What Does Deuteronomy 26:11 Mean?
And you rejoice in every good thing the LORD your God has given you and your house, you and the Levite, and the sojourner who is in your midst.
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 thou shalt rejoice in every good thing which the LORD thy God hath given unto thee, and unto thine house, thou, and the Levite, and the stranger that is among you.THE KEY
The sojourner’s name comes from a root of dwelling, and the verse places that person inside the circle of shared rejoicing.
THE MEANING
The good in your life is held in a shared field of joy with your household, the Levite, and the sojourner living among you. The verse includes the stranger in its picture of who rejoices in what has been given.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The lie is that what is given to you becomes yours alone, with no place for the stranger in its joy.
THE ROOT
הַגֵּר
ha-ger the sojourner
GROWS FROM
גור
g-w-r
To sojourn or dwell as a resident outsider.
The root connects the stranger to the act of dwelling among others. Here the sojourner is named as someone present within the community’s rejoicing.
ALSO GROWS
gur: To sojourn or dwell as a newcomer.
גּוּר
It shows the dwelling sense carried by the word for stranger.
ger: Sojourner or resident outsider.
גֵּר
This is the word used for the stranger included in the verse’s shared joy.
נָתַן
natan
GROWS FROM
נתן
n-t-n
To give, set, or place.
“given” in this verse is natan. The good is described as received from the LORD. The sentence then names the household, Levite, and sojourner within the rejoicing around that gift.
ALSO GROWS
mattan: Gift or present.
מַתָּן
It makes the root’s giving sense concrete as something received.
mattanah: Gift or offering.
מַתָּנָה
It carries the same giving root into the noun for what is given.
וְשָׂמַחְתָּ
vesamachta and you
GROWS FROM
שמח
s-m-ch
To be glad or rejoice.
“rejoice” in this verse is vesamachta and you. The same root names rejoicing as an act and gladness as a state. Here that gladness takes shape around the good received and the people named alongside you.
ALSO GROWS
simchah: Joy or gladness.
שִׂמְחָה
It names the joy that the verse locates in the good given.
sameach: Glad or rejoicing.
שָׂמֵחַ
It describes the state of gladness expressed by the verse’s command to rejoice.
THE PATTERN
Scripture frames joy as a shared good that reaches beyond the immediate household.
And you shall rejoice before the face of the LORD your God, you and your son and your daughter, your male servant and your female servant, the Levite within your gates, the sojourner, the fatherless, and the widow who are in your midst, in the place the LORD your God has chosen to settle his name there.Rejoice with those who rejoice, and weep with those who weep.But when you make a feast, call the emptied, the maimed, the lame, the blind.THE THREAD
He executes judgment for the fatherless and the widow, and loves the sojourner, giving him bread and a cloak.The same word, ger (גֵּר, sojourner), names the stranger here and the sojourner who receives food and clothing there. The shared root gathers provision and rejoicing around the same person.
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