What Does Exodus 18:15 Mean?
And Moses said to his father-in-law, Because the people come to me to seek God.
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 Moses said unto his father in law, Because the people come unto me to enquire of God:THE KEY
The one named “drawn out” now stands where others come to seek God.
THE MEANING
A question can be a way of coming toward God. The people come to Moses with uncertainty, and their aim is to seek what God makes known; the seeking itself is already movement toward its source.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The belief that uncertainty disqualifies you from approaching God dissolves here: the people come precisely because they need to enquire.
THE ROOT
לִדְרֹשׁ
lidrosh
GROWS FROM
דרש
darash
to seek, inquire, or search out
The verb translated “enquire” carries the motion of seeking, not just asking a question. The people come to seek God; the question is the form their seeking takes.
ALSO GROWS
doresh: one who seeks or inquires
דּוֹרֵשׁ
The seeker is defined by movement toward what they want to know, echoing the people’s approach to Moses.
midrash: inquiry or exposition
מִדְרָשׁ
This later form of the same root names the work of seeking meaning in a text, extending the root’s sense of inquiry beyond a single question.
מֹשֶׁה
Moshe
GROWS FROM
משה
mashah
to draw out, especially from water
Exodus 2:10 links Moses’s name to being drawn out of the water. Here, the one drawn out becomes the person others approach as they seek God, a name that quietly carries an image of emergence.
ALSO GROWS
mashah: to draw out
מָשָׁה
Exodus 2:10 uses this verb for drawing Moses out of the water, giving the name its image of emergence.
Moshe: Moses; the name is linked to being drawn out of water
מֹשֶׁה
The name adds a subtle layer to his role here: others come to him while seeking what God makes known.
THE PATTERN
Seeking God is a movement that can meet a response and lead toward finding.
I seek the LORD, and he answers me, and snatches me out of every place of dread.And you will seek me and find me, when you search for me with all your heart.That they would seek God, if perhaps they might feel for him and find him, though he is not far from each one of us.THE THREAD
I seek the LORD, and he answers me, and snatches me out of every place of dread.The verb rendered “enquire” here is the same Hebrew verb rendered “sought” in this psalm. That shared root opens the scene as active seeking: bringing a question toward God is itself a way of seeking, and the psalm says that seeking is heard.
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