What Does Deuteronomy 15:8 Mean?
But you shall open your hand wide to him, and you shall surely lend him enough for what he lacks.
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
But thou shalt open thine hand wide unto him, and shalt surely lend him sufficient for his need, in that which he wanteth.THE KEY
The verb for “open” is repeated before lending appears, making an open hand the passage between another person’s lack and provision.
THE MEANING
This verse meets you where another person’s lack is visible: the hand opens toward them, and the lending is measured by what is missing to them. Provision takes the shape of enough for the need in front of you, not a gesture measured only by what you can spare.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the idea that any amount of giving is enough simply because something has been handed over; the measure here is what meets the person’s actual lack.
THE ROOT
פָּתֹחַ תִּפְתַּח
pātoach tiphtaḥ
GROWS FROM
פתח
To open or unfasten.
“open your hand wide” in this verse is pātoach tiphtaḥ. The Hebrew repeats the opening verb before it names the loan. The image begins with a hand made accessible, so provision moves through an opening rather than remaining held back.
ALSO GROWS
petaḥ: doorway, entrance
פֶּתַח
A doorway is an opening that gives passage; here, the open hand gives passage to what another person needs.
maphteaḥ: key
מַפְתֵּחַ
A key opens what is closed; this branch echoes the verse’s picture of an opened hand as access to provision.
יֶחְסַר
yeḥsar
GROWS FROM
חסר
To be lacking or short.
“enough for what he lacks” in this verse is yeḥsar. The phrase names the person’s lack twice: the lending is to be sufficient for “his need,” that which “is lacking” to him. The root makes the measure concrete, the provision corresponds to what is missing for this person.
ALSO GROWS
ḥaser: lacking
חָסֵר
This form describes the state the verse addresses: something necessary is missing.
maḥsor: lack, need
מַחְסוֹר
This noun appears in the verse as “his need,” tying the act of lending to the recipient’s actual shortage.
THE PATTERN
Provision meets a person’s concrete need through what an open hand makes available.
Do not hold back good from its owners, when your hand has the reach to do it.and set them down at the feet of the sent ones, and it was given out to each as anyone had need.THE THREAD
You open your hand and fill every living thing with delight.The Hebrew verb פתח (pataḥ, open) appears in both verses: here, the hand opens toward a person in need; there, God’s hand opens to satisfy every living thing. The shared root lets this human act of provision echo the image of provision from God.
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