What Does Deuteronomy 1:4 Mean?
After he had struck down Sihon the king of the Amorites, who settled in Heshbon, and Og the king of Bashan, who settled at Ashtaroth in Edrei.
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
After he had slain Sihon the king of the Amorites, which dwelt in Heshbon, and Og the king of Bashan, which dwelt at Astaroth in Edrei:THE KEY
The instruction that follows begins on the far side of the blow that brings the occupying powers down.
THE MEANING
You stand on the far side of what occupied the ground: the kings are already struck down. The next verse begins Moses’ instruction from this threshold, where their rule no longer holds the scene.
THE ROOT
הַכֹּתוֹ
hakkoto
GROWS FROM
נכה
N-K-H
To strike or smite; in this form, to strike down.
“struck down” in this verse is hakkoto. The Hebrew carries the force of a blow as well as the result of death. This strike marks the moment before the instruction that follows, joining the end of a ruler’s power to the beginning of a new hearing.
ALSO GROWS
nakah: To strike or smite.
נָכָה
It is the verb-root beneath “slain,” keeping the blow itself visible in the verse.
makkah: A blow or plague.
מַכָּה
This noun from the same root shows how the language can name both the striking and what the strike brings.
יֹשֵׁב
yoshev
GROWS FROM
ישב
Y-Sh-B
To sit, remain, or dwell.
The verse describes the kings as settled in places, not as distant or abstract threats. The strike falls on rulers with an established seat and hold on the ground.
ALSO GROWS
yashav: To sit or dwell.
יָשַׁב
This verb shares the root of “dwelt” and carries both the posture of sitting and the condition of inhabiting a place.
moshav: A dwelling, seat, or settlement.
מוֹשָׁב
This branch makes the settled nature of the kings’ rule tangible: they occupy a place and have a seat there.
THE PATTERN
A new movement into freedom or instruction begins after the power holding the ground is broken.
Across the Jordan, in the land of Moab, Moses began to make this instruction plain, saying,And the LORD delivered Israel that day out of the hand of the Egyptians, and Israel saw the Egyptians dead upon the lip of the sea.Since then the children share in common flesh and blood, he likewise shared in those same things with them, so that through death he might make idle the one who held the strength of death, the Slanderer.THE THREAD
And the LORD our God gave him before us, and we struck him, and his sons, and all his people.The same root נכה (nakah, “strike”) lies beneath “slain” here and “smote” there. The linked verse spells out the force compressed into the first: the blow falls on the king, his sons, and all his people.
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