What Does Deuteronomy 7:20 Mean?
Moreover the LORD your God will send the hornet among them, until those who are left, and those who hide themselves from you, perish.
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
Moreover the LORD thy God will send the hornet among them, until they that are left, and hide themselves from thee, be destroyed.THE KEY
The force the LORD sends reaches even those hiding from you, and the verse names their destruction as its endpoint.
THE MEANING
The verse names the LORD’s sending among the people and states its endpoint plainly: those who remain, including those hiding from you, are destroyed. Their hiding from you does not interrupt the destruction the verse describes.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The belief that concealment guarantees safety is undone here: the verse expressly includes those hiding from you among those destroyed.
THE ROOT
אָבֹד
avod from avad
GROWS FROM
אבד
perish; be lost
“perish” in this verse is avod from avad. The word rendered “destroyed” comes from אבד, whose range includes perishing and being lost. That root adds the sense of disappearance, while the verse’s stated endpoint remains the destruction of those still left, including those in hiding.
ALSO GROWS
oved: perishing; lost
אָבֵד
It shares the root’s language of perishing and being lost, echoing the fate of those who remain.
avaddon: destruction; ruin
אֲבַדּוֹן
This related noun names destruction directly, keeping the verse’s violent endpoint in view.
יְשַׁלַּח
yeshallach from shalach
GROWS FROM
שלח
send forth; release; let go
“send” in this verse is yeshallach from shalach. The Hebrew verb carries the sense of sending forth or releasing. Here that sending is forceful: hornets are released among the people, and the verse says the sending continues until those left and hidden are destroyed.
ALSO GROWS
mishloach: sending; dispatch
מִשְׁלוֹחַ
The related noun names an act of sending, as the verb does here with the hornets.
Shiloach: sent forth; the name of waters or a pool
שִׁלֹחַ
The same root appears in the name of waters sent forth; here the thing sent is hornets, and the stated effect is destruction.
וְהַנִּסְתָּרִים
veha-nistarim
GROWS FROM
סתר
hide; conceal
“hide themselves” in this verse is veha-nistarim. The phrase says they hide “from thee,” making concealment relative to the one addressed. The root does not turn their hiding into escape: the verse includes them in the same stated endpoint.
ALSO GROWS
seter: secret; hiding place
סֵתֶר
The related noun gives a name to concealment, the condition of those hiding in the verse.
histir: to hide; conceal
הִסְתִּיר
This verb from the same root describes the act the people are doing, while the verse says their concealment does not avert destruction.
THE PATTERN
Human concealment does not put anyone beyond the reach of what God sends or sees.
And I will send hornets before you, which shall drive out the Hivite, the Canaanite, and the Hittite from before you.And I sent the hornet before you, and it drove them out from before you, even the two kings of the Amorites. Not with your sword, nor with your bow.And no creation is hidden before him, but all things are naked and bared at the throat to the eyes of him to whom our account belongs.THE THREAD
And I will send hornets before you, which shall drive out the Hivite, the Canaanite, and the Hittite from before you.Exodus uses the same Hebrew verb, shalach (שָׁלַח), meaning “send forth,” alongside the hornet image. Deuteronomy carries the scene to its stark endpoint: those still remaining and hiding from you are included in the destruction.
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