Jehovah will bring a nation against thee from afar, from the end of the earth, like as the eagle flieth, a nation whose tongue thou understandest not;
Moses is near the end of a long warning about what would follow if Israel turned from the God who had blessed them. Here the threat takes the shape of an invader, and two questions press on the reader: who is this nation, and why would God send it against His own people?
The blessings and curses of this chapter are not about how a sinner is made right with God. They set out how God rules a nation He has taken up.
In Deuteronomy 28 we have the principles of God's government among that people, and the immediate results of obedience or disobedience. Those results were solemnly fulfilled in the fate of that unhappy people, still loved for the sake of their fathers. Breaking the law, as the principle of relationship with God, had consequences for righteousness — for whether a person had an adequate ground of God's acceptance. Those consequences must not be confused with the temporary results of disobedience under God's government.
The reason comes two verses earlier. It is not open rebellion, but joyless service in a time of plenty.
In Deuteronomy 28:47-48 Israel did not serve the LORD with joy and gladness of heart while they had plenty of everything; so they would serve the enemies the LORD would send against them, in hunger and thirst and want. When joy fails, the possession is lost in practice, here on the path where we are tested. Is there not danger for us too? Do we not feel how everything around us drags us down to the level of the world we walk in? How we need to guard the heart against the first weakening of joy! That is the sign that decline has begun, and once the heart starts to go, the fall is easy and fast.
Some read the verse as pointing to the empires that swallowed the ten tribes and then Judah.
The Lord would send a foreign nation against them. It would show no respect for old age and no compassion toward children (vv. 49-50). This likely refers to the attack of the Assyrians (2 Kings 17:5-6), which devastated the ten tribes. It refers later to the attack of the Babylonians, when Judah came under bondage (2 Kings 24:1-3).
Others see details that fit an empire not yet in existence when Moses spoke. Its battle standard and its language both match.
Moses plainly predicts the Roman power that would break the Jews, and at a time when no such power existed. The eagle was the standard of the Roman armies. The Jews understood many eastern languages, but they did not know Latin. "A hard-faced nation who shall not respect the old or show mercy to the young." Rome killed the old people and the children.
The eagle stands for speed. One writer pictures the Chaldean cavalry, and shows what such a swoop looked like.
The Chaldeans moved as fast and as nimbly as a pack of hungry wolves rushing on in silence. With gleaming eyes glowing in the dark, they were sure to reach their prey. Just at the right moment the horsemen came storming on, swift as eagles.
The strange speech is itself part of the punishment. Isaiah carries the same threat forward, and it was later pressed on believers in Corinth who prized tongues.
In Isaiah God warns the Jews, who were slow to listen to His prophets, that He would speak to them through the stumbling lips of foreigners. Such a tongue speaking to Israel was a sign that they were humbled, and a sign of God's judgment. How wrong, then, for the believers in Corinth to turn away from God speaking in prophecy to build them up, and to prefer tongues they could not understand! They took pleasure as Christians in what had been God's solemn threat to His ancient people for their stubborn refusal to listen.
This chapter says again and again that Israel will be "destroyed." One writer shows that the word does not mean the nation is wiped out.
Yet we find the word "destroy" used to predict the curse on Israel. As a nation they are still under that penalty, and it is not "utter extinction," as the passage itself shows. It says they would be left few in number — which is not extinction at all. In chapter 30 it is added further, "And when all these things come upon you, the blessing and the curse ... and you return to the LORD your God ... then the LORD your God will restore your fortunes." Here is national repentance and restoration predicted.
- Cause. The invasion begins in the heart: joyless service in a time of plenty is the reason given for the yoke that follows.
- Government. The chapter is about God's rule over a nation on earth. It shows the temporary results of disobedience, not the ground of acceptance with God.
- Sign. The unknown language is no accident of history. It is a mark of humiliation, taken up again in Isaiah and pressed on the believers at Corinth.
