What Does Exodus 15:24 Mean?
And the people murmured against Moses and said, What shall we drink?
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 people murmured against Moses, saying, What shall we drink?THE KEY
The complaint itself carries the sense of lodging, and it is aimed at Moses, whose name remembers being drawn out of water.
THE MEANING
When what sustains you is uncertain, a question about need can become an accusation against the person you associate with the way forward. The need is real; the complaint gives that need a target.
THE ROOT
וַיִּלֹּנוּ
wayyillonu
GROWS FROM
לון
lûn
To lodge or remain overnight; in this verb, to murmur or complain.
“murmured” in this verse is wayyillonu. The verb shares its root with a word for lodging: the same Hebrew seed can describe staying overnight and voicing complaint. English gives only the complaint; Hebrew also lets the sound of something settling in remain audible.
ALSO GROWS
lālûn: To lodge, stay overnight.
לָלוּן
This branch makes the root’s sense of staying or settling audible beneath the word translated “murmured.”
telunah: Murmuring, complaint.
תְּלוּנָה
This noun carries the same root into the complaint itself, showing the shared seed behind the verb and the expressed grievance.
מֹשֶׁה
Mosheh
GROWS FROM
משה
m-sh-h
To draw out, especially to draw someone out of water.
Moses’s name is linked to being drawn out of water. At the water’s edge, the name carries a remembered rescue inside the person the people now address.
ALSO GROWS
mashah: To draw out.
מָשָׁה
This verb names the action tied to Moses’s name.
meshithihu: I drew him out.
מְשִׁיתִהוּ
This form appears in the naming explanation in Exodus 2:10, making the connection between Moses and being drawn out of water explicit.
THE PATTERN
When provision feels uncertain or arrives in an unexpected form, people direct complaint at the one they associate with it.
And the whole assembly of the children of Israel murmured against Moses and Aaron in the wilderness.The Jews then murmured at him, because he said, I am the bread which came down from heaven.Do not murmur, as some of them also murmured, and perished by the destroyer.THE THREAD
And Moses said, This shall be, when the LORD gives you flesh to eat in the evening, and bread until you are filled in the morning, for the LORD hears your murmurings which you murmur against him. And what are we? Your murmurings are not against us, but against the LORD.The same root appears again as “murmurings,” and Moses says the complaint reaches beyond him to the LORD. That makes the question here more than a grievance against a human guide: the verse exposes where the people believe their provision comes from.
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