Deuteronomy 28:13, commentary and pictures

To be made the head and not the tail, above only and not beneath, is promised only to those who listen to the Lord's commandments and observe and do them with wholehearted obedience. To be the head means honor and leadership rather than subordination, and to be above and not beneath means preeminence and exaltation rather than being brought low. The promise stands among the blessings of obedience set beside the curses, where obedience brings blessing and prosperity and disobedience brings a curse that grows heavier as transgression continues. When His people disobeyed, God altered His purpose and withheld the blessing, for Israel's distrust, unbelief, pride, and transgression forfeited His favor and made it impossible for Him to settle them as a prosperous, holy, happy people. The same terms still bind His people today, so that submission to His authority brings life, health, happiness, and success to His work, including in connection with the Sabbath, while violation forfeits protection and delays His work.

Promise and Its Condition

Being made the head and not the tail, above only and not beneath, is conditional on hearkening to the commandments of the Lord, observing them and doing them with wholehearted obedience. Honor and elevation rather than subjection are the positive promises held out in the law, with obedience stated as the condition for receiving them. Health is included among those promised blessings as a reward of obedience.

To be the head and not the tail means a position of honor and leadership rather than subordination, and to be above and not beneath means preeminence and exaltation rather than being brought low. It promises supremacy rather than subjection, and exaltation above other nations rather than being brought low.

The promise belongs to the blessings of obedience stated plainly in Deuteronomy 26, 27 and 28, read by Moses alongside the curses that would follow disobedience. Obedience brings blessing and prosperity, while disobedience brings removal of the prospering hand and the curses described in the same chapter, with the curse growing heavier as transgression of the commandments continues. Obedience and disobedience are thus set forth as outcomes to be chosen between, blessing on condition of obedience and fearful results from transgression.

The blessings rest on the clear, specific terms of a covenant agreement that leaves minds not in ignorance and uncertainty and calls for wholehearted observance. God verifies His promises when the divine law is obeyed and its conditions are fulfilled, and to expect blessing while violating the conditions on which alone it can be bestowed is presumption. Prosperity and adversity depended on obeying or transgressing that law kept in the sacred ark, whose sacredness comes only from the law it contains, so possessing the ark itself did not guarantee prosperity apart from obedience.

When His people disobey He alters His purpose and withholds the promised blessing. He refused the adults of the army that left Egypt entrance into the promised land and left them to fall in the wilderness, because keeping His commandments, statutes, judgments and ordinances, walking in them and doing them, is the condition for living in them and receiving blessing. Continued disobedience still hinders His work and delays its advance until His commandments are kept. God was faithful and not chargeable for misfortune and delay, but distrust, unbelief, pride and transgression forfeited favor, kindled wrath, dishonored Him before the nations, and made it impossible for Him to manifest His power to protect and settle His people as a prosperous, holy, happy people.

The directions express the principles of the law of God's kingdom made specific, presenting the never-ceasing obligation of all blessed with life and health and advantages in temporal and spiritual things to sustain His work. That obligation includes gifts, offerings, and the tithe to sustain His messengers, and honoring Him with tithes, offerings and the firstfruits of increase as part of faithfulness, with prosperity or hardship corresponding to obedience or disobedience. Its message has not grown weak because of age, and His claims are just as binding now and just as fresh in importance as His gifts are fresh and continual. The blessing was not wealth for personal use alone, for He expected generous return from what He had given.

Blessings and Present Application

The promise was that God would establish Israel in the promised land and deliver them as He had delivered them from Egypt, raising them above other nations to supremacy rather than subjection. To be made the head and not the tail meant national prosperity and distinction, exaltation rather than lowness, for those who listened to His commandments and obeyed them and fully trusted in Him. Disobedience would remove His prospering hand and bring the curses stated in the same chapter.

Prosperity, holiness, and happiness in Canaan were made dependent on submission to His authority, as a nation governed by His judgments and as individuals walking in His ordinances, loving, fearing, and obeying Him. This required keeping free from the sins of the Canaanite nations and maintaining purity and holiness in word and act, and not one good thing promised would have failed if the conditions had been met. Obedience to His law still brings life, happiness, and blessing to individuals and nations now, as it would have brought them to Israel, and commandment-keeping people are among the righteous for whose sake He extends mercy and stays judgment.

The blessings include health as a reward of obedience, for He would be Deliverer, Protector, and Healer to those who diligently hearken to His voice, do what is right in His sight, give ear to His commandments, and keep all His statutes. Diligent obedience, including its principles for physical health, would have made Israel a model of health and prosperity, exceptionally strong in body and mind, with skill, wisdom, and vigor of intellect, protected from the diseases of Egypt and those afflicting other nations. Transgression breaks down the providential barriers erected to preserve from disease and brings disease of every kind, as the waters of Marah were an object lesson of disease brought through sin, while sickness would not have preyed upon the bodies of the obedient.

Obedience would have exalted Israel to represent His goodness, mercy, and love, with worship of the true God and righteous lives displaying His character to restore His moral image in humanity. Their prosperity would have revealed His glory and supported the spread of Christ's kingdom. By contrast, independence from Him places people under Satan's control.

Israel failed to receive these blessings because they did not fulfill His purpose through faithfulness; the preeminence rather than subordination that could have been theirs through faithfulness was forfeited. He was faithful to His promises and was not chargeable for their misfortunes and delay. Their fathers forfeited His favor, and their own distrust, unbelief, pride, and transgression of His holy requirements kindled His wrath, made it impossible for Him to manifest His power to protect them and bring them into immediate possession of the land and settle them as a prosperous, holy, happy people, and dishonored Him and detracted from His glory before the nations.

The promise belongs to His call for a holy people who bear His name, to be above and not beneath in honor and leadership rather than subordination, and it applies to His people today in connection with the Sabbath. Israel's history is recorded to be studied to avoid the sins that brought wrath. When people make Him supreme and obey His law, He makes them the head and gives success to their work by His blessing rather than by human ideas, even those of men who oppose His law, leading others to consider the truths taught and to recognize methods superior to those commonly employed in the schools of the world.