- Fulfilment. Commentators differ on the invader: Assyria and Babylon, or Rome with its eagle standard and its Latin. Both readings point to a word that came true.
- Restoration. The word "destroy" here has never meant the end of the nation; the same book promises a return and a restoring.
a nation of fierce countenance, which regardeth not the person of the old, nor is kind to the young;
Here the curses of Deuteronomy 28 reach their sharpest point: an invader from far away, too fast to escape and too cruel to spare the old or the young. Who is this nation, why does God Himself send it, and how could Moses describe it so long before it existed?
Commentators read the whole chapter as a picture of how God ruled Israel in their land. It deals with reward and punishment in history, not with a soul's standing before Him.
In Deuteronomy 28 we have the principles of God's government in the midst of that people, and the immediate consequences of obedience or disobedience — consequences so solemnly fulfilled in the fate of that unhappy people, still loved for the fathers' sakes. The law was a principle of relationship with God, and it raised the question of a righteousness good enough for His acceptance. Breaking it brought consequences of that kind. Do not confuse them with the temporary consequences of disobedience under God's government. Chapter 28 is about the temporary kind. As to Israel, the history of the world shows us the threats of this chapter carried out.
One writer reads verses 49-50 as a portrait of Rome, line by line: its battle standard, its language, and how it treated the helpless.
Moses clearly predicted the Roman power that was used to break the Jews, and that at a time when no such power existed. Read verses 49-50: "The Lord will bring a nation against you from far away... swift as the eagle flies, a nation whose language you do not understand." The eagle was the standard of the Roman armies. The Jews understood many eastern languages, but they did not know Latin. "…who shall not respect the old or show mercy to the young." Rome killed the old people and the children.
One writer gathers the other blows of the chapter — madness, blindness, the iron yoke — and names why this nation came at all.
The Lord had struck them, as He said, with madness, blindness and confusion of mind. They groped at noonday as the blind grope in darkness. The yoke of iron was fastened on their neck. The hard-faced nation that flies like an eagle had come upon them, because they did not fear this glorious and awesome name, the Lord your God.
God sends the invader, but that does not make the invader innocent. The chastening of His people has a measure and an end; the enemy's hatred will meet its own answer.
God has combined two elements in these revelations. On one side He judges what was wrong in His own people. On the other He judges merciless enemies who did not know His gracious purpose to chasten His people. He would not leave His people unpunished; but could He permit a full end? So He measured the chastening, and its end matched the goodness of God. Meanwhile God lets the enemy pour out hatred on His people without limit or restraint. Yet He does not merely use that hatred for the good of His own people and for the punishment of their unfaithfulness. He would surely turn on the cruel enemy when His purpose was accomplished.
The warning does not stop with Israel. One writer turns it on everyone who now holds a place of privilege.
Every verse from the fifteenth to the end of this chapter has found its fulfilment, again and again. What a warning this chapter is to Gentile Christendom! "For if God did not spare the natural branches, neither will He spare you" (Rom. 11:21).
The ruin is not the last word. One writer follows the same city past its destruction into its future.
The Gentiles destroyed Jerusalem so completely that the Roman plough passed over the city (Micah 3:12). Death or slavery was the appointed portion of her people (Deut. 28:49-57). But again the star of Jacob will rise. The sons of her destroyers will build up her walls and pour their treasures and wealth into the city of the Saviour's love and choice (Isa. 60).
- Government — The chapter is about God's rule over a nation on earth. Its blessings and curses are temporary, not a verdict on a soul before Him.
- Cause — The hard-faced nation came because Israel stopped fearing the name of the Lord their God.
- Rod — God sends the merciless invader, yet does not approve its cruelty. He measures the chastening, and turns at last on the foe He used.
- Reach — Moses named the eagle standard, the unknown language and the killing of old and young before Rome existed. The warning reaches anyone who now holds a place of privilege.
- Result — The plough of the destroyer is not the end of the story. Her destroyers' sons will rebuild the walls, and the city's glory will outlast the eagle.