What Does Exodus 9:5 Mean?
And the LORD set an appointed time, saying, Tomorrow the LORD shall do this thing in the 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
And the LORD appointed a set time, saying, To morrow the LORD shall do this thing in the land.THE KEY
The LORD gives the coming event a fixed moment: the Hebrew word for “set time” is rooted in appointing and meeting.
THE MEANING
A looming event can already have a named moment: tomorrow. Here the LORD sets its time and names its reach as the land.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The coming event is random or indefinite; the verse gives it a fixed time, tomorrow.
THE ROOT
מוֹעֵד
mo'ed
GROWS FROM
יעד
יעד (ya’ad): to appoint or designate, including setting a time or place for meeting.
“an appointed time” in this verse is mo'ed. The root יעד (ya’ad, appoint or designate) makes the mo’ed more than a vague date: it is a time deliberately set. Here, tomorrow is the boundary assigned to the event.
ALSO GROWS
ya'ad: to appoint, designate, or assign
יָעַד
This verb names the act beneath the appointed time: the moment is deliberately set.
no'ad: to be appointed; to meet or assemble by appointment
נוֹעַד
This form shows how the same root connects an appointment with a meeting set for a particular time.
דָּבָר
davar
GROWS FROM
דבר
דבר (davar): to speak; as a noun, a word, matter, or thing.
“this thing” in this verse is davar. The English “thing” is דָּבָר (davar), a word that also means “word” or “matter.” The event is named in speech before it unfolds, joining what the LORD says with what the LORD does.
ALSO GROWS
dibber: to speak or say
דִּבֵּר
This verbal form shares the root of “thing,” placing the announced words beside the matter that is to happen.
devarim: words or matters
דְּבָרִים
The plural form keeps speech and matters within the same root family, echoing the verse’s movement from saying to doing.
THE PATTERN
An event can be named in advance and assigned a particular time for its arrival.
And God said, "Let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens to part the day from the night, and let them be for signs, and for appointed times, and for days and years."You rise and have compassion on Zion, for it is time to favor her; the appointed time has come.Because he has set a day in which he will judge the settled world in alignment, by the man whom he has marked out, giving all people trust through raising him up from among the dead.THE THREAD
And God said, "Let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens to part the day from the night, and let them be for signs, and for appointed times, and for days and years."The “seasons” are מוֹעֲדִים (mo’adim, appointed times), the plural form of the word for the time set in Exodus. In Genesis, the lights mark appointed times; here, the LORD appoints the moment of an event.
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