What Does 1 Kings 14:15 Mean?
For the LORD shall strike Israel, as a reed sways in the waters, and he shall pluck Israel up out of this good ground, which he gave to their fathers, and shall scatter them beyond the river, because they made their groves, provoking the LORD to anger.
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
For the LORD shall smite Israel, as a reed is shaken in the water, and he shall root up Israel out of this good land, which he gave to their fathers, and shall scatter them beyond the river, because they have made their groves, provoking the LORD to anger.THE KEY
The Hebrew moves from soil to winnowing: Israel is uprooted from good ground, then scattered by a verb that also means to winnow.
THE MEANING
The verse places the reader before a severe image: the LORD strikes Israel, shakes it like a reed in water, pulls it from good ground, and scatters it beyond the river. It names Israel’s making of groves as what provokes the LORD to anger, holding both the displacement and the divine anger in full view.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The belief that a good inheritance makes loss impossible is undone here: the ground given can become the ground from which Israel is uprooted.
THE ROOT
וְנָתַשׁ
wə-nātaš
GROWS FROM
נתש
Pull out, pluck up, uproot.
“pluck up” in this verse is wə-nātaš. This root names the physical act of pulling something from where it is planted. Beside הָאֲדָמָה, ground or soil, it makes the loss concrete: Israel is lifted from its soil.
ALSO GROWS
lintōš: To pluck up, to root out.
לִנְתֹּשׁ
The infinitive carries the same act of removing something from where it is rooted.
yinnātešû: They will be uprooted.
יִנָּתְשׁוּ
This form shows the same root as something done to a people: they are pulled from their ground.
הָאֲדָמָה
hāʾădāmāh
GROWS FROM
אדם
The word-family linking ground or soil with the human formed from it.
The Hebrew noun is ground or soil, making the good land material and tangible. The same consonants appear in אָדָם, the human or ground-being, so the uprooting reaches into the people’s very connection to soil.
ALSO GROWS
ʾādām: Human; Adam, the ground-being.
אָדָם
The shared consonants link the human to the soil from which the name arises.
ʾādōm: Red, ruddy.
אָדֹם
This branch carries the earth’s coloring within the same consonantal family.
וְזֵרָה
wəzērāh
GROWS FROM
זרה
Scatter, winnow.
The English word scatter leaves the motion open; this Hebrew verb also means to winnow, throwing grain so that it is separated and carried. After the uprooting from soil, the verb casts the people in the image of what is driven from the threshing floor.
ALSO GROWS
zōreh: One who winnows or scatters.
זֹרֶה
The participle keeps the scattering motion active, as an act of throwing grain.
mizrēh: Winnowing fork or shovel.
מִזְרֶה
The instrument belongs to the same root and makes the grain-sifting image concrete.
THE PATTERN
Scripture depicts judgment as loss of settled ground, turning people or grain into what is driven from its place.
And I will scatter you among the nations, and I will pour out a sword after you. Your land shall be emptied, and your cities shall be a dry waste.The nations shall crash like the roar of many waters; but God shall rebuke them, and they shall flee far off, and shall be pursued like chaff of the mountains before the breath, and like a rolling thing before the whirlwind.Whose winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will thoroughly clean his threshing floor, and gather the wheat into the barn; but the chaff he will burn up with fire that cannot be put out.THE THREAD
Thus says the LORD against all my harmful neighbors, who touch the inheritance I have caused my people Israel to inherit. Behold, I will uproot them from their ground, and uproot the house of Judah from among them.Jeremiah uses the same root, נתש, for plucking the neighbors from their land that 1 Kings uses for uprooting Israel from the good ground. The repeated root carries the physical force of removing a people from their soil.
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