What Does Exodus 39:29 Mean?
And a sash of fine twisted linen, and of blue, and purple, and scarlet, of stitched work, as the LORD commanded Moses.
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 a girdle of fine twined linen, and blue, and purple, and scarlet, of needlework; as the LORD commanded Moses.THE KEY
The Hebrew word for this sash’s “needlework” is also used to describe a body being “curiously wrought” in secret.
THE MEANING
The sash gathers fine linen, blue, purple, and scarlet into one embroidered band. Its pattern takes shape through deliberate craft, under the LORD’s command to Moses, whose name carries the image of being drawn out of water.
THE ROOT
מַעֲשֵׂה רֹקֵם
ma'aseh roqem
GROWS FROM
ר־ק־ם
r-q-m
To embroider or make a variegated pattern.
“stitched work” in this verse is ma'aseh roqem. This word-family describes threads worked into a pattern, not simply laid beside one another. The same root describes hidden bodily formation in Psalm 139:15, joining the sash and the body in one Hebrew image of patterned making.
ALSO GROWS
riqmah: Embroidery; embroidered work.
רִקְמָה
This names the patterned work made by the craft described in the verse.
ruqqamti: I was embroidered or intricately wrought.
רֻקַּמְתִּי
Psalm 139:15 uses this form for the speaker’s hidden formation.
מֹשֶׁה
Moshe
GROWS FROM
מ־שׁ־ה
m-sh-h
To draw out.
The name carries the image of being drawn out of water, which the English name Moses does not show. The verse names Moses as the one receiving the command, and the name itself holds that nature within it.
ALSO GROWS
meshithihu: I drew him out.
מְשִׁיתִהוּ
Exodus 2:10 connects this phrase with Moses’ name and being drawn out of the water.
Moshe: Moses; associated with being drawn out.
מֹשֶׁה
The name in this verse preserves the same image of drawing out.
THE PATTERN
Distinct materials and parts take coherent form as they are skillfully worked or joined together.
And the skillfully woven belt of the ephod, which is upon it, will be of the same, by its work, of gold, blue, purple, scarlet, and twisted fine linen.My bones are not hidden from you, as I am made in the hiding place, and embroidered in the lowest depths of the earth.from whom the whole body, joined together and knit by every joint that supplies, according to the working in the measure of each part, makes the growth of the body for the building up of itself in love.THE THREAD
My bones are not hidden from you, as I am made in the hiding place, and embroidered in the lowest depths of the earth.The verse’s מַעֲשֵׂה רֹקֵם (ma’aseh roqem), “embroidered work,” shares its root with רֻקַּמְתִּי (ruqqamti), “curiously wrought,” in Psalm 139:15. The same word-family describes the sash’s patterned craft and the body’s hidden formation.
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