made a curse for us.
That is, who does not perfectly perform all that the law requires, and continues to do so; for the law requires obedience, and that perfect and constant, and in failure thereof curses, in proof of which the apostle produces this passage; see Gill on Galatians 3:10
The verse-by-verse work is done. What follows gathers the whole unit. All three layers below are machine-generated (⚙). Weigh them; they have no authority.
AI synthesis — woven from the public-domain voices above and the original text; generated and fallible.
The unit opens with Moses laying a binding charge — the Piel way·ṣaw (H6680) — on the eve of the crossing, splitting the nation between two named peaks. JFB describes the ground precisely: the ridges near Shechem, “rising in steep precipices … and separated by a green, well-watered valley of about five hundred yards wide. The people of Israel were here divided into two parts.” ⚙ The two place-names are the rarest words in the unit: Gerizim (H1630, four verses in the whole canon) and Ebal (H5858, eight) — and the Verifier ties them straight back to the original command of Deuteronomy 11:29 as a confirmed verbal link. The division is genealogical: Benson notes the blessing-tribes are “all … the children of the free-women, Leah and Rachel,” while Keil explains the two odd men on Ebal, Reuben and Zebulun, were drawn from the wives' line only “in order to secure the division into two sixes.” ⚙ Gill, reading the barren mountain itself as emblem, hears Hebrews 6:8 in the rock: Ebal is “nigh unto cursing, and so a proper place to curse.” That is a typological move (a 17th-century one, here ascribed to Gill, not asserted as the text's plain sense).
The mechanism is liturgical call-and-response. The Levites “answer” — Cambridge fixes the verb wə·‘ā·nū (H6030) as “solemnly pronounce” — with what the Hebrew calls a “high voice” (rām, H7311), an idiom Cambridge notes is “not elsewhere in the O.T.” ⚙ Then the whole assembly seals each curse with ’ā·mên (H543), the word from the root firm, sure. Benson presses the hard question this raises — “how could they say it to the curses?” — and answers that the Amen was “both a profession of their faith in the truth of these curses, and an acknowledgment of the equity of them.” ⚙ One detail governs the entire list and is easy to miss: bas·sā·ṯer, “in secret” (H5643, v. 15). Gill, citing Aben Ezra, observes “that all that follow respect things done in a secret way, and which were not cognizable by the civil magistrate.” The Ebal liturgy is aimed precisely at the crimes no human court can reach — which is why the form is a declaration of fact, not a magistrate's sentence. JFB and Ellicott both insist the grammar bears this: “Cursed is he,” and not, “Cursed be he.”
Eleven specific curses follow, which Barnes reads as “special sins which are selected by way of example.” ⚙ They are not random. Ellicott traces an order shadowing the Decalogue: idolatry (first table, v. 15), then “duty to parents enforced … and the rights of neighbours, the blind … and the unprotected,” then “four precepts … all concerned with purity,” then “slander and treachery.” The Hebrew verbs are sharper than the English: to “dishonor” a parent is maq·leh (H7034), to make light of them — the same lightness-root as the noun “curse” itself (H7045). To move a boundary is the rare mas·sîḡ (H5253), “to push back,” a verb the Verifier confirms is shared with the boundary-law of Deuteronomy 19:14. ⚙ Through the sexual curses (vv. 20–23) Gill notes the unifying thread: these acts “may well be supposed to be done in secret,” binding them to v. 15's hidden idol and v. 24's secret blow — Cambridge observing that “in secret … is nowhere else attached to murder.” The eleventh curse, on the bought verdict against innocent blood (vv. 24–25, the unrendered dām), closes the catalogue where it is most invisible: the judicial murder dressed as justice.
The final malediction abandons the specific and turns universal: cursed is the one who does “not raise up all the words of this law to do them.” ⚙ Cambridge fixes yā·qîm (H6965) as “establisheth” — the same verb used of Josiah upholding the Book — so the curse falls not only on the active sinner but on the one who fails to uphold the whole. Barnes: it “comprehensively … condemns all and every offence against God's Law.” Keil draws the consequence the Reformers all saw here: “Every conscious act of transgression subjects the sinner to the curse of God, from which none but He who has become a curse for us can possibly deliver us.” ⚙ This is the verse the Apostle Paul lifts. Ellicott names it plainly: “From this verse St. Paul also reasons that ‘as many as are of the works of the law are under a curse’ … it is impossible to secure the blessing of Gerizim except through Him who bare the curse of Ebal.” The chapter that withheld its blessings (Gill: “to put men upon seeking for them elsewhere”) ends by pointing past itself.
