Deuteronomy 28:27

The Lord will smite thee with the botch of Egypt,.... Which some understand of the leprosy, Of that sort of it called "elephantiasis", frequent among the Egyptians; [See comments on Leviticus 13:2].

The LORD will smite thee with the botch of Egypt, and with the emerods, and with the scab, and with the itch, whereof thou canst not be healed. The botch of Egypt , [ shªchiyn (H7822)] - an inflamed ulceration.

Deuteronomy 28:27 The LORD will smite thee with the botch of Egypt, and with the emerods, and with the scab, and with the itch, whereof thou canst not be healed.Ver. 27. With the botch of Egypt,] i.e., With the leprosy called Elephantiasis, when the skin grows hard as the elephant’ s skin. This, saith one, was bred only about Nile, the river of Egypt.

(27) The botch of Egypt.—The “boil,” with which the Egyptians were plagued (Exodus 9:9, &c.) is the same word. (See also 2 Kings 20:7; Job 2:7.) Rashi says of this boil, “It was very bad, being moist on the inside, and dry outside.” A learned Dalmatian Jew, with whom I have read this passage, tells me that he has seen many cases of this kind among the Hungarian and Polish Jews, and that it prevails among them, being traceable partly to their uncleanliness. Emerods—i.e., hœmorrhoids (as in 1 Samuel 5:6). The scab.—In Leviticus 21:20; Leviticus 22:22 “scurvy.” It would make both a priest and a victim unclean, and unfit for the service of Jehovah. The itch.—Here only. “A dry ulcer like a sherd” (Rashi). Whereof thou canst not be healed.—Not that these things are in themselves incurable, but that they should have them incurably.

Verse 27. The Lord will smite thee with the botch] שחין shechin, a violent inflammatory swelling. In Job 2:7, one of the Hexapla versions renders it ελεφας, the elephantiasis, a disease the most horrid that can possibly afflict human nature. In this disorder, the whole body is covered with a most loathsome scurf; the joints are all preternaturally enlarged, and the skin swells up and grows into folds like that of an elephant, whence the disease has its name. The skin, through its rigidity, breaks across at all the joints, and a most abominable ichor flows from all the chinks, c. See an account of it in Aretaeus, whose language is sufficient to chill the blood of a maniac, could he attend to the description given by this great master, of this most loathsome and abominable of all the natural productions of death and sin. This was called the botch of Egypt, as being peculiar to that country, and particularly in the vicinity of the Nile. Hence those words of Lucretius: - Est Elephas morbus, qui circum flumina Nili Nascitur, AEgypto in media nec praeterea usquam. Lib. vi., ver. 1112. Emerods] עפלים ophalim, from עפל aphal, to be elevated, raised up; swellings, protuberances; probably the bleeding piles. Scab] גרב garab does not occur as a verb in the Hebrew Bible, but [Arabic] gharb, in Arabic, signifies a distemper in the corner of the eye, (Castel.,) and may amount to the Egyptian ophthalmia, which is so epidemic and distressing in that country: some suppose the scurvy to be intended. Itch] חרס cheres, a burning itch, probably something of the erysipelatous kind, or what is commonly called St. Anthony's fire. Whereof thou canst not be healed.] For as they were inflicted by GOD'S justice, they could not of course be cured by human art.

27. the boil of Egypt] Cp. P, Exodus 9:9 with Driver’s note. One of the skin-diseases common in Egypt. Boil, Heb. sheḥ ?ξn; Eg. sḥ ?n, ‘an abscess.’ Some think of small-pox, others of elephantiasis. But it may be the bubonic plague; see next note. emerods] LXX ἕλκοςΑἰγ. εἰςτὴνἕδραν. Rather, as R.V. marg., tumours; Heb. ‘ophalim, swellings. Probably the buboes of the bubonic plague (so Macalister). On this see HGHL, 157 ff. scurvy] Heb. garab (Ar. garab = mange), Leviticus 21:20; Leviticus 22:22; LXX ψώραἀγρία, Vulg. scabies. ‘Favus’ (Macalister). itch] Heb. ḥ ?eres, Leviticus 21:20, LXX κνήφη, Vulg. prurigo.

27. The botch of Egypt — Probably the disease called elephantiasis. Comp. Exodus 9:9, where the Hebrew word is translated boil. This section (27-34) announces some further disasters that will follow upon disobedience.