What Does 1 Kings 14:12 Mean?
So rise, and go to your own house. When your feet come into the city, the child shall die.
Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.
Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.
King James wording
King James Version
Arise thou therefore, get thee to thine own house: and when thy feet enter into the city, the child shall die.THE KEY
The verse binds the child’s death to the woman’s arrival, making the city threshold the precise moment named by the prophecy.
THE MEANING
You stand inside a sentence where the woman is sent home and the child’s death is placed at the moment she enters the city. The words leave the loss bare and locate its timing at her arrival.
THE ROOT
בְבֹאָךְ
bevo’akha
GROWS FROM
בוא
b-w-ʾ
Come, arrive, enter.
“come into” in this verse is bevo’akha. The Hebrew verb gathers her coming into the city into one act, and the child’s death is bound to that arrival. The KJV image of feet entering makes the threshold concrete; the Hebrew verb holds the whole arrival in view.
ALSO GROWS
baʾ: came, comes
בָּא
The basic form names arrival, the movement that sets the timing here.
heviʾ: brought, caused to come
הֵבִיא
This form shows the root can describe bringing something into a place, extending the sense of arrival.
mavo: entrance, entry
מָבוֹא
This noun names the point of entry that the verse makes the moment of the child’s death.
הַיָּלֶד
hayyeled
GROWS FROM
ילד
y-l-d
Beget, bear, bring forth.
The word for child grows from the root of bearing and begetting. The verse places one who has been brought forth directly beside the declared dying, holding birth and loss together without softening either.
ALSO GROWS
yalad: beget, bear
יָלַד
This verb names the bringing forth that stands behind the word for child.
toledot: generations, lineages
תּוֹלְדוֹת
This branch extends the root of birth into the succession of those brought forth.
moledet: birth, birthplace, kindred
מוֹלֶדֶת
This form keeps the root’s connection to birth and origin visible.
יָמוּת
yamut
GROWS FROM
מות
m-w-t
Die, be dead.
“die” in this verse is yamut. The verb states the outcome directly, with no figurative softening. Placed after the arrival clause, it makes the timing precise: her coming into the city is when the child dies.
ALSO GROWS
mavet: death
מָוֶת
The noun names the outcome expressed by the verb in this verse.
met: dead, a dead person
מֵת
This form describes the state that follows the verse’s stated event.
mot: to die, dying
מוֹת
This form keeps the action of dying visible alongside the noun for death.
THE PATTERN
A declared word carries its consequence to its appointed moment.
And the LORD visited Sarah as he had said, and the LORD did for Sarah as he had spoken.And behold, you will be silent and unable to speak until the day these things come to be, because you did not lean your full weight on my words, which will be filled in their season.And Jeroboam's wife rose and went away, and came to Tirzah. And when she came to the threshold of the door, the child died.THE THREAD
And Jeroboam's wife rose and went away, and came to Tirzah. And when she came to the threshold of the door, the child died.The same בוא (b-w-ʾ, “come, arrive, enter”) root appears in both verses: here the child’s death is bound to her coming into the city, and in verse 17 her coming to Tirzah reaches the threshold as the child dies. The repeated arrival verb makes the prophecy’s timing visible in its fulfillment.
Read the SDV Bible.
Every verse has a Deep Dive in the app.
The iPhone Bible app with the Selah Decoded Version.
Does something in this reading look wrong? Tell us