What Does Deuteronomy 1:11 Mean?
May the LORD God of your fathers add to you a thousand times as many as you are, and bless you, as he has spoken to you!
Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.
Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.
King James wording
King James Version
(The LORD God of your fathers make you a thousand times so many more as ye are, and bless you, as he hath promised you!)THE KEY
The Hebrew behind “make you … more” means “may he add,” so the thousandfold begins with what is already here.
THE MEANING
The blessing speaks into what is present now: the LORD can add to it a thousandfold and bless as promised. The increase grows from what is already here, held within a word spoken to you.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It loosens the belief that your present measure is the final measure available to you.
THE ROOT
יֹסֵף
yōsēp̄
GROWS FROM
יסף
To add, increase, or continue.
“add to you a thousand times as many as you are” in this verse is yōsēp̄. The verb is literally “may he add”: the verse pictures abundance as an increase of what is already present. Its thousandfold scale stretches the present measure without erasing its starting point.
ALSO GROWS
lehosif: To add or increase.
לְהוֹסִיף
This verb keeps the passage’s central movement visible: more is added to what is already here.
Yosef: Joseph, a name meaning “he adds.”
יוֹסֵף
The name carries the same root into a person’s name, preserving the idea of increase in the word-family.
וִיבָרֵךְ
wîḇārēḵ
GROWS FROM
ברך
To bless; the same consonants also form the word for knee.
“bless” in this verse is wîḇārēḵ. The verse joins increase with blessing. The shared consonants of blessing and knee keep an embodied shade of bending near the word, while the verse speaks plainly of the LORD blessing you as promised.
ALSO GROWS
berekh: Knee.
בֶּרֶךְ
This related word brings the bodily image of bending into the same consonantal family as blessing.
berakhah: Blessing.
בְּרָכָה
This noun names the blessing that accompanies the increase in the verse.
דִּבֶּר
dibbēr
GROWS FROM
דבר
To speak; the related noun names a word or matter.
Where English says “promised,” the Hebrew says “spoken.” The verse roots the future increase in speech already given, and the same root also names a word or matter.
ALSO GROWS
dābār: A word, matter, or thing.
דָּבָר
The promise is linked to the same root that names a word or matter.
medabbēr: Speaking; one who speaks.
מְדַבֵּר
This form keeps the spoken quality of the promise in view.
THE PATTERN
A spoken promise extends present life through increase and blessing.
And I will multiply your seed as the stars of the heavens, and I will give all these lands to them, and in your seed all the nations of the earth shall be blessed.The LORD adds upon you, upon you and upon your children.And the word of God grew, and the number of the disciples multiplied in Jerusalem greatly, and a great crowd of the priests heard and responded by leaning their weight.THE THREAD
And I will make you a great nation, and I will bless you, and I will make your name great, and be a blessing.The same Hebrew root ברך (b-r-k, “bless”) appears in this promise to Abram. Deuteronomy’s blessing opens onto the same outward movement: increase is received within blessing that reaches beyond the one who receives it.
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