What Does Deuteronomy 31:14 Mean?
And the LORD said to Moses, Look, your days draw near for you to die. Call Joshua, and take your stand in the tent of meeting, so that I may charge him. And Moses and Joshua went and took their stand in the tent of meeting.
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 LORD said unto Moses, Behold, thy days approach that thou must die: call Joshua, and present yourselves in the tabernacle of the congregation, that I may give him a charge. And Moses and Joshua went, and presented themselves in the tabernacle of the congregation.THE KEY
The Hebrew root says Moses’ days are drawing near; death’s approach becomes the setting for a meeting where responsibility passes to the next bearer.
THE MEANING
The verse holds mortality and continuation together: your days move toward death, while a charge can still pass into the hands of the one who follows you. The ending of one life and the beginning of another occupy the same moment.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that approaching death makes a life’s charge disappear; responsibility can move forward as its bearer dies.
THE ROOT
קָרְבוּ
qārĕvū
GROWS FROM
ק־ר־ב
q-r-b
Draw near; approach.
English separates the approach of time from the act of drawing near. Here the days draw near to death, and the scene turns toward a meeting where a charge is entrusted.
ALSO GROWS
qorban: Drawing near; what is brought near.
קָרְבָּן
This branch shares the root of the approaching days and carries the idea of something brought near.
qerev: The inward part; the midst.
קֶרֶב
The root’s sense of nearness also reaches into what is within or at the center.
וַאֲצַוֶּנּוּ
va’atzavennu
GROWS FROM
צ־ו־ה
ts-v-h
Command; instruct; appoint.
The charge is an instruction entrusted by the speaker to Joshua. The same root runs through words for command and commandment, joining this personal handoff to a wider pattern of instruction.
ALSO GROWS
mitzvah: Commandment; instruction.
מִצְוָה
The shared root shows the charge as an instruction, not merely a title or transfer of status.
tsav: A command; directive.
צַו
This related form makes the force of what is entrusted explicit: Joshua receives a directive.
יְהוֹשֻׁעַ
Yehoshua
GROWS FROM
י־שׁ־ע
y-sh-ʿ
Deliver; bring to safety.
Joshua’s name joins the deliverance root with the divine name: “the LORD delivers.” The successor’s name carries deliverance into the scene where the charge changes hands.
ALSO GROWS
yeshuah: Deliverance.
יְשׁוּעָה
The name’s root connects Joshua with deliverance as an act of being brought out to safety.
moshia: Deliverer; one who brings to safety.
מוֹשִׁיעַ
This related form shows the root as an agent who carries deliverance forward.
THE PATTERN
Entrusted responsibility continues as it passes from one bearer to the next.
And the LORD said to Moses, Take Joshua the son of Nun, a man in whom is the breath, and lean your hand upon him. And stand him before Eleazar the priest, and before all the assembly, and give him a charge before their eyes.Now the days of David drew near that he should die, and he charged Solomon his son, saying,And these things you heard from me among many witnesses, place beside steady people who will be able to teach others also.THE THREAD
And the days of Israel drew near to die, and he called his son Joseph, and said to him, If now I have found favor in your eyes, set, I pray you, your hand under my thigh, and do with me faithful love and truth. Do not bury me, I pray you, in Egypt.Genesis uses the same Hebrew root, ק־ר־ב (q-r-b), meaning “draw near,” as Deuteronomy does for the days approaching death. In both verses, death’s nearness is followed by a summons to the next bearer: Moses calls Joshua, and Israel calls Joseph.
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