Deuteronomy 11:10
For the land, which thou goest to possess, is not like the land of Egypt, from whence thou camest out, where, when the seed is sown, waters are brought in to water it after the manner of gardens.
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- Vulgate (Clementine)
- Terra enim, ad quam ingrederis possidendam, non est sicut terra Ægypti, de qua existi, ubi jacto semine in hortorum morem aquæ ducuntur irriguæ :
- Septuagint (Swete)
- ἔστιν γὰρ ἡ γῆ εἰς ἣν εἰσπορεύῃ ἐκεῖ κληρονομῆσαι αὐτήν, οὐχ ὥσπερ γῆ Αἰγύπτου ἐστίν, ὅθεν ἐκπεπόρευσθε ἐκεῖθεν, ὅταν σπείρωσιν τὸν σπόρον καὶ ποτίζωσιν τοῖς ποσὶν αὐτῶν ὡσεὶ κῆπον λαχανίας·
- Hebrew (WLC)
- כִּ֣י הָאָ֗רֶץ אֲשֶׁ֨ר אַתָּ֤ה בָא שָׁ֨מָּה֙ לְרִשְׁתָּ֔הּ לֹ֣א כְאֶ֤רֶץ מִצְרַ֨יִם֙ הִ֔וא אֲשֶׁ֥ר יְצָאתֶ֖ם מִשָּׁ֑ם אֲשֶׁ֤ר תִּזְרַע֙ אֶֽת זַרְעֲךָ֔ וְהִשְׁקִ֥יתָ בְרַגְלְךָ֖ כְּגַ֥ן הַיָּרָֽק
Haydock's commentary
Gardens. Hebrew, "where thou didst sow the seed, and water it with the foot, as a garden," by means of various machines or wheels, which were turned by the feet. (Philo)
Solinus (ii. 22, 36,) takes notice of this inconvenience in Egypt. The country is watered only by the Nile, which overflows for six weeks, about the beginning of June. Various canals or reservoirs are formed to preserve a sufficient supply of water during the remainder of the year. Pliny ([Natural History?] xviii.) observes, that "if the Nile rise less than 12, or more than 16 cubits high, famine is inevitable." (Calmet) See Genesis xlii. 3.
Prince Radzivil saw the canals of Egypt, which the people said had been dug by the Hebrews. Augustus ordered his soldiers to clean them out. (Suetonius, c. 18.)
After the seed was committed to the earth, it was necessary to water it frequently, as the sun would harden the soil too much. No rain falls in that part of Egypt where the Hebrews had dwelt, according to many respectable authors; (Tirinus) or at least what little may fall is not sufficient to keep the earth moist. Proclus allows that some showers are felt in Lower Egypt, which lies nearest to the Mediterranean Sea; and travellers often take notice of them, in their journeys from Alexandria to Memphis. Yet the country in general is destitute of this advantage, Zacharias xiv. 18. (Lloyd) (Haydock)
From Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary, 1859, in the transcription made by Todd Easton and kept online by John Paul Wohlschied at johnblood.gitlab.io/haydock.
The Fathers on this verse
St Jerome The Letters of St. Jerome, Paula and Eustochium to Marcella
What are God’s first words to Abraham? “Get thee out of thy country and from thy kindred unto a land that I will show thee.” The patriarch, the first to receive a promise of Christ, is here told to leave the Chaldees, to leave the city of confusion and its rehoboth or broad places; to leave also the plain of Shinar, where the tower of pride had been raised to heaven. He has to pass through the waves of this world, and to ford its rivers; those by which the saints sat down and wept when they remembered Zion, and Chebar’s flood, whence Ezekiel was carried to Jerusalem by the hair of his head. All this Abraham undergoes that he may dwell in a land of promise watered from above, and not like Egypt, from below, no producer of herbs for the weak and ailing, but a land that looks for the early and the latter rain from heaven. It is a land of hills and valleys, and stands high above the sea. …