What Does 1 Samuel 21:14 Mean?
Then Achish said to his servants, Look, you see the man is raving. Why then have you brought him to me?
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
Then said Achish unto his servants, Lo, ye see the man is mad: wherefore then have ye brought him to me?THE KEY
Achish’s label turns a visible appearance into a verdict that closes the door to the person.
THE MEANING
When you are reduced to a label, the room can stop asking who you are; Achish moves straight from calling the man mad to asking why he was brought. The verse shows how a judgment based on appearances can harden into exclusion.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
A label based on what someone appears to be does not reveal the whole person.
THE ROOT
מִשְׁתַּגֵּעַ
mishtagea
GROWS FROM
שגע
shagaʿ
To be mad or behave wildly.
“raving” in this verse is mishtagea. The form describes someone acting mad, naming what Achish sees rather than revealing the man’s inner state. The same root supplies words for both a person called mad and madness itself, showing how an appearance can become an identity in the observer’s eyes.
ALSO GROWS
meshugga: Mad; a madman.
מְשֻׁגָּע
This word labels a person by the behavior others perceive, as in 2 Kings 9:11.
shigga'on: Madness; derangement.
שִׁגָּעוֹן
The noun names the condition itself, extending the same root from a person’s apparent behavior to a category of mind.
THE PATTERN
When a person’s words or conduct unsettle the room, observers can use the label of madness to shut down the question of what they are saying.
Then Jehu came out to the servants of his lord, and one said to him, Is all whole? Why did this mad fellow come to you? And he said to them, You know the man, and his speech.The days of the visitation have come, the days of the repayment have come. Israel shall perceive it. The prophet is a fool, the man of breath is mad, for the multitude of your crookedness, and the great hatred.And as he thus spoke for himself, Festus said with a great voice, Paul, you are beside yourself; the many letters have turned you to madness.THE THREAD
Do I lack raving men, that you have brought this one to rave before me? Shall this one come into my house?The next verse repeats the שגע root in “mad men” and “play the mad man,” making the label explicit. Achish turns what he sees into a category, then uses that category to deny the man entry to his house.
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