What Does Deuteronomy 8:18 Mean?
But you shall remember the LORD your God, for it is he who gives you power to make strength, so that he may raise up his covenant, which he swore to your fathers, as it is 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
But thou shalt remember the LORD thy God: for it is he that giveth thee power to get wealth, that he may establish his covenant which he sware unto thy fathers, as it is this day.THE KEY
Wealth here is received capacity put to covenant purpose, not proof that you made yourself.
THE MEANING
Your capacity to produce resources is received: the verse credits the LORD with the strength that enables your work. The wealth that follows serves a purpose beyond personal accumulation: the standing of a promise God has sworn.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that prosperity proves self-sufficiency: the verse credits God with the capacity behind production and places covenant purpose at its center.
THE ROOT
חַיִל
chayil
GROWS FROM
חיל
ḥ-y-l
Strength, force, or capacity; the noun can describe resources, wealth, an army, or valor.
“make strength” in this verse is chayil. English “wealth” can sound like a pile of possessions, but chayil also names strength, force, and valor. The word links what is gained with usable capacity, not just what is stored.
ALSO GROWS
chayil: Resources or wealth
חַיִל
This is the word rendered “wealth” here, tying resources to the capacity by which they are made.
cheil: Army or force
חֵיל
The same word family can name organized force, showing that chayil carries a sense of usable strength as well as possessions.
eshet chayil: Woman of strength or valor
אֵשֶׁת־חַיִל
The phrase in Proverbs 31:10 preserves the word’s sense of capability, beyond its use for wealth.
נֹתֵן
noten
GROWS FROM
נתן
To give, set, or place.
“giveth” in this verse is noten. The verb carries the sense of giving or placing: the capacity is received, while you still act with it to produce resources. Source and human agency coexist in the verse.
ALSO GROWS
natan: Give, set, or place
נָתַן
This verb names the act behind “giveth,” locating the source of the capacity in God.
mattanah: Gift
מַתָּנָה
A gift is the same act of giving made visible as something received.
לְהָקִים
lehaqim
GROWS FROM
קום
To rise, stand, or remain standing.
“raise up” in this verse is lehaqim. The verb translated “establish” means to cause something to stand. What stands is the covenant God has sworn, so the verse places wealth-making capacity in service of a promise’s continuance.
ALSO GROWS
qum: Rise or stand
קוּם
This is the basic action beneath “establish”: bringing something into a standing position.
maqom: Place
מָקוֹם
This word for “place” belongs to the same word family, connecting standing with where something stands.
heqim: Raise or establish
הֵקִים
This causative form expresses making something stand, the sense used for the covenant here.
THE PATTERN
God supplies capacity and resources for human work, and directs them toward purposes larger than possession.
Both riches and weight come from your face, and you reign over all; and in your hand is strength and might, and in your hand it is to make great, and to strengthen all.Every good giving and every complete gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no shifting and no shadow cast by turning.THE THREAD
He gives power to the faint, and to those without might he multiplies strength.The same Hebrew verb נֹתֵן (noten, giving) and word כֹּחַ (koach, strength or capacity) appear here. What Deuteronomy says is given for producing resources is also given where human strength fails: capacity is received at its source.
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