What Does 2 Samuel 15:31 Mean?
And one told David, saying, Ahithophel is in the bond with Absalom. And David said, O LORD, I pray you, overturn the counsel of Ahithophel into dullness.
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 one told David, saying, Ahithophel is among the conspirators with Absalom. And David said, O LORD, I pray thee, turn the counsel of Ahithophel into foolishness.THE KEY
The prayer targets the plot’s apparent wisdom itself, asking for its logic to collapse into folly.
THE MEANING
A threatening plan can sound so complete that it feels inevitable. This prayer asks that the counsel itself become foolish, so the scheme loses force from within. The verse leaves open the possibility that a plan that appears decisive can unravel at its own logic.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The lie this undoes is that a clever plan, backed by a trusted adviser, has already fixed the outcome.
THE ROOT
סַכֵּל
sakkel
GROWS FROM
סכל
To be foolish; in this form, to render foolish.
“turn ... into foolishness” in this verse is sakkel. The Hebrew verb asks that the counsel be made foolish; the root also names folly as a quality. The wording opens a deeper possibility: the scheme loses power when its apparent wisdom collapses into folly.
ALSO GROWS
sākāl: Foolish; a fool.
סָכָל
This names folly as a quality, the very condition the prayer asks to expose in the counsel.
sikhlût: Folly, foolishness.
סִכְלוּת
This noun makes the requested outcome explicit: the counsel is rendered folly.
עֲצַת
ʿatsat
GROWS FROM
יעץ
To advise, deliberate, or give counsel.
The Hebrew word for counsel grows from the verb to advise, and a related branch names the adviser. That makes the prayer’s target precise: it concerns the advice organizing the conspiracy, not only the people carrying it out.
ALSO GROWS
ʿēṣāh: Counsel, advice, or a plan.
עֵצָה
This is the noun in the verse: the plan itself is what the prayer asks to have rendered foolish.
yōʿēṣ: Adviser, counselor.
יוֹעֵץ
This related word brings the adviser into view alongside the advice, linking Ahithophel’s role to the counsel under challenge.
THE PATTERN
A scheme’s apparent wisdom can lose its force when its counsel is exposed or overturned.
He breaks the knots of the crafty, so their hands cannot carry them through.Many plans are in the heart of a man, but the counsel of the LORD, it will stand.Where is the wise one? Where is the scribe? Where is the arguer of this age? Has God not made foolish the wisdom of this world?THE THREAD
The counsel of Ahithophel, which he counseled in those days, was as though a man had asked at the word of God. So was all the counsel of Ahithophel, both with David and with Absalom.The word translated counsel is עֵצָה (ʿēṣāh), from יָעַץ (yaʿats), in both verses. Here the counsel is described as so authoritative it seems like an oracle; 15:31 then shows its vulnerability in the prayer that it be made foolish.
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