What Does Exodus 1:7 Mean?
And the children of Israel bore fruit and swarmed and multiplied and grew exceedingly mighty; and the land was filled with them.
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 children of Israel were fruitful, and increased abundantly, and multiplied, and waxed exceeding mighty; and the land was filled with them.THE KEY
The phrase rendered “increased abundantly” is literally “swarmed”: this is life teeming across a place, not merely a number going up.
THE MEANING
The verse lets you see growth now as more than a rising count: it bears fruit, swarms, multiplies, grows strong, and fills its place. Its verbs accumulate until abundance becomes visible across the land.
THE ROOT
וַיִּשְׁרְצוּ
vayyishretsu
GROWS FROM
ש־ר־ץ
sh-r-ts
To swarm or teem with living abundance.
“swarmed” in this verse is vayyishretsu. This verb makes increase feel alive and in motion. The English phrase conveys abundance, while the Hebrew also evokes life spreading in a teeming mass.
ALSO GROWS
sherets: Swarming creature; teeming thing
שֶׁרֶץ
The noun names life that appears in a swarm, giving the verse’s increase a creaturely, teeming quality.
sharats: To swarm; to teem
שָׁרַץ
The verb makes abundance active and spreading rather than merely counted.
וַיִּרְבוּ
vayyirbu
GROWS FROM
ר־ב־ה
r-b-h
To become many; to increase in number or abundance.
“multiplied” in this verse is vayyirbu. This root brings the multiplication into focus: the people become many. Beside the image of swarming, it shows abundance both as a living surge and as growing number.
ALSO GROWS
hirbah: He increased; he made many
הִרְבָּה
This causative form shows the same root expressing an increase brought about in others.
harbeh: Much; many; abundantly
הַרְבֵּה
This form describes the abundance that multiplication produces.
וַתִּמָּלֵא
vattimmale
GROWS FROM
מ־ל־א
m-l-ʾ
To fill; to become full.
The verse’s movement ends not with a count but with a place filled. The land becomes the visible measure of the people’s abundance.
ALSO GROWS
male: Full; to be full
מָלֵא
This form names the state reached when the land is filled.
melo: Fullness
מְלוֹא
The noun form shows the same root holding not only the act of filling but also the fullness that remains.
THE PATTERN
Life expands through fruitfulness and multiplication until it fills the place where it grows.
And God blessed them, saying, "Bear fruit and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas, and let the birds multiply upon the earth."And God blessed Noah and his sons, and said to them, Bear fruit, and multiply, and fill the earth.And the word of God grew, and the number of the disciples multiplied in Jerusalem greatly, and a great crowd of the priests heard and responded by leaning their weight.THE THREAD
And God said, "Let the waters swarm with swarming living soul, and let birds fly over the earth, upon the face of the expanse of the heavens."The phrase “bring forth abundantly” uses the same Hebrew root as “increased abundantly” here: שָׁרַץ (sharats), to swarm or teem. In Genesis it describes living creatures filling the waters; here the same word pictures a people’s growth as life spreading through a place.
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