What Does Deuteronomy 14:8 Mean?
And the swine, because it splits the hoof, yet does not bring up the cud, is unclean to you. You shall not eat of their flesh, nor touch their fallen body.
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
And the swine, because it divideth the hoof, yet cheweth not the cud, it is unclean unto you: ye shall not eat of their flesh, nor touch their dead carcase.THE KEY
A split hoof is only half the sign; the missing cud-chewing determines the swine’s status.
THE MEANING
The verse names the swine unclean because it has one of the two signs: it divides the hoof but does not chew the cud. The boundary covers both eating its flesh and touching its dead body.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
One matching feature is not enough to meet a boundary that requires two.
THE ROOT
מַפְרִיס פַּרְסָה
mafris parsah
GROWS FROM
פרס
paras
to split, break, or divide
“splits the hoof” in this verse is mafris parsah. The Hebrew names the split-hoof sign with a verb and a related noun from the same root. Yet the division alone does not establish the category here; the verse also requires the cud sign.
ALSO GROWS
parsah: hoof, here the split hoof
פַּרְסָה
This is the noun for the hoof in the verse, sharing its consonants with the verb for splitting.
paras: to break or divide; used of dividing bread in Isaiah 58:7
פָּרַס
The same root describes breaking bread out for the hungry, keeping the image concrete: something divided into portions.
טָמֵא
tame
GROWS FROM
טמא
ṭ-m-ʾ
to be ritually unclean or impure
“unclean” in this verse is tame. Here טָמֵא names the status assigned by the stated signs; it does not describe a moral defect in the animal. The verse then gives that status concrete limits around eating its flesh and touching its carcass.
ALSO GROWS
tum’ah: uncleanness, impurity
טֻמְאָה
This noun names the status marked by טָמֵא.
timme: to defile, make unclean
טִמֵּא
The same root can describe the act of making something unclean as well as the status named here.
THE PATTERN
When a boundary depends on paired conditions, meeting one condition does not erase the missing one.
Yet these you may not eat, of those that bring up the cud or split the hoof. The camel brings up the cud but does not split the hoof, so it is unclean to you.And every beast that splits the hoof and is cleft through in two, and brings up the cud among the beasts, you shall eat.For whoever guards the whole instruction, and yet stumbles at one point, is bound to all of it.THE THREAD
And every beast that splits the hoof and is cleft through in two, and brings up the cud among the beasts, you shall eat.This verse uses the same split-hoof vocabulary, from פרס (paras, to divide), and states the positive counterpart with both signs present. Read together, the verses show why the split hoof alone does not determine the swine’s status.
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