Later text
Luke 4:4BSB
But Jesus answered, "It is written: 'Man shall not live on bread alone.'"
Intertextuality Pair
Quotation
Later text
Luke 4:4BSB
But Jesus answered, "It is written: 'Man shall not live on bread alone.'"
Earlier text
He humbled you, and in your hunger He gave you manna to eat, which neither you nor your fathers had known, so that you might understand that man does not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of the LORD.
Jesus' first response to Satan in the wilderness — "It is written: 'Man shall not live on bread alone'" — is a direct quotation from Deuteronomy 8:3, where Moses reminds Israel that Yahweh humbled them with hunger in the wilderness to teach that dependence on God's word is the true sustenance of life. The original context recalls God's provision of manna, which Israel was to interpret as a word of instruction, not merely a meal. Jesus recapitulates Israel's wilderness testing — forty days paralleling Israel's forty years — but succeeds where Israel failed. His citation of Deuteronomy is not merely proof-texting; it demonstrates that he understands himself as the true Israel who trusts the Father's provision rather than grasping for independent sustenance. The Greek ouk epʾ artō monō zēsetai ho anthrōpos follows the LXX closely, and Jesus' use of "man" (anthrōpos) rather than "you" makes the answer universal and typological in scope.