What Does 2 Samuel 22:16 Mean?
The channels of the sea appear, and the foundations of the world are uncovered, at the shout of the LORD, at the blast of the breath of his nostrils.
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 the channels of the sea appeared, the foundations of the world were discovered, at the rebuking of the LORD, at the blast of the breath of his nostrils.THE KEY
The Hebrew stacks two breath-words before the LORD’s rebuke lays bare the sea’s channels and the world’s foundations.
THE MEANING
You stand within a world whose hidden depths are not sealed from the LORD: his rebuke lays bare the channels under the sea and the foundations beneath the world. His breath comes as a blast, so the unveiling carries force and upheaval, not gentleness.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The depths are sealed beyond the LORD’s reach, and the foundations beneath your world cannot be exposed or shaken.
THE ROOT
נִשְׁמַת
nishmat
GROWS FROM
נשם
nasham
To breathe; breath.
Here נִשְׁמַת (nishmat, “breath of”) precedes רוּחַ (ruach, “wind” or “breath”), putting two breath-images in sequence. The KJV’s “blast of the breath” preserves their force; the Hebrew also leaves wind and breath joined in the following word.
ALSO GROWS
neshamah: Breath; life-breath.
נְשָׁמָה
This related form makes clear that the image begins with breath, even where the KJV gives it the forceful shade “blast.”
nishmat: Breath of; the construct form used before another word.
נִשְׁמַת
In this phrase it leads into ruach, layering one breath-image upon another.
רוּחַ
ruach
GROWS FROM
רוח
ruach
Air in motion: wind or breath.
“blast” in this verse is ruach. The same word רוּחַ (ruach, “wind” or “breath”) names air moving across the sea and breath within a living body. Here it carries the force by which hidden sea-channels become visible, while the preceding נִשְׁמַת (nishmat, “breath of”) deepens the breath-image.
ALSO GROWS
ruach: Wind; moving air.
רוּחַ
This is the word’s outward movement, as the force that acts upon the sea.
ruhot: Winds; the plural form of ruach.
רוּחוֹת
The plural form keeps the same root attached to moving air, while the singular here also carries the sense of breath.
יִגָּלוּ
yiggallu
GROWS FROM
גלה
galah
To uncover or reveal.
The Hebrew verb pictures the foundations becoming uncovered. “Discovered” can sound like someone finding something; the root instead points to concealment being removed, so what was hidden comes into view.
ALSO GROWS
galah: To uncover; to reveal.
גָּלָה
This verb gives the root sense behind the foundations being shown.
nigleh: Uncovered; revealed.
נִגְלֶה
This related form expresses the exposed state of what had been hidden.
THE PATTERN
Scripture presents God’s breath as moving through creation: it drives waters aside, renews the earth, and cannot be confined to a visible path.
And Moses stretched out his hand over the sea, and the LORD made the sea go back by a strong breath of the east all that night, and made the sea dry ground, and the waters were split.You send out your breath, and they are created; you renew the face of the ground.The breath blows where it wills, and you hear its sound, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes; so is everyone who is born of breath.THE THREAD
And Moses stretched out his hand over the sea, and the LORD made the sea go back by a strong breath of the east all that night, and made the sea dry ground, and the waters were split.The Hebrew רוּחַ (ruach, “wind” or “breath”) moves the sea in both verses. In Exodus it turns the waters back; here the same word accompanies the exposure of the sea’s channels and the world’s foundations.
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