Deuteronomy 6:8
in Deuteronomy 6Tie them as reminders on your hands and bind them on your foreheads.
BSB
The same verse in ASV and KJV ▾
ASV
And thou shalt bind them for a sign upon thy hand, and they shall be for frontlets between thine eyes.
KJV
And thou shalt bind them for a sign upon thine hand, and they shall be as frontlets between thine eyes.
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This verse in Deuteronomy 6
Commentary
6 notes on this verseThou shalt bind them for a sign upon thins hand - Is not this an allusion to an ancient and general custom observed in almost every part of the world? When a person wishes to remember a thing of importance, and is afraid to trust to the common operations of memory, he ties a knot on some part of his clothes, or a cord on his hand or finger, or places something out of its usual order, and in view, that his memory may be whetted to recollection, and his eye affect his heart.
This site's exposition
Tie them as reminders on your hands
on Deuteronomy 6:8-9
Jewish practice took the instruction literally and produced the tefillin and the mezuzah. Matthew 23:5 speaks of phylacteries being made broad, so the practice was established well before the first century.
The record, by era
The Puritans and the Awakening2 voices
Christ blames the Pharisees, not for wearing them, but for affecting to have them broader than other people's, Matt. xxiii. But when Bibles came to be common among them there was less occasion for this expedient.
And thou shalt bind them for a sign upon thine hand,....
The Nineteenth Century2 voices
A commentator
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown1802–1910
Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)
The form was as follows: Four pieces of parchment, inscribed, the first with Ex 13:2-10; the second with Ex 13:11-16; the third with De 6:1-8; and the fourth with De 11:18-21, were enclosed in a square case or box of tough skin, on the side of which was placed the Hebrew letter (shin), and bound round the forehead with a thong or ribbon.
A commentator
Albert Barnes1798–1870
Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869)
proposed
By adopting and regulating customary usages (e. g. Egyptian) Moses provides at once a check on superstition and a means of keeping the Divine Law in memory. On the “frontlets,” the “phylacteries” of the New Test. Mat 23:5, see Exo 13:16. On Deu 6:9; Deu 11:20 is based the Jewish usage of the mezuzah. This word denotes properly a door-post, as it is rendered here and in Exo 12:7, Exo 12:22; Exo 21:6 etc. Among the Jews however, it is the name given to the square piece of parchment, inscribed with Deu 6:4-9; Deu 11:13-21, which is rolled up in a small cylinder of wood or metal, and affixed to the right-hand post of every door in a Jewish house. The pious Jew touches the mezuzah on each occasion of passing, or kisses his finger, and speaks Psa 121:8 in the Hebrew language.
How the passage was read
On Deuteronomy 6:4-9On Deuteronomy 6:4-9
The confession Israel still prays twice a day
Verses 4 and 5 are the Shema (Hebrew for “Hear,” the passage's first word): “Hear, O Israel: the LORD our God, the LORD is one.” It is the closest thing Judaism has to a creed, prayed morning and evening by observant Jews to this day; the Mishnah, the first code of Jewish oral law (about AD 200), opens its very first page with the question of when the evening Shema is recited (Berakhot 1:1). When a lawyer asks Jesus which commandment is greatest, His answer begins with this text (Matthew 22:37).
The commands to bind these words “on your hand” and “between your eyes” and to write them “on your doorposts” are kept physically. Tefillin (called phylacteries in the Gospels) are two small leather boxes containing Scripture passages, bound with straps to the arm and forehead during weekday morning prayer. A mezuzah is a small case fixed to the doorpost of a Jewish home holding this passage on parchment. Jesus never criticizes either practice; His woe falls on tefillin made extra wide to be seen (Matthew 23:5), ostentation in a good thing, not the thing itself.
This section is reception history: how the passage was read and kept in the Jewish tradition. Where a reading parts from an essential of the Christian faith, the section says so at that point.
Sources: Mishnah Berakhot 1:1 (the Shema's recitation, the Mishnah's opening subject) · Mishnah Menachot 4:1 (tefillin of arm and head, each valid without the other)
The words behind it
8 Hebrew wordsEvery Hebrew word of this verse in the order it stands, with what it means and the door to its own study. The last column counts the times a word stands in the whole Bible: the rarer the word, the more the places it appears belong together.
| Hebrew | Sound | Meaning | Word study | In the Bible |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| וּקְשַׁרְתָּ֥ם | ukeshartam | and you will tie them | H7194 → | |
| לְא֖וֹת | leot | for a sign | H226 → | 80 times |
| עַל־ | ʾal- | on | H5921 → | 5755 times |
| יָדֶ֑ךָ | yadekha | hand your | H3027 → | 1618 times |
| וְהָי֥וּ | vehayu | and they will be | H1961 → | 3559 times |
| לְטֹטָפֹ֖ת | letotafot | for marks | H2903 → | |
| בֵּ֥ין | bein | between | H996 → | 407 times |
| עֵינֶֽיךָ׃ | ʾeineikha | eyes your | H5869 → | 887 times |
וּקְשַׁרְתָּ֥םand you will tie them
ukeshartamH7194 →
לְא֖וֹתfor a sign
leotH226 →80 times
עַל־on
ʾal-H5921 →5755 times
יָדֶ֑ךָhand your
yadekhaH3027 →1618 times
וְהָי֥וּand they will be
vehayuH1961 →3559 times
לְטֹטָפֹ֖תfor marks
letotafotH2903 →
בֵּ֥יןbetween
beinH996 →407 times
עֵינֶֽיךָ׃eyes your
ʾeineikhaH5869 →887 times
A shaded row is a word that stands 400 times or fewer in the Bible.
The walk
8 stopsEach card is a verse this one points to, and under it the verses that one points to in turn. Where several paths arrive at the same place, that place is listed first: the text keeps returning to it.
Through
Proverbs 3:3Never let loving devotion or faithfulness leave you; bind them around your neck, write them on the tablet of your heart.
it leads to
- 2 Corinthians 3:3
It is clear that you are a letter from Christ, the result of our ministry, written not with ink but with the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone but on…
Reached by 3 separate paths from here.
- Proverbs 7:3
Tie them to your fingers; write them on the tablet of your heart.
- Hebrews 10:16
“This is the covenant I will make with them after those days, declares the Lord. I will put My laws in their hearts and inscribe them on their minds.”
- 2 Corinthians 3:3
Through
Proverbs 7:3Tie them to your fingers; write them on the tablet of your heart.
it leads to
- Proverbs 3:3
Never let loving devotion or faithfulness leave you; bind them around your neck, write them on the tablet of your heart.
Reached by 2 separate paths from here.
- Deuteronomy 11:18–20
Fix these words of mine in your hearts and minds; tie them as reminders on your hands and bind them on your foreheads.
- Deuteronomy 6:8–9
Tie them as reminders on your hands and bind them on your foreheads.
- Jeremiah 31:33
“But this is the covenant I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the LORD. I will put My law in their minds and inscribe it on their hearts. And…
- Proverbs 3:3
Through
Deuteronomy 11:18Fix these words of mine in your hearts and minds; tie them as reminders on your hands and bind them on your foreheads.
it leads to
- Colossians 3:16
Let the word of Christ richly dwell within you as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom, and as you sing psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs with gratitude in your hearts to…
- Colossians 3:16
Where this verse is studied
On this page
Studies15
About Deuteronomy
This page draws on Adam Clarke, Commentary on the Bible; Albert Barnes, Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869); Alfred Edersheim, Sketches of Jewish Social Life; Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible; John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament (1748-1763) and Matthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible.