diff --git a/command/hcl_printer.go b/command/hcl_printer.go
index 7947bb815ca1..677e5c0aaaa3 100644
--- a/command/hcl_printer.go
+++ b/command/hcl_printer.go
@@ -94,7 +94,7 @@ func (e *encodeState) encodeMap(m map[string]interface{}) error {
 	for i, k := range sortedKeys(m) {
 		v := m[k]
 
-		e.WriteString(k + " = ")
+		e.WriteString(fmt.Sprintf("%q = ", k))
 		err := e.encode(v)
 		if err != nil {
 			return err
diff --git a/command/hcl_printer_test.go b/command/hcl_printer_test.go
new file mode 100644
index 000000000000..af0abec6c881
--- /dev/null
+++ b/command/hcl_printer_test.go
@@ -0,0 +1,52 @@
+package command
+
+import "testing"
+
+// The command package has it's own HCL encoder to encode variables to push.
+// Make sure the variable we encode parse correctly
+func TestHCLEncoder_parse(t *testing.T) {
+	cases := []struct {
+		Name  string
+		Val   interface{}
+		Error bool
+	}{
+		{
+			Name: "int",
+			Val:  12345,
+		},
+		{
+			Name: "float",
+			Val:  1.2345,
+		},
+		{
+			Name: "string",
+			Val:  "terraform",
+		},
+		{
+			Name: "list",
+			Val:  []interface{}{"a", "b", "c"},
+		},
+		{
+			Name: "map",
+			Val: map[string]interface{}{
+				"a": 1,
+			},
+		},
+		// a numeric looking identifier requires quotes
+		{
+			Name: "map_with_quoted_key",
+			Val: map[string]interface{}{
+				"0.0.0.0/24": "mask",
+			},
+		},
+	}
+
+	for _, c := range cases {
+		t.Run(c.Name, func(t *testing.T) {
+			_, err := encodeHCL(c.Val)
+			if err != nil {
+				t.Fatal(err)
+			}
+		})
+	}
+}
diff --git a/command/push_test.go b/command/push_test.go
index 0f84611a8636..94573765fc3b 100644
--- a/command/push_test.go
+++ b/command/push_test.go
@@ -761,11 +761,12 @@ func testArchiveStr(t *testing.T, path string) []string {
 	return result
 }
 
+// we always quote map keys to be safe
 func pushTFVars() []atlas.TFVar {
 	return []atlas.TFVar{
 		{Key: "bar", Value: "foo", IsHCL: false},
 		{Key: "baz", Value: `{
-  A = "a"
+  "A" = "a"
 }`, IsHCL: true},
 		{Key: "fob", Value: `["a", "quotes \"in\" quotes"]`, IsHCL: true},
 		{Key: "foo", Value: "bar", IsHCL: false},