38 You will sow much seed in the field but you will harvest little,w because locustsx will devoury it. 39 You will plant vineyards and cultivate them but you will not drink the winez or gather the grapes, because worms will eata them.b 40 You will have olive trees throughout your country but you will not use the oil, because the olives will drop off.c 41 You will have sons and daughters but you will not keep them, because they will go into captivity.d 42 Swarms of locustse will take over all your trees and the crops of your land.

43 The foreigners who reside among you will rise above you higher and higher, but you will sink lower and lower.f 44 They will lend to you, but you will not lend to them.g They will be the head, but you will be the tail.h

45 All these curses will come on you. They will pursue you and overtake youi until you are destroyed,j because you did not obey the Lord your God and observe the commands and decrees he gave you. 46 They will be a sign and a wonder to you and your descendants forever.k 47 Because you did not servel the Lord your God joyfully and gladlym in the time of prosperity, 48 therefore in hunger and thirst,n in nakedness and dire poverty, you will serve the enemies the Lord sends against you. He will put an iron yokeo on your neckp until he has destroyed you.

49 The Lord will bring a nation against youq from far away, from the ends of the earth,r like an eagles swooping down, a nation whose language you will not understand,t 50 a fierce-looking nation without respect for the oldu or pity for the young. 51 They will devour the young of your livestock and the crops of your land until you are destroyed. They will leave you no grain, new winev or olive oil,w nor any calves of your herds or lambs of your flocks until you are ruined.x 52 They will lay siegey to all the cities throughout your land until the high fortified walls in which you trust fall down. They will besiege all the cities throughout the land the Lord your God is giving you.z

53 Because of the suffering that your enemy will inflict on you during the siege, you will eat the fruit of the womb, the flesh of the sons and daughters the Lord your God has given you.a 54 Even the most gentle and sensitive man among you will have no compassion on his own brother or the wife he loves or his surviving children, 55 and he will not give to one of them any of the flesh of his children that he is eating. It will be all he has left because of the suffering your enemy will inflict on you during the siege of all your cities.b 56 The most gentle and sensitivec woman among you—so sensitive and gentle that she would not venture to touch the ground with the sole of her foot—will begrudge the husband she loves and her own son or daughterd 57 the afterbirth from her womb and the children she bears. For in her dire need she intends to eat theme secretly because of the suffering your enemy will inflict on you during the siege of your cities.