What Does Deuteronomy 28:11 Mean in the King James?
And the LORD shall make thee plenteous in goods, in the fruit of thy body, and in the fruit of thy cattle, and in the fruit of thy ground, in the land which the LORD sware unto thy fathers to give thee.
The analysis reads the King James wording.
King James Version The King James Version, first published in 1611. Selah Verse shows the standard text.
THE KEY
The root behind “plenteous” carries the sense of surplus that remains, appearing here as fruit in bodies, animals, and soil.
THE MEANING
The verse addresses you through a picture of good taking fruit in your body, your livestock, and your ground. Abundance here reaches beyond possessions to the life that grows and bears fruit.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
This undoes the belief that divine good is only inward or spiritual: the verse includes bodily, animal, and agricultural fruitfulness.
THE ROOT
הוֹתִירְךָ
hotirkha
GROWS FROM
יתר
To remain, be left over, or exceed (yatar); in the Hiphil, to leave over or make abundant.
This verb shares its root with words for what remains as a surplus. So “plenteous” carries the sense of increase that leaves something over, and the verse makes that surplus visible in fruit across body, herd, and soil.
ALSO GROWS
yether: Remainder, surplus
יֶתֶר
This noun names what remains beyond what is used, revealing the surplus within the verse’s abundance.
yitron: Profit, advantage, surplus
יִתְרוֹן
Ecclesiastes uses this word to ask what surplus remains from human labor, showing another shade of the same root.
נִשְׁבַּע
nishba
GROWS FROM
שבע
To swear or bind oneself by an oath (shava).
“sware” in this verse is nishba. The abundance is presented as a sworn pledge. The same consonants appear in the word for “seven,” and Genesis 21 joins seven ewe lambs with an oath at Beersheba, echoing the pledge’s weight.
ALSO GROWS
shevu'ah: Oath
שְׁבוּעָה
This noun makes explicit the binding pledge carried by the verse’s “sware.”
sheva: Seven
שֶׁבַע
The shared consonants echo the scriptural association of an oath with seven, made visible in Genesis 21:28–31.
לְטוֹבָה
letovah
GROWS FROM
טוב
To be good, beneficial, or well (tov).
“goods” in this verse is letovah. The Hebrew phrase attaches this abundance to tovah, “good” or “welfare.” The verse therefore frames increase as well-being, giving its surplus a quality as well as a quantity.
ALSO GROWS
tov: Good, beneficial
טוֹב
This adjective shows the root’s basic sense of what is good or beneficial.
tovah: Goodness, benefit, welfare
טוֹבָה
This feminine form echoes the verse’s phrase and frames abundance as a condition of well-being.
THE PATTERN
Abundance takes form as fruitfulness across human life, animals, and cultivated land.
And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.Thou visitest the earth, and waterest it: thou greatly enrichest it with the river of God, which is full of water: thou preparest them corn, when thou hast so provided for it.Now he that ministereth seed to the sower both minister bread for your food, and multiply your seed sown, and increase the fruits of your righteousness;)THE THREAD
What profit hath a man of all his labour which he taketh under the sun?“Profit” is יִתְרוֹן (yitron), from the same root יתר behind the abundance verb here. Ecclesiastes asks what surplus human labor leaves; Deuteronomy pictures increase reaching body, herd, and soil.
Read the SDV Bible.
Every verse has a Deep Dive in the app.
The iPhone Bible app with the Selah Decoded Version.
Does something in this reading look wrong? Tell us