רבינו בחיי — ואם לא תשמעו לי

Q — The opening pasuk of the tochacha lists six or seven negative phrases in a row — is it just rhetorical buildup, or is something exact happening?

A — Rabbeinu Bachya reads the seven phrases as a calibrated staircase of moral decline, each step caused by the previous one. Step one — "לא תשמעו" — no longer learning Torah. Step two — "לא תעשו" — once one stops learning, one stops doing; the deeds were a consequence of the learning. Step three — "בחקתי תמאסו" — having quit doing, the chukim now feel arbitrary and one despises them. Step four — "את משפטי תגעל נפשכם" — even the rational mishpatim that everyone else respects (don't steal, don't murder) come to be loathed. Step five — "לבלתי עשות" — one moves from passive non-doing to actively *preventing others* from doing. Step six — "את כל מצותי" — outright denial of every mitzvah (the kol is doing work). Step seven — "להפר את בריתי" — denial of the bris itself, kefirah ba'ikar. So the rabbinic dictum "עברה גוררת עברה" is not a generality; it is the structural argument of this very pasuk. Stop learning at dawn, and by sundown you arrive at kefirah ba'ikar — seven gradations, each compelled by the last.