Deuteronomy 7:2 (YLT)

Passage

and Jehovah thy God hath given them before thee, and thou hast smitten them--thou dost utterly devote them--thou dost not make with them a covenant, nor dost thou favour them.

Nearby Context

Deuteronomy 7:1 `When Jehovah thy God doth bring thee in unto the land whither thou art going in to possess it, and He hath cast out many nations from thy presence, the Hittite, and the Girgashite, and the Amorite, and the Canaanite, and the Perizzite, and the Hivite, and the Jebusite, seven nations more numerous and mighty than thou,

Deuteronomy 7:2 and Jehovah thy God hath given them before thee, and thou hast smitten them--thou dost utterly devote them--thou dost not make with them a covenant, nor dost thou favour them.

Deuteronomy 7:3 `And thou dost not join in marriage with them; thy daughter thou dost not give to his son, and his daughter thou dost not take to thy son,

Deuteronomy 7:4 for he doth turn aside thy son from after Me, and they have served other gods, and the anger of Jehovah hath burned against you, and hath destroyed thee hastily.

Study Lenses

The verse centers on "jehovah", "hath", "given", "before", "thee", "thou", "hast", and "smitten". It is saying that the verse draws attention to "jehovah" and "hath", so its meaning should be read from those terms before moving to application.

The nearby context moves from verse 1's "When Jehovah thy God doth bring thee..." into verse 3's "And thou dost not join in marriage...", so "jehovah" and "hath" belong inside that flow. In Deuteronomy context, the local focus is covenant, worship, and faithfulness.

A plain takeaway is to answer the verse's own emphasis on "jehovah" and "hath" with trust shaped by these words, not by a vague optimism outside the passage.