What Does 2 Samuel 13:11 Mean?
And when she had brought them to him to eat, he gripped her, and said to her, Come, lie with me, my sister.
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 when she had brought them unto him to eat, he took hold of her, and said unto her, Come lie with me, my sister.THE KEY
The verse puts Amnon’s grip before his invitation, so “come lie with me” cannot be mistaken for consent.
THE MEANING
The grip comes first; Amnon’s words come while Tamar is already being held. His demand is coercion, and calling her “my sister” sharpens the betrayal of the kinship that should protect her.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
An intimate-sounding request does not make a forced act mutual; Amnon’s words do not erase the force of his grip.
THE ROOT
וַיַּחֲזֶק־בָּהּ
wayyaḥăzeq-bāh
GROWS FROM
חזק
ḥ-z-q
Be strong, make firm, prevail
“gripped” in this verse is wayyaḥăzeq-bāh. The verb וַיַּחֲזֶק (wayyaḥăzeq, “he took hold”) comes from חזק (ḥazaq, “be strong” or “make firm”). That strength here is force: the root makes the physical overpowering explicit before Amnon speaks.
ALSO GROWS
ḥāzāq: Strong, mighty
חָזָק
This related form makes the power in Amnon’s grasp audible; his strength is what lets him overpower Tamar.
ḥizzēq: Strengthen, make firm
חִזֵּק
The same root can describe making something firm; here its force is imposed on Tamar’s body.
שִׁכְבִי
shikhvî
GROWS FROM
שכב
sh-k-b
Lie down; in context, have sexual relations
“lie with” in this verse is shikhvî. שִׁכְבִי (shikhvî, “lie down”) belongs to a root that can describe lying down generally or sexual relations. The surrounding words make the sexual demand clear, while the prior grip makes clear that it is coercive, not mutual.
ALSO GROWS
miškāv: Bed, lying place
מִשְׁכָּב
This noun preserves the root’s ordinary physical sense of lying down, which the phrase “with me” makes sexual here.
wayyiškav: And he lay; in context, he lay with her
וַיִּשְׁכַּב
This form appears in Genesis 34:2 in another account where a man takes and harms a woman, echoing the coercion in this verse.
THE PATTERN
Sexual desire grants no right over another person; Scripture names force and exploitation as harm.
And when Shechem, son of Hamor the Hivite, prince of the land, saw her, he took her, and lay with her, and bent her low.But if a man finds the pledged young woman in the field, and the man grips her and lies down with her, then the man alone who lay down with her shall die.That no one step over and grasp more against his brother in any deed, because the Lord is the one who brings alignment out against all such, as we told you before and bore witness.THE THREAD
And when Shechem, son of Hamor the Hivite, prince of the land, saw her, he took her, and lay with her, and bent her low.The same root שכב (sh-k-b, “lie down” or, in context, “have sexual relations”) appears in both verses. In each, taking and harm surround the act, revealing that the text is naming coercion, not mutual intimacy.
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