What Does 2 Samuel 1:14 Mean?
And David said to him, How were you not afraid to stretch out your hand and destroy the LORD's anointed one?
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
And David said unto him, How wast thou not afraid to stretch forth thine hand to destroy the LORD’s anointed?THE KEY
The hand is sent toward destruction, and “the LORD’s anointed” names the boundary it crosses.
THE MEANING
The question meets the moment before harm becomes action: a hand reaches toward destruction, and a life named as the LORD’s anointed is treated as disposable. The verse asks what could make someone unafraid to cross that boundary.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that having power over a life makes that life yours to destroy.
THE ROOT
לִשְׁלֹחַ
lishloach
GROWS FROM
שָׁלַח
shalach
Send forth, release, or let go.
“stretch out your hand” in this verse is lishloach. The phrase translated “stretch forth” is literally the act of sending out the hand. The root also appears in Shiloach, “Sent,” the pool associated with restored sight; what is sent forth can carry destruction or restoration.
ALSO GROWS
send away: Send away or release.
שִׁלֵּחַ
This branch makes the hand’s movement an act of release into motion, rather than merely a gesture.
Shiloach: Sent; the name behind Siloam.
שִׁלֹחַ
John 9:7 glosses Siloam as “Sent” and links its waters with restored sight, showing another direction this root’s sending can take.
מְשִׁיחַ
meshiach
GROWS FROM
מָשַׁח
mashach
Smear or anoint.
“anointed one” in this verse is meshiach. “The LORD’s anointed” names someone through the act of anointing, not just through an honorific label. The verse sets the hand’s movement against a person whose anointing is named as belonging to the LORD.
ALSO GROWS
anoint: Apply oil or mark by anointing.
מָשַׁח
The verb behind “anointed” keeps the identity tied to the act that marks the person.
anointing oil: Anointing oil.
מִשְׁחָה
This related noun shows the physical practice carried in the root behind the title.
THE PATTERN
Scripture places a limit on human hands that claim the right to take or destroy life.
Whoever pours out the blood of man, by man his blood shall be poured out, for in the shape of God he made man.Saying, "Do not touch my anointed ones, and do my prophets no harm."Then Jesus said to him, Turn your sword back to its place, for all who take up the sword will perish by the sword.THE THREAD
And he said to his men, The LORD forbid that I should do this thing to my lord, the LORD's anointed one, to stretch out my hand against him, for he is the anointed one of the LORD.The same two roots meet here: shalach sends the hand forth, and mashach names the anointed one. Together the verses focus attention on the hand’s direction toward a person whose anointing is named as the LORD’s.
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