What Does Deuteronomy 4:35 Mean?
To you it was shown, that you might perceive that the LORD is God, and there is no other beside him.
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
Unto thee it was shewed, that thou mightest know that the LORD he is God; there is none else beside him.THE KEY
What is shown becomes knowing: the LORD is God, and no rival stands beside him.
THE MEANING
What is shown to you now is meant to become knowing: the LORD is God, with no other beside him. The verse moves from what is brought into view to recognition of God’s singularity.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that God is one power among several, with a rival standing beside him.
THE ROOT
לָדַעַת
ladaʿat
GROWS FROM
ידע
To know, perceive, or recognize through encounter.
“perceive” in this verse is ladaʿat. The English “know” can sound like collecting a fact, but yada links knowing with recognition formed through contact. What is shown becomes something you know, and the recognition it leads to is that the LORD alone is God.
ALSO GROWS
daʿat: Knowledge, awareness
דַּעַת
This names the knowing that the showing in the verse leads toward.
yōdēaʿ: One who knows
יֹדֵעַ
This form makes knowing an act of recognition, not merely a fact stored away.
הָרְאֵתָ
hārʾētā
GROWS FROM
ראה
To see, look, or perceive.
“was shewed” in this verse is hārʾētā. The verse begins with seeing before it reaches knowing. The Hebrew keeps the two movements connected: what is made visible becomes something recognized.
ALSO GROWS
rōʾeh: One who sees; a seer
רֹאֶה
This branch keeps the focus on the one who perceives what has been brought into view.
marʾeh: Appearance, vision
מַרְאֶה
This names what is seen, the disclosure that opens the way to knowing.
THE PATTERN
What is brought into view leads to recognition of the one God, with no rival beside him.
And Israel saw the great hand that the LORD did upon the Egyptians, and the people stood in awe of the LORD, and they leaned their weight on the LORD and on his servant Moses.I am the LORD, and there is none else; there is no God beside me. I gird you, though you have not known me.And this is the life of the ages, that they might know you, the only God of truth, and Jesus, the Anointed One, whom you have sent.THE THREAD
Perceive therefore this day, and bring it back to your heart, that the LORD is God in the heavens above, and upon the earth beneath; there is no other.This verse repeats the root יָדַע (yadaʿ), meaning “know” or “perceive,” as the continuation of what is shown here. The recognition settles in the heart and extends across heaven and earth: the LORD is God, and there is none else.
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