What Does 1 Kings 2:20 Mean?

Then she said, I ask one small request of you. Please, do not turn my face away. And the king said to her, Ask, my mother, for I will not turn your face away.

1 Kings 2:20 · SDV

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.

This verse in the King James

King James wording

King James Version

Then she said, I desire one small petition of thee; I pray thee, say me not nay. And the king said unto her, Ask on, my mother: for I will not say thee nay.

THE KEY

The king gives his answer before he knows the request, making the first gift an open door to ask.

THE MEANING

You stand in the pause before a request’s content is spoken: she asks for one small petition, and the king answers before he hears what it is. The same Hebrew root runs through her petition and his invitation to ask, making welcome the first response. The verse leaves the request unnamed and lets you feel the assurance that precedes it.

WHAT THIS UNDOES

It undoes the belief that a request must be fully disclosed before it can be welcomed: here, the invitation comes before its contents.

THE ROOT

שאלה

she'elah

GROWS FROM

שאל

⁨שאל⁩ (sha’al): to ask or request.

English gives petition and ask different shapes, but the Hebrew repeats ⁨שאל⁩ in the request and the king’s command to ask. The repeated root makes his reply part of the request’s opening: before its outcome is known, the asking itself is welcomed.

ALSO GROWS

sho'elet: I ask; I am asking.

שֹׁאֶלֶת

This is the petitioner’s own verb in the verse, from the same root as the petition she names.

she'ali: Ask!

שְׁאֲלִי

This is the king’s reply, repeating the root as an invitation to voice the request.

Sha'ul: Asked for; requested.

שָׁאוּל

This name is formed from the same root, giving a personal shape to what is sought or asked for.

THE PATTERN

An invitation to ask opens room for an answer before the request’s full shape is known.

In Gibeon the LORD showed himself to Solomon in a dream by night, and God said, Ask what I shall give you.

1 Kings 3:5 · SDVThe invitation to ask comes before Solomon names what he wants.

Ask, and it will be given to you; search, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you.

Matthew 7:7 · SDVAsking is presented as the opening through which a response becomes possible.

But if any of you is left behind in wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all without doubling and without taunting, and it will be given him.

James 1:5 · SDVThe request for wisdom is met with generosity rather than reproach.

THE THREAD

In Gibeon the LORD showed himself to Solomon in a dream by night, and God said, Ask what I shall give you.

1 Kings 3:5 · SDV

The Hebrew root ⁨שאל⁩ (sha’al, ask) appears in both the king’s invitation here and God’s invitation to Solomon. In each verse, the invitation arrives before the request is named, so the opening to ask is already a response.

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