Deuteronomy 8 is organized as a new chiasm:

A. Remember and do commandments, 8:1-2

B. Manna and clothing in the wilderness, 8:3-4

C. Know in your heart that Yahweh disciplined you, 8:5-6

D. The good land, 8:7-10

C’. Do not be proud in heart, 8:11-14

B’. Manna and water, 8:15-17

A’. Remember and do, 8:18-20

At the center of this structure is a complex description of the “good land” that the Lord is giving to Israel. Verses 7-10 form a fairly clear chiasm within the chiasm of the chapter:

A. Good land, 7a

B. Land of water, with valleys and hills (Heb. har), 7b

C. Land of grains and fruit, 8a

D. Land of oil and honey, 8b

C’. Land of food (Heb. lechem, “bread”), 9a

B’. Land of iron, with copper in hills (Heb. har), 9b

A’. Good land, 10

At the center of the century of the chapter is the promise of a land of oil and honey, a variation of the usual “milk and honey.”

The phrase “good land” frames the central section (vv. 7, 10). “Good land” evokes the repeated declarations of Genesis 1 that the creation is “good,” and the description of the land fills out that creation reference in detail. The word “land” is used seven times in the D section (vv. 7 [2x], 8 [2x], 9 [2x], 10), and those seven descriptions of the land correspond to the seven days of creation.

1. The good land: Day 1, the creation is made good. Day 1 is the first time Yahweh pronounces something good, and through Moses He pronounces the land good.
2. A land of water: Day 2, the separation of waters. Verse 7’s description of the water system of the land is itself a small creation image that uses seven words: brooks, water, fountains (“eyes”), springs, flowing, valley, hills. It is indeed a well-watered land, like Eden.
3. A fruitful land producing grain and fruit: Day 3, the grain and fruit trees spring from the earth. Verse 8 lists five fruits from the land, starting with the lowest (barley, wheat), moving to vines, and then upward to trees (fig, pomegranate). The fruit of the earth makes a virtual ladder to heaven.
4. A land of olive oil and honey: Day 4, the rulers of the heavens. Olive oil is associated with rulers because it is used for anointing, for supplying a man with the ability to shine as a light among his people. Honey isn’t so obviously associated with rule, but honey is a reward for victory in battle (cf. Joshua conquering the land of honey; Samson defeating the lion and eating honey) or with energy for battle (Jonathan eating honey during battle). The child of Isaiah 7 eats curds and honey “at the time He knows to refuse good and choose evil,” that is, at the time he comes to royal maturity. Prophetic words are sometimes sweet as honey (cf. Ezekiel 3:3).
5. A land without scarcity, lacking nothing: Day 5, the first day of blessing and command. The promise of Deuteronomy 8:9a is that Israel will never lack bread, a sign of the blessing that will rest on the land.
6. A land of iron and copper: Day 6, creation of man. Adam was made of earth, and stones are often images of human beings in the Bible. Precious stones portray glorified human beings, and in a number of passages men of iron and copper appear, burnished men, no longer fragile clay but hardened into metal. Deuteronomy 8 refers to mining of copper, and that reference to metallurgy suggests another Day 6 association: Human beings become “iron” and “copper” as they mine and forget metals into tools, shelters, and machines. “Iron age” is not just a description of technology, but a way of describing the human way of being during that period of time.
7. A good land of blessing and satisfaction: Day 7, Sabbath. In the good land, Israel enters into Yahweh’s goodness, into His rest and satisfaction with creation. On the Sabbath, Israel enters into the gift of the good land, and into the blessing of God. The Sabbath (shabat) is a day of satiation and satisfaction (saba’, the verb used in Deuteronomy 8:10).

In short, the gift of the land blossoms into seven gifts, the gifts of land, water, food, oil and honey, abundance, glorified earth, satisfaction. To receive the gift of the land is to receive the blessing of Yahweh. the gift of new creation.