Deuteronomy 8:4

Thy raiment waxed not old upon thee, neither did thy foot swell, these forty years.

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Word by word — the Hebrew

Word	Hebrew	Strong’s	Meaning
raiment	שִׂמְלָ֨תְךָ֜ sim.La.te.kha	H8071	a dress · noun, common feminine singular construct + pronominal suffix, 2nd person masculine singular
old	בָֽלְתָה֙ val.Tah	H1086	to fail · verb, qal perfect, 3rd person feminine singular
foot	וְרַגְלְךָ֖ ve.rag.le.Kha	H7272	a foot (as used in walking) · conjunction + noun, common feminine singular construct + pronominal suffix, 2nd person masculine singular
swell	בָצֵ֑קָה va.Tze.kah	H1216	perhaps to swell up · verb, qal perfect, 3rd person feminine singular
forty	אַרְבָּעִ֥ים 'ar.ba.'Im	H705	forty · noun, common masculine plural absolute
years	שָׁנָֽה sha.Nah	H8141	a year (as a revolution of time) · noun, common feminine singular absolute

Strong's Exhaustive Concordance (James Strong, 1890/1894), public domain; digitized by Open Scriptures (CC BY-SA). KJV word tagging: eBible.org (public domain). Original-language text, parsing and brief lexicon: STEPBible.org data from Tyndale House, Cambridge (CC BY 4.0).

Cross-references

Deuteronomy 29:5 And I have led you forty years in the wilderness: your clothes are not waxen old upon you, and thy shoe is not waxen old upon thy foot.
Nehemiah 9:21 Yea, forty years didst thou sustain them in the wilderness, so that they lacked nothing; their clothes waxed not old, and their feet swelled…
Matthew 26:25-30 Then Judas, which betrayed him, answered and said, Master, is it I? He said unto him, Thou hast said.

Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).

Commentary

Matthew Henry on Deuteronomy 8:1-9

The charge here given them is the same as before, to keep and do all God's commandments. Their obedience must be, 1. Careful: Observe to do. 2. Universal: To do all the commandments, Deu 8:1. And, 3. From a good principle, with a regard to God as the Lord, and their God, and particularly with a holy fear of him (Deu 8:6), from a reverence of his majesty, a submission to his authority, and a dread of his wrath. To engage them to this obedience, besides the great advantages of it, which he sets before them (that they should live and multiply, and all should be well with them, Deu 8:1), he directs them, I. To look back upon the wilderness through which God had now brought them: Thou shalt remem…

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Jamieson-Fausset-Brown on Deuteronomy 8:4

Thy raiment waxed not old upon thee, neither did thy foot swell, these forty years--What a striking miracle was this! No doubt the Israelites might have brought from Egypt more clothes than they wore at their outset; they might also have obtained supplies of various articles of food and raiment in barter with the neighboring tribes for the fleeces and skins of their sheep and goats; and in furnishing them with such opportunities the care of Providence appeared. But the strong and pointed terms which Moses here uses (see also Deu 29:5) indicate a special or miraculous interposition of their loving Guardian in preserving them amid the wear and tear of their nomadic life in the desert. Thirdly,…

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John Gill on Deuteronomy 8:4

Thy raiment waxed not old upon thee, &c. They wanted not clothes all the forty years they were in the wilderness; which some account for by the rising generation being supplied with the clothes of those that died in the wilderness, and with the spoils they took from Amalek, Exodus 17:1 and others, as Aben Ezra observes, remark that they brought much clothes with them out of Egypt, which no doubt they did; see Exodus 12:35 and he adds, as worthy of notice, that the manna they lived upon did not produce sweat, which is prejudicial to clothes; but be it so, that they were sufficiently provided with clothes, it must be miraculous that these clothes they wore should not wax old. This, in a spirit…

The Church Fathers

If the garments of the Israelites could last without wearing out for so many years in the desert and the hides of dead animals could continue undestroyed for so long a time in their shoes, surely God can extend the quality of incorruption in certain bodies for as long as he wills. I think therefore that the body of the Lord is the same now in heaven as it was when he ascended into heaven.
— Augustine of Hippo, LETTER 205

God granted to the garments of the Israelites their proper state without any damage for forty years. If so, how much more does he grant a very happy temperament of certain state to the bodies of those who obey his command until they may be turned into something better? This embetterment occurs not by the death of man, by which the body is deserted by the soul, but by a blessed change from mortality to immortality, from an animal to a spiritual quality.
— Augustine of Hippo, On the Good of Marriage 2.2

Is he not good, who in the wilderness fed with bread from heaven such countless thousands of the people, lest any famine should assail them, without need of toil, in the enjoyment of rest? For the space of twenty years, their raiment grew not old, nor were their shoes worn, a figure, which, to the faithful, points to the resurrection that is to come. This shows that the glory of great deeds and the beauty of the power by which he has clothed us and the stream of human life is not absurd, not for nothing.
— Ambrose of Milan, Exposition of the Christian Faith 2.2.23

The Church Fathers: public-domain translations (Ante-Nicene and Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers), verse-indexed by SermonIndex (CC BY 4.0).

Dictionary and topics

Clothing · Of the Israelites, did not become old — Of the Israelites, did not become old
Desert, Journey Of Israel Through The · Their clothing preserved during — Their clothing preserved during
Feet, The · Were liable to: Swelling from walking — Were liable to: Swelling from walking
Garments · Called: Raiment — Called: Raiment
Obedience · ENJOINED — ENJOINED

Dictionary: Easton's (1897) and Smith's (1863), public domain. Topics: Nave's Topical Bible (1896) and Torrey's Topical Textbook (1897), public domain. Both as parsed by NEUU (CC BY 4.0).

Deuteronomy 8:4

Word by word — the Hebrew

Cross-references

Commentary

Matthew Henry on Deuteronomy 8:1-9

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown on Deuteronomy 8:4

John Gill on Deuteronomy 8:4

The Church Fathers

Dictionary and topics

Deuteronomy 8:4

Word by word — the Hebrew

Cross-references

Commentary

Matthew Henry on Deuteronomy 8:1-9

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown on Deuteronomy 8:4

John Gill on Deuteronomy 8:4

The Church Fathers

Dictionary and topics

John Calvin on Deuteronomy 8:1-6

Keil & Delitzsch on Deuteronomy 8:1-6

Tyndale Open Study Notes on Deuteronomy 8:3

Rashi on Deuteronomy 8:4