What Does 1 Samuel 18:21 Mean?

And Saul said, I will give her to him, that she may be a snare to him, and that the hand of the Philistines may be against him. And Saul said to David, Today you will become my son-in-law in one of the two.

1 Samuel 18:21 · 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

And Saul said, I will give him her, that she may be a snare to him, and that the hand of the Philistines may be against him. Wherefore Saul said to David, Thou shalt this day be my son in law in the one of the twain.

THE KEY

The snare is a promise of belonging engineered to place its recipient within an enemy’s reach.

THE MEANING

Here, a promised bond carries danger: marriage is used to place David within reach of hostile force. The offer is called a gift, while its purpose is to bring the Philistines’ power down on him.

WHAT THIS UNDOES

The verse undoes the belief that an offer of closeness proves care: a gift can be designed to expose its recipient to harm.

THE ROOT

מוֹקֵשׁ

moqesh

GROWS FROM

יקש

y-q-sh

To set a snare or entrap.

“snare” in this verse is moqesh. The verse makes marriage itself the trap, with Philistine force waiting at its opening. What looks like a gift of connection is designed as a device of capture.

ALSO GROWS

yaqash: To set a snare; to ensnare.

יָקַשׁ

This verb makes the trap deliberate: the danger is part of the offer’s design.

noqash: To be ensnared; to be caught in a trap.

נוֹקַשׁ

This form names the intended result for David: being caught within the danger Saul has arranged.

דָּוִד

dāwîd

GROWS FROM

דוד

d-w-d

Beloved; beloved one.

David’s name carries belovedness. That sharpens the verse’s collision: the person named for belovedness is made the target of a snare hidden inside a bond.

ALSO GROWS

dōd: Beloved; lover.

דּוֹד

This branch carries the beloved nature compressed in David’s name.

dōdîm: Loves; caresses.

דֹּדִים

The word’s intimate sense stands against the way a promised relationship is being used here, as a means of capture.

THE PATTERN

What appears to offer safety or sustenance can become a snare when it is made an instrument of capture.

And he shall be for a set-apart place; but for a stone of striking and a rock of stumbling to both houses of Israel, for a trap and for a snare to those who settle in Jerusalem.

Isaiah 8:14 · SDVThe same figure is both sanctuary and snare, showing how what seems to offer refuge can also become a point of capture.

Let their table become a snare before them, and their wholeness a trap.

Psalm 69:22 · SDVThe table that should sustain becomes a snare, turning provision into the means of entrapment.

And that they may come back to their senses out of the snare of the Slanderer, who have been caught alive by him into his will.

2 Timothy 2:26 · SDVThe snare is exposed by its result: people are caught and held captive.

THE THREAD

And Pharaoh's servants said to him, How long will this man be a snare to us? Let the men go, so that they may serve the LORD their God. Do you not yet perceive that Egypt has perished?

Exodus 10:7 · SDV

Both verses use ⁨מוֹקֵשׁ⁩ (moqesh), “snare.” In Exodus, the court sees release as a threat to those holding power; here, Saul engineers a trap for David, revealing how control turns freedom into danger.

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