Deuteronomy 8:2-3

8:2 Remember the whole way by which he¹ has brought you these forty years through the desert² so that he might, by humbling you, test you to see if you have it within you to keep his commandments or not. 8:3 So he humbled you by making you hungry and then feeding you with unfamiliar manna.³ He did this to teach you⁴ that humankind⁵ cannot live by bread⁶ alone, but also by everything that comes from the Lord’s mouth.⁷

Deuteronomy 8:16

8:16 fed you in the desert with manna (which your ancestors had never before known) so that he might by humbling you test you⁸ and eventually bring good to you.

¹tn Heb “the Lord your God.” The pronoun has been used in the translation for stylistic reasons.

²tn Or “wilderness” (so KJV, NRSV, NLT); likewise in v. 15.

³tn Heb “manna which you and your ancestors did not know.” By popular etymology the word “manna” comes from the Hebrew phrase מָן הוּא (man hu’), i.e., “What is it?” (Exod 16:15). The question remains unanswered to this very day. Elsewhere the material is said to be “white like coriander seed” with “a taste like honey cakes” (Exod 16:31; cf. Num 11:7). Modern attempts to associate it with various desert plants are unsuccessful for the text says it was a new thing and, furthermore, one that appeared and disappeared miraculously (Exod 16:21-27).

⁴tn Heb “in order to make known to you.” In the Hebrew text this statement is subordinated to what precedes, resulting in a very long sentence in English. The translation makes this statement a separate sentence for stylistic reasons.

⁵tn Heb “the man,” but in a generic sense, referring to the whole human race (“mankind” or “humankind”).

⁶tn The Hebrew term may refer to “food” in a more general sense (cf. CEV).

⁷sn Jesus quoted this text to the devil in the midst of his forty-day fast to make the point that spiritual nourishment is incomparably more important than mere physical bread (Matt 4:4; cf. Luke 4:4).

⁸tn Heb “in order to humble you and in order to test you.” See 8:2.