Matthew Henry on Leviticus 26:14-39
After God had set the blessing before them (the life and good which would make them a happy people if they would be obedient), he here sets the curse before them, the death and evil which would make them as miserable if they were disobedient. Let them not think themselves so deeply rooted as that God's power could not ruin them, nor so highly favoured as that his justice would not ruin them if they revolted from him and rebelled against him; no You only have I known, therefore I will punish you soonest and sorest. Amo 3:2. Observe,
I. How their sin is described, which would bring all this misery upon them. Not sins of ignorance and infirmity; God had provided sacrifices for those. Not the si…
Read the whole note in the consoleJamieson-Fausset-Brown on Leviticus 26:29
ye shall eat the flesh of your sons--The revolting picture was actually exhibited at the siege of Samaria, at the siege of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar (Lam 4:10), and at the destruction of that city by the Romans. (See on Deu 28:53).
Adam Clarke on Leviticus 26:29
Ye shall eat the flesh of your sons, etc. - This was literally fulfilled at the siege of Jerusalem. Josephus, Wars of the Jews, book vii., chap. ii., gives us a particular instance in dreadful detail of a woman named Mary, who, in the extremity of the famine during the siege, killed her sucking child, roasted, and had eaten part of it when discovered by the soldiers! See this threatened, Jer 19:9 (note).
John Gill on Leviticus 26:29
And ye shall eat the flesh of your sons,.... Which was fulfilled at the siege of Samaria, in the times of Joram, 2 Kings 6:29; and at the siege of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar, Lamentations 4:10; and though there is no instance of it at that time in the sacred records, the Jews (p) tells us of one Doeg ben Joseph, who died and left a little one with his mother, who was very fond of him; but at this siege slew him with her own hands, and ate him, with respect to which they suppose Jeremiah makes the lamentation, Lamentations 2:2; and of this also there was an instance at the last siege of Jerusalem, by Titus, when a woman, named Mary, of a considerable family, boiled her son, and ate part of h…
