What Does Deuteronomy 22:9 Mean?
You shall not sow your vineyard with mixed kinds, lest the fullness of the seed you have sown and the yield of the vineyard become set apart.
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
Thou shalt not sow thy vineyard with divers seeds: lest the fruit of thy seed which thou hast sown, and the fruit of thy vineyard, be defiled.THE KEY
The verb translated “defiled” comes from a root for being set apart as sacred, so the mixed planting changes the harvest’s status.
THE MEANING
The verse shows mixed planting affecting the whole yield: both what grows from the seed and what the vineyard produces become marked as set apart. The Hebrew verb carries the sense of consecration, giving the consequence a sacred dimension.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The assumption that different seeds can share a planting without changing the standing of its harvest is undone: the verse says the yield itself becomes set apart.
THE ROOT
תִּקְדַּשׁ
tiqdash
GROWS FROM
קדש
q-d-sh
to set apart; to consecrate as sacred
“become set apart” in this verse is tiqdash. The verb translated “defiled” belongs to the root of setting something apart as sacred. The yield is marked with a changed status, so the consequence reaches beyond how the crop looks or grows.
ALSO GROWS
qādôsh: set apart; sacred
קָדוֹשׁ
This familiar branch makes the sacred sense audible in the verb describing the harvest.
miqdāsh: sanctuary; set-apart place
מִקְדָּשׁ
The sanctuary is a place marked as set apart, showing the status carried by this root.
זֶרַע
zeraʿ
GROWS FROM
זרע
z-r-ʿ
seed; to sow; offspring
English separates “seed” from “sow,” while Hebrew holds them in one root-family. The verse’s wording links the act of planting to what emerges from it: the seed sown and the harvest remain joined.
ALSO GROWS
zāraʿ: to sow
זָרַע
This verb names the planting act in the verse and shares its root with “seed.”
zeraʿ: seed; offspring
זֶרַע
The same word-family can name both what is planted and what follows from it.
THE PATTERN
Creation and cultivation preserve distinctions between kinds, and mixing them changes what the planting yields.
And God said, "Let the earth sprout green growth, the seed-bearing plant, and the fruit tree making fruit after its kind, whose seed is in it, upon the earth." And it was so.You shall guard my statutes. You shall not let your livestock multiply with another kind; you shall not sow your field with two kinds of seed; nor shall a garment of two kinds, linen and wool, come upon you.But God gives it a body as he willed, and to each seed its own body. Not all flesh is the same flesh; but there is one flesh of humans, another flesh of the herd, another flesh of the winged, and another of fish.THE THREAD
And God said, "Let the earth sprout green growth, the seed-bearing plant, and the fruit tree making fruit after its kind, whose seed is in it, upon the earth." And it was so.Genesis and Deuteronomy use זֶרַע (zeraʿ), the same Hebrew root for “seed” and “sow.” Genesis describes seed-bearing plants yielding according to kind; Deuteronomy shows what happens when distinct seeds are brought together in one planting.
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