What Does Exodus 6:1 Mean?
Now you shall see what I will do to the Great House, for with a gripping hand he shall let them go, and with a gripping hand he shall drive them out of his land.
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
Then the LORD said unto Moses, Now shalt thou see what I will do to Pharaoh: for with a strong hand shall he let them go, and with a strong hand shall he drive them out of his land.THE KEY
Freedom arrives when the hand that holds is overruled until it sends its captives out.
THE MEANING
The power that confines you does not get the final say; it can be made to release what it holds. The repeated strong hand makes this release forceful: what is held is sent out of the constricting place. “Now shalt thou see” names the moment that change becomes visible.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
This undoes the belief that freedom depends on the captor deciding to become kind.
THE ROOT
יְשַׁלְּחֵם
yeshallechem
GROWS FROM
שלח
Send forth, send away, release.
The word translated “let them go” carries the movement of sending forth. The captives are not merely loosened from a grip; they are sent out of Pharaoh’s land.
ALSO GROWS
shaliach: A messenger; one who is sent.
שָׁלִיחַ
The same root makes sending the defining action: release carries someone outward to a new place.
Shiloach: Sent; the name of the waters at Siloam.
שִׁלֹחַ
This branch links sending with the waters associated with restored sight, echoing “Now shalt thou see.”
חֲזָקָה
chazaqah
GROWS FROM
חזק
Be strong, strengthen, take hold.
“gripping hand” in this verse is chazaqah. English “strong” can sound like a fixed quality, while this root also names the action of strengthening and holding fast. Here strength is active force: the release happens under pressure, not through Pharaoh’s goodwill.
ALSO GROWS
chazaq: Strong, mighty.
חָזָק
This adjective describes the force behind the repeated hand in the verse.
vayechazzeq: He strengthened or made firm; a form of the same root used when the LORD hardens Pharaoh’s heart (Exodus 9:12).
וַיְחַזֵּק
The same root can describe Pharaoh’s resistance becoming firm and the force that overrules it.
THE PATTERN
Release breaks the hold that confines people and sends them into open life.
And the Egyptians gripped the people hard, to send them out of the land in haste; for they said, “We are all dead.”He brings them out of darkness and the valley of deepest darkness, and tears their bonds apart.The breath of the LORD is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the emptied. He has sent me to heal the shattered in heart, to herald release to the captives, and the return of sight for the blind, to send the crushed away into release.THE THREAD
And he said to him, Go, wash in the pool of Siloam, the Sent. So he went and washed, and came seeing.Siloam, interpreted as “Sent,” belongs to the same שָׁלַח (shalach) word family as “let them go” here. In Exodus, sending carries people out of the place that holds them; at Siloam, the sent waters become the place where sight emerges, echoing “Now shalt thou see.”
Read the SDV Bible.
Every verse has a Deep Dive in the app.
The iPhone Bible app with the Selah Decoded Version.
Does something in this reading look wrong? Tell us