⚙ Read under Sola Scriptura, this passage is built on a deliberate, audible asymmetry, and the asymmetry is the message. Twelve tribes are sent to two mountains to speak both a blessing and a curse — yet the text records only the curses. The blessings are commanded (v. 12) and, at the fulfillment in Joshua 8:34, actually pronounced; but Moses' script preserves only the twelve ’ā·rūr. Gill's instinct seems exactly right: the silence is intentional, “to put men upon seeking for them elsewhere.” The law can name what a man must not do; it cannot, of itself, hand him the blessing. And the structure tightens that point with its own grammar. Every curse aims at the hidden — bas·sā·ṯer governs the list — the secret idol, the quietly shifted landmark, the incest behind closed doors, the bought verdict, the knife in the dark. These are precisely the sins no court convicts; the Ebal liturgy exists to convict them anyway, because the Judge sees in secret (Geneva: “God that sees in secret, will avenge it”). Then the twelfth curse springs the trap: it does not name a hidden act at all, but the simple failure to uphold all the words — and there is no man who upholds them all. The people who shout Amen to the first eleven, condemning the hidden sinner among them, find at the twelfth that the Amen has closed over their own heads. This is why the New Testament's reading is not an importation but a completion: the law's last word, spoken from the mountain of cursing, is a verdict against everyone who stands beneath it — which is why its true answer must come from outside it, from the One who would be “made a curse for us.” The Amen the congregation owed to its own condemnation, He alone could turn into a blessing.
They came to Ebal to curse the hidden sinner among them; by the twelfth Amen they had cursed themselves — and so set the law looking for a Redeemer it could not supply. (an interpretive line, not Scripture)
AI-generated connections. Each carries a verification badge with a recorded basis; contested links are flagged.
⚙ The two mountains are named in only a handful of verses across the whole Hebrew Bible (Gerizim, H1630, four; Ebal, H5858, eight), which makes their recurrence a genuine verbal tie rather than coincidence. This ceremony was first commanded at Deuteronomy 11:29 and is reported as carried out, blessing and curse together, at Joshua 8:33–34. Barnes draws the line to the fulfillment himself: “Compare Joshua 8:32-35.” The Verifier confirms the link to Deuteronomy 11:29 on the shared rare lexeme Gerizim, and to Joshua 8:33 on the shared rare lexeme Ebal — both Hebrew↔Hebrew, both confirmed verbal.
Deuteronomy 11:29 · Joshua 8:33 · Joshua 8:34
basis: shared rare lexemes H1630 Gᵉrizîym (4 verses) and H5858 ʻÊybâl (8 verses), plus H2022 har and H5975 ʻâmad — Verifier-confirmed Hebrew↔Hebrew verbal link to both the command (Deut 11:29) and the fulfillment (Josh 8:33)
⚙ The people's response, ’ā·mên (H543, 24 verses), paired here with the curse-verb ’ā·rar (H779, 52 verses), reproduces the very configuration of Numbers 5:22, where the suspected woman answers “Amen, Amen” to a self-maledictory oath, and of Nehemiah 5:13, where the assembly answers “Amen” to Nehemiah's shaking-out curse. Barnes makes the connection unprompted: the Amen “attested the conviction of the utterers that the sentences … were true, just, and certain; so in Numbers 5:22.” Poole reads the Amen here as itself an oath: “So let it be: I wish this curse may befall me, if I be guilty.” ⚙ Honesty note on the tier: the Verifier returns this as a verbal link because ’ā·mên falls under its rarity threshold, but neither passage quotes the other — what is genuinely shared is a fixed liturgical form (a curse answered by the congregation's own self-incriminating Amen), and ’ā·rar at 52 verses is common. We therefore downgrade the badge from verbal to structural / thematic: the tie is a shared ceremonial pattern, not a citation.
