What Does Amos 9:11 Mean?
In that day I will raise up the booth of David that is fallen, and close up its breaches; I will raise up its torn-down places, and I will build it as in the days of the ages.
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
In that day will I raise up the tabernacle of David that is fallen, and close up the breaches thereof; and I will raise up his ruins, and I will build it as in the days of old:THE KEY
The beloved shelter is restored by closing its breaches and raising its ruins.
THE MEANING
David (דָּוִד, Dāwīd, “beloved”) gives the fallen shelter a name shaped by belovedness. The verse speaks now of restoration that closes openings, raises ruins, and rebuilds a shelter with a remembered shape. Its repair reaches the places where the structure broke.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The belief that what has fallen is beyond repair dissolves here: the verse names breaches to close and ruins to raise.
THE ROOT
סֻכַּת
sukkat
GROWS FROM
סכך
s-k-k
Cover, shelter, screen over.
The word translated “tabernacle” is סֻכָּה (sukkah, booth or shelter), a covering place. The image is of a fallen shelter being restored as a place that covers and shelters again.
ALSO GROWS
sākhakh: Cover, screen over
סָכַךְ
The covering action behind the shelter makes its restoration concrete: what once sheltered is made sheltering again.
masakh: Screen, curtain
מָסָךְ
This branch is also a covering or barrier, echoing the enclosing structure that is rebuilt.
אָקִים
ʾāqîm
GROWS FROM
קום
q-w-m
Rise, stand, remain standing.
The same form אָקִים (ʾāqîm, I will raise up) appears twice: first for David’s fallen shelter and again for its ruins. Restoration here is repeated re-standing, reaching both the whole structure and what remains broken within it.
ALSO GROWS
hēqîm: Establish, raise up
הֵקִים
This causative form makes something stand, the same movement Amos names for the fallen shelter and its ruins.
maqom: Place
מָקוֹם
This noun comes from the same root of standing; the raised shelter becomes a place that can stand again.
פִּרְצֵיהֶן
pirṣehen
GROWS FROM
פרץ
p-r-ts
Break through, burst open.
“breaches” in this verse is pirṣehen. A breach is an opening made by breaking through, not just an empty space. The verse pairs that rupture with the act of closing it, naming repair as a direct answer to where the structure gave way.
ALSO GROWS
pāraṣ: Break through, burst out
פָּרַץ
This verb reveals the force behind a breach: an enclosure has been broken open.
pōrēṣ: Breaker, one who breaks through
פֹּרֵץ
Micah uses this form for the one who breaks open a way; Amos’s breaches mark openings that now need to be closed.
THE PATTERN
Restoration rebuilds the shelter by repairing its breach and raising what has fallen.
Those who come from you shall build the dry ruins of the ages. You shall raise up the foundations of generation to generation, and you shall be called the mender of the breach, the one who turns the paths back to dwell in.And they shall build the dry ruins of the ages, they shall raise up the former stunned places, and they shall make new the dry cities, the stunned places of many generations.After this I will turn back, and will build again the tent of David, which is fallen down, and I will build again the overturned places thereof, and I will set it upright.THE THREAD
Those who come from you shall build the dry ruins of the ages. You shall raise up the foundations of generation to generation, and you shall be called the mender of the breach, the one who turns the paths back to dwell in.Isaiah’s “breach” is פֶּרֶץ (perets, breach), from the root פָּרַץ (pāraṣ, break through), the same root as Amos’s “breaches.” Isaiah names the repair of that rupture directly, showing how restoration meets the specific place where the shelter has broken open.
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