What Does Deuteronomy 27:10 Mean?
And you shall hear and respond to the voice of the LORD your God, and do his commandments and his statutes, which I command you this day.
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
Thou shalt therefore obey the voice of the LORD thy God, and do his commandments and his statutes, which I command thee this day.THE KEY
Here, “obey” is already the Hebrew verb for hearing: the voice is heard when its words take shape in action.
THE MEANING
The voice of the LORD meets you in the present tense of this day, and hearing it is bound to what takes shape in your actions. The verse joins receiving the voice and doing what it says in one movement.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
This undoes the belief that hearing God’s voice is complete once the sound reaches your ears; here, hearing is unfinished until it enters what you do.
THE ROOT
וְשָׁמַעְתָּ
veshamata
GROWS FROM
שמע
shama
To hear or listen, with the sense of heeding and responding.
“hear and respond to” in this verse is veshamata. The Hebrew verb translated “obey” also means “hear” or “listen.” The verse moves from hearing the LORD’s voice to doing his commands, showing that response is what hearing looks like when it takes shape in action.
ALSO GROWS
shomea: One who hears; a hearer.
שֹׁמֵעַ
This form makes the listener visible: hearing belongs to someone who receives the voice.
shemuah: A report or tidings; something heard.
שְׁמוּעָה
A report is carried by hearing, echoing how the voice in this verse reaches the listener.
חֻקָּיו
chukav
GROWS FROM
חקק
chaqaq
To engrave, inscribe, or prescribe.
The word translated “statutes” is related to a root of engraving and prescribing, carrying the sense of something marked into a lasting form. Beside hearing and doing, it shows the voice taking shape in what is set in place for this day.
ALSO GROWS
chaqaq: To engrave, inscribe, or decree.
חָקַק
This verb gives the statute its image of something marked or prescribed.
choq: A prescribed portion, decree, or statute.
חֹק
This noun shares the verse’s word family and names what has been set in place.
THE PATTERN
The word is truly heard when hearing takes form in what is done.
They come to you as the people come, and they sit before you as my people, and they hear and respond to your words, but they will not do them; for with their mouth they show much love, but their heart walks after their cut-off gain.But be makers of the word, and not hearers only, miscounting yourselves.But he said, Rather, flourishing are those who hear and respond to the word of God and guard it.THE THREAD
Now therefore, if you will truly hear and respond to my voice, and guard my covenant, then you shall be my own treasure from among all peoples, for all the earth is mine.“Obey my voice” translates a Hebrew phrase built from the same root, שמע (shama), meaning to hear and heed. Deuteronomy joins that hearing to doing, making clear how the voice becomes response.
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