What Does Deuteronomy 8:4 Mean in the King James?
Thy raiment waxed not old upon thee, neither did thy foot swell, these forty years.
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 verse measures care by what survives the long road: your covering does not wear out, and your foot does not swell.
THE MEANING
The verse makes your body part of the account of endurance: what covers you holds, and the foot that carries you does not swell through the long passage. Care reaches the ordinary things that let a person continue, not only the dramatic moments.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the idea that bodily details fall outside the reach of care: worn clothing and swollen feet are named as part of what is sustained.
THE ROOT
בָּלְתָה
baletah
GROWS FROM
בלה
balah
To wear out, wear away, or grow old through use.
English “old” can sound like a condition of age; the Hebrew verb evokes something being spent by time and use. The verse says the long passage does not wear the clothing through.
ALSO GROWS
balah: To wear out or grow old.
בָּלָה
This verb makes the clause about material resisting wear over time, not simply looking new.
baleh: Worn out; old.
בָּלֶה
This adjective names the condition the verse says the garment avoids.
THE PATTERN
Sustaining a long journey includes the ordinary material and bodily needs that let a person continue.
And I have led you forty years in the wilderness: your clothes are not waxen old upon you, and thy shoe is not waxen old upon thy foot.Yea, forty years didst thou sustain them in the wilderness, so that they lacked nothing; their clothes waxed not old, and their feet swelled not.Wherefore, if God so clothe the grass of the field, which to day is, and to morrow is cast into the oven, shall he not much more clothe you, O ye of little faith?THE THREAD
And I have led you forty years in the wilderness: your clothes are not waxen old upon you, and thy shoe is not waxen old upon thy foot.This verse uses the same בלה (balah), “wear out,” root to describe clothing that does not wear through. The echo makes the long passage measurable by what remains intact as well as by the journey itself.
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