It
shall happen, when Yahweh your God brings you into the land where you go to possess it, that you shall set the blessing on Mount Gerizim, and the curse on Mount Ebal.
Deuteronomy 11:29
Deuteronomy 11 [20.] You shall write them on the door posts of your house, and on your gates; that your days may be multiplied, and the days of your children, in the land which Yahweh swore to your fathers to give them, as the days of the heavens above the earth. For if you shall diligently keep all these commandments which I command you, to do them, to love Yahweh your God, to walk in all his ways, and to cling to him; then will Yahweh drive out all these nations from before you, and you shall dispossess nations greater and mightier than yourselves. Every place whereon the sole of your foot treads shall be yours: from the wilderness, and Lebanon, from the river, the river Euphrates, even to the western sea shall be your border.
Deuteronomy 11 [25.] No man will be able to stand before you. Yahweh your God will lay the fear of you and the dread of you on all the land that you tread on, as he has spoken to you. Behold, I set before you today a blessing and a curse: the blessing, if you listen to the commandments of Yahweh your God, which I command you today; and the curse, if you do not listen to the commandments of Yahweh your God, but turn aside out of the way which I command you today, to go after other gods, which you have not known. It shall happen, when Yahweh your God brings you into the land where you go to possess it, that you shall set the blessing on Mount Gerizim, and the curse on Mount Ebal.
Deuteronomy 11 [30.] Aren’t they beyond the Jordan, behind the way of the going down of the sun, in the land of the Canaanites who dwell in the Arabah, near Gilgal, beside the oaks of Moreh? For you are to pass over the Jordan to go in to possess the land which Yahweh your God gives you, and you shall possess it, and dwell therein. You shall observe to do all the statutes and the ordinances which I set before you today.
Meaning:
As Israel waited to enter the promised land, Moses set before them a choice: “a blessing and a curse: the blessing, if you listen to the commandments of Yahweh your God… and the curse, if you do not listen” (Deuteronomy 11:26-28). This verse gives that choice a place on the map. Once in the land, the people were to proclaim the blessing from one mountain and the curse from another.
- “When Yahweh your God brings you into the land”
Moses is confident that God will bring them in. The ceremony would remind Israel that the land was a gift to be enjoyed in faithful obedience.
- “The blessing on Mount Gerizim, and the curse on Mount Ebal”
Gerizim and Ebal stand facing each other in the hill country of Samaria, with the town of Shechem in the valley between them. Moses later gave detailed instructions: six tribes were to “stand on Mount Gerizim to bless the people,” and six on Mount Ebal “for the curse” (Deuteronomy 27:12-13). Joshua carried out the command after the victory at Ai. All Israel stood “half of them in front of Mount Gerizim, and half of them in front of Mount Ebal,” and he “read all the words of the law, the blessing and the curse” (Joshua 8:33-34).
- A choice that shapes life
The two mountains pictured the two paths before Israel. Near the end of Deuteronomy Moses pressed the point: “I have set before you life and death, the blessing and the curse. Therefore choose life” (Deuteronomy 30:19). Obedience was not a way to earn God’s love, which he had already shown in rescuing them from Egypt, but the way to live in that love.
- Gerizim in later history
Because of this verse, Mount Gerizim became sacred to the Samaritans, who believed it was the place God had chosen for worship and built a temple there. That is why the Samaritan woman said to Jesus at Jacob’s well, “Our fathers worshiped in this mountain” (John 4:20). Jesus answered that “the hour comes, when neither in this mountain, nor in Jerusalem, will you worship the Father” (John 4:21). The blessing once proclaimed from Gerizim finds its fulfilment in Christ, who “redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us,” so “that the blessing of Abraham might come on the Gentiles” (Galatians 3:13-14).
The Significance of Deuteronomy 11:29
- Every life faces a choice
Like Israel between the two mountains, every person stands before God’s word and must respond. God sets the way of life before us and calls us to choose it.
Cross-References:
Joshua 8:33: “Half of them in front of Mount Gerizim, and half of them in front of Mount Ebal.” The ceremony carried out.
Deuteronomy 30:19: “I have set before you life and death, the blessing and the curse.” The choice before Israel.
John 4:20: “Our fathers worshiped in this mountain.” The Samaritan woman speaks of Gerizim.
Conclusion: Deuteronomy 11:29 commands that when Israel entered the land, the blessing was to be proclaimed on Mount Gerizim and the curse on Mount Ebal. The two mountains near Shechem became a vivid picture of the choice between obedience and disobedience, life and death. Gerizim later became the Samaritans’ holy mountain, and in Christ the blessing it symbolized is offered to people of every nation.
PIB Scriptures are derived from the World English Bible