What Does Ezekiel 14:16 Mean?
Though these three men were in it, as I live, says the Lord GOD, they shall snatch neither sons nor daughters; they alone shall be snatched, and the land shall become a wasteland.
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
Though these three men were in it, as I live, saith the Lord GOD, they shall deliver neither sons nor daughters; they only shall be delivered, but the land shall be desolate.THE KEY
The Hebrew repeats one rescue-root in opposite voices: the men cannot rescue their children, but they themselves are rescued.
THE MEANING
This verse puts a hard boundary around family bonds: one person’s deliverance does not secure another’s escape when the land is judged. The three men are rescued; their sons and daughters are not, and the land remains desolate.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that another person’s righteousness or closeness can guarantee your deliverance. Their rescue does not extend to their children.
THE ROOT
יַצִּילוּ
yatsilu
GROWS FROM
נצל
To snatch away, rescue, or escape.
“snatch neither sons nor daughters” in this verse is yatsilu. Hebrew repeats נצל (n-ṣ-l, natsal; rescue) in two different voices. One form names the rescue the men cannot bring to their children; the other names the rescue they receive themselves, making the boundary part of the grammar.
ALSO GROWS
yatsilu: They will rescue or deliver.
יַצִּילוּ
This form makes the men agents of rescue, but the verse says they cannot deliver their sons or daughters.
yinnatselu: They will be rescued.
יִנָּצֵלוּ
The voice shifts from rescuing another to being rescued themselves; the shared root marks how far their deliverance reaches.
THE PATTERN
When judgment names an individual, another person’s standing cannot be counted as that person’s own.
The fathers shall not be put to death for the sons, nor the sons for the fathers; each man shall be put to death for his own falling short.The living soul that is missing shall die. The son shall not bear the crookedness of the father, nor shall the father bear the crookedness of the son; the alignment of the aligned shall be upon him, and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon him.For each one carries his own load.THE THREAD
Though these three men, Noah, Daniel, and Job, were in it, they shall snatch their own living souls by their alignment, says the Lord GOD.This verse names Noah, Daniel, and Job, then uses the same root נצל (n-ṣ-l, natsal; rescue) to say their righteousness reaches only their own lives. Verse 16 repeats the root in opposite voices: they cannot rescue their children, while they themselves are rescued.
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