Numbers 5:22 · Nehemiah 5:13
basis: shared lexemes H543 ʼâmên (24 verses) and H779 ʼârar (52 verses) with Numbers 5:22 and Nehemiah 5:13 — but the link is a shared liturgical FORM (a self-maledictory curse sealed by the congregation's own Amen), not a quotation; ʼârar is common (52 vv) and neither text cites the other, so the Verifier's 'verbal' default is downgraded to structural/thematic
⚙ The curse on moving a neighbor's boundary (v. 17) turns on mas·sîḡ (H5253), “to push back,” a verb that occurs in only nine verses. It is the same verb in the boundary statute of Deuteronomy 19:14, “Thou shalt not remove thy neighbour's landmark.” Because the lexeme is this rare, the Verifier records the tie as a confirmed verbal link rather than a thematic echo — the curse is enforcing a specific written law by name.
Deuteronomy 19:14
basis: shared rare lexeme H5253 nâçag (9 verses), the technical verb for pushing back a landmark, plus H1366 gᵉbûwl (boundary) and H7453 rêaʻ (neighbor) — Verifier-confirmed verbal link to Deut 19:14
⚙ Paul quotes Deuteronomy 27:26 at Galatians 3:10: “Cursed is everyone who does not continue in all things which are written in the book of the law, to do them.” Ellicott, Benson, Keil, and Gill all name this connection as the verse's chief afterlife. ⚙ But this is a cross-Testament link (Greek↔Hebrew), and so it cannot be confirmed on shared Strong's numbers — the Verifier finds no shared original-language lexeme between the Hebrew of Deuteronomy and the Greek of Galatians, because the two languages do not share a lexicon. Paul follows the Septuagint, which adds the word “all” (and “continue in”) that the Masoretic Hebrew of v. 26 frames slightly differently; the citation is an explicit, named NT quotation, but its textual basis runs through the Greek translation, not a verbatim Hebrew match. We flag it for that reason: the link is real and ancient, but the recorded basis is a translation tradition, not a shared lexeme.
Galatians 3:10 · Galatians 3:13
basis: cross-Testament (Greek↔Hebrew): no shared Strong's lexeme is possible; Paul's citation in Gal 3:10 follows the LXX of Deut 27:26 (which carries 'all' / 'continue in'), so the connection is an explicit NT quotation resting on a translation tradition, not a verbatim Hebrew match — flagged per the cross-Testament rule
⚙ Several voices read the recorded silence of the blessings typologically. Benson (on v. 15): the curses alone are given because “it was an honour reserved for Christ to bless us; to do that which the law could not do. So in his sermon on the mount, the true mount Gerizim, we have blessings only.” This is a figural reading (the Beatitudes as the answering Gerizim to Deuteronomy's Ebal), not a verbal quotation; it is a cross-Testament thematic pairing with no shared lexicon, so it is tiered structural/thematic, and we flag that the reading is an interpretive tradition (Benson, 19th c.), not a claim the text itself makes.
Matthew 5:1 · Matthew 5:3
basis: cross-Testament thematic pairing only (no shared lexicon possible Greek↔Hebrew): Benson's reading of the Sermon on the Mount as the answering 'Gerizim' to Deuteronomy's curse-only Ebal — a motif correspondence, not a quotation
AI-generated reading; weigh it against the text.
⚙ The twelfth curse (v. 26) condemns everyone who fails to keep all the law, and no one keeps it all — so the catalogue ends by leaving the whole congregation under the ’ā·rūr it had just pronounced on others. Ellicott states the resolution the early church read here: “it is impossible to secure the blessing of Gerizim except through Him who bare the curse of Ebal. ‘Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us, as it is written, cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree.’” Keil, citing Galatians 3:13, agrees that deliverance comes from “He who has become a curse for us.” Matthew Henry reads the same condemning function of the catch-all curse straight into the gospel: “his righteous law condemns every one who, at any time, or in any thing, transgresses it. Under its awful curse we remain as transgressors, until the redemption of Christ is applied to our hearts.” Benson turns it into the believer's own Amen: “To this we must all say, Amen! … that we must have perished for ever, if Christ had not redeemed us from the curse of the law.” This reading — that the substitutionary curse-bearing of Christ answers Deuteronomy 27:26 — is ancient and held across the commentators here, resting on Paul's explicit citation.
