What Does Exodus 39:43 Mean?
And Moses saw all the work, and behold, they had made it as the LORD had commanded, even so they had made it, and Moses blessed 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 Moses did look upon all the work, and, behold, they had done it as the LORD had commanded, even so had they done it: and Moses blessed them.THE KEY
The blessing falls not on the work alone, but on the people whose hands brought it to completion.
THE MEANING
The verse meets you at the point where work is complete: what has been done as commanded is seen as a whole, and blessing rests on those who carried it through. Moses, whose name is linked to being drawn out, sees all the work and blesses its makers; completion includes recognition of the hands that made it.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The lie that finishing the task is all that matters, and the workers need no recognition, dissolves when Moses blesses them.
THE ROOT
וַיְבָרֶךְ
vayevarekh
GROWS FROM
ברך
B-R-K
To kneel; to bless.
“blessed” in this verse is vayevarekh. The Hebrew verb joins blessing with the image of a bent knee. Its branches connect the blessing Moses gives to a posture of recognition: after seeing the completed work, he honors the people whose hands carried it through.
ALSO GROWS
berekh: Knee
בֶּרֶךְ
This same-root word carries the image of bending the knee, a posture echoed in the act of blessing.
berakhah: Blessing
בְּרָכָה
Moses’ act is a berakhah spoken over the workers, making their completed labor visible and honored.
THE PATTERN
Completed work is seen as whole, and blessing or rest follows its completion.
And God blessed the seventh day and set it apart, for on it he had stopped from all his work which God had created and made.Blessed be the LORD, who has given rest to his people Israel, according to all that he spoke. Not one word of all his good word has fallen, which he spoke by the hand of Moses his servant.For the one who has entered into his settling has himself also settled from his own works, as God did from his.THE THREAD
And I will make you a great nation, and I will bless you, and I will make your name great, and be a blessing.The Hebrew root ברך (barakh) links the blessing Moses gives the workers with the blessing promised here. In both verses, blessing is received and then extends outward: here, the people who completed the work are blessed; there, the blessed one becomes a blessing.
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