Galatians 3:13 · Galatians 3:10 · Deuteronomy 21:23
⚙ The text records the curses and pointedly omits the blessings, though both were commanded (v. 12). Gill reads the omission as purposeful: the blessings “are not recorded, because they were not to be had from the law … and therefore there is a profound silence about them, to put men upon seeking for them elsewhere, and which are only to be had in Christ.” Benson presses the same point — the blessing was “an honour reserved for Christ … to do that which the law could not do.” ⚙ This is a christological reading of an absence in the text (the missing Gerizim formulae), and it is an inference, not a quotation: the commentators argue from the structure of the chapter to its fulfillment. We mark it widely-held among these voices but note it rests on reading significance into a silence, which is an interpretive move the text invites but does not state.
Galatians 3:14 · Galatians 4:31
The biblical text is the Berean Standard Bible (BSB), public domain (CC0). Hebrew/Greek text, transliteration, morphology and Strong’s are transcribed from the Berean interlinear (CC0) + Strong’s lexicons (PD); the literal renderings, divergence notes, word notes and all synthesis are this tool’s own work (⚙) — fallible; verify them.
Named voices, quoted verbatim from public-domain works:
This unit is the Ebal liturgy of curses (Deuteronomy 27:11–26): the division of the twelve tribes between Gerizim and Ebal (vv. 11–14) and the twelve maledictions sealed by the people's Amen (vv. 15–26). The synthesis is built up from the Hebrew, and every commentary excerpt is a verbatim, contiguous substring of the sourced voices_raw — trimmed at the ends to a pointed quotation, never altered, reordered, modernized, or stitched. Several voices quote others within their own text (Keil quotes O. v. Gerlach; Ellicott twice quotes Rashi); those nested quotations are preserved exactly as the public-domain editions print them, and the nesting is flagged in the relevant editorial_note rather than smoothed away. Honesty notes specific to this passage: (1) The single most consequential cross-reference here — Paul's quotation of v. 26 at Galatians 3:10 — is a cross-Testament link and therefore cannot rest on a shared Strong's number; it follows the Septuagint (which carries 'all' and 'continue in'), so it is tiered 'flagged — verify source' to mark that its basis is a translation tradition, not a verbatim Hebrew match, even though the citation itself is explicit and ancient. (2) The two intra-Hebrew geographic links (Deut 11:29 command, Josh 8:33 fulfillment) are confirmed verbal links because Gerizim (4 verses) and Ebal (8 verses) are genuinely rare lexemes; the same holds for the boundary verb nâçag (9 verses) tying v. 17 to Deut 19:14. (3) The Numbers 5:22 / Nehemiah 5:13 'covenant Amen' link is a deliberate DOWNGRADE: the Verifier returns it as 'verbal' because ʼâmên (24 vv) sits under its rarity threshold, but the partner lexeme ʼârar is common (52 vv) and neither passage quotes the other — what is shared is a fixed liturgical FORM (a self-maledictory curse sealed by the congregation's own Amen), so the badge is set to 'structural / thematic — confirmed,' not verbal. (4) An over-blended quotation was corrected: an earlier draft fused JFB's 'Cursed is he, not Cursed be he' (v. 15) with Ellicott's 'not imprecations so much as declarations of fact' (v. 26) into one stitched citation across two authors and two verses; the two are now attributed separately, each as a contiguous substring of its own source. (5) The typological readings — Gill's barren Ebal as an emblem of cursing (Hebrews 6:8), and Benson's Sermon on the Mount as 'the true mount Gerizim' — are attributed to their authors as interpretive traditions, not asserted as the plain sense of the Hebrew; likewise JFB's valley-and-priests choreography is flagged as drawn from the Mishnah (Sotah), not from the text. (6) BSB leaves two Hebrew words unrendered in the parse (the standalone dām, 'blood,' in v. 25, and clause-internal particles); these are surfaced in the verse notes rather than passed over. The source text of Gill on v. 13 reads 'barren and fruitful,' an apparent printer's slip for 'unfruitful,' reproduced verbatim with a note.
✦ = human, public-domain source, quoted and named. ⚙ = machine synthesis, to be verified. Flagged cross-references are left visible on purpose — the verifier working in the open. “Search the Scriptures daily, whether those things were so.” (Acts 17:11)