What Does Ezekiel 16:49 Mean?
Behold, this was the crookedness of your sister Sodom, the swelling, the fullness of bread, and the abundance of ease that were in her and in her daughters; and she did not strengthen the hand of the bowed ones and the lacking.
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
Behold, this was the iniquity of thy sister Sodom, pride, fulness of bread, and abundance of idleness was in her and in her daughters, neither did she strengthen the hand of the poor and needy.THE KEY
The verse measures Sodom’s full table by the hand it leaves unsupported.
THE MEANING
Where pride, a full table, and undisturbed ease coexist with a hand left unsupported, this verse names the condition crookedness. Abundance and comfort can be present while care is absent; the poor and needy remain without support.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The lie it dissolves is that abundance and ease, by themselves, prove a household or community is whole.
THE ROOT
הֶחֱזִיקָה
heḥĕzîqāh
GROWS FROM
חזק
To be firm or strong; to make firm, hold, or strengthen.
“strengthen” in this verse is heḥĕzîqāh. The verb carries the sense of making something firm and holding it up. The image is a hand, the capacity to act, left without support that could steady it; the same root elsewhere describes upholding a poor neighbor.
ALSO GROWS
ḥāzāq: Strong, firm.
חָזָק
The word shares the root’s sense of firmness: the hand that is not strengthened is left without that steadiness.
ḥōzeq: Strength, might.
חֹזֶק
This noun names the strength that the verse says was not given to the poor and needy.
heḥĕzîq: To hold, uphold, strengthen.
הֶחֱזִיק
This verb form shows that strengthening can mean actively holding someone up.
שִׂבְעַת
śivʿat
GROWS FROM
שׂבע
To be full or satisfied; to satisfy.
“fulness” in this verse is śivʿat. The phrase is שִׂבְעַת־לֶחֶם (śivʿat-leḥem, fullness of bread), set beside a hand left unsupported. The root spans being full and making another full, so the contrast is between abundance at the table and need that remains unsatisfied.
ALSO GROWS
śāvēaʿ: Full, sated, satisfied.
שָׂבֵעַ
It describes the condition of having enough, the condition named beside the unmet need.
śōvaʿ: Fullness, satiety.
שֹׂבַע
This noun shares the root’s idea of being filled and echoes the verse’s abundance of bread.
hiśbîaʿ: To satisfy, satiate.
הִשְׂבִּיעַ
This form shows the root can describe filling another, sharpening the contrast with the needy who remain without support.
הַשְׁקֵט
hashqēṭ
GROWS FROM
שקט
To be quiet, calm, or undisturbed; to quiet.
The phrase וְשַׁלְוַת הַשְׁקֵט (we-shalwat hashqēṭ, ease of quiet) gives the scene an undisturbed quality alongside its abundance. The root שקט (š-q-ṭ, quiet or calm) lets the verse’s “idleness” also be heard as ease that remains untroubled while need goes unsupported.
ALSO GROWS
shāqēṭ: Quiet, at rest, undisturbed.
שָׁקֵט
It names the calm condition present alongside the full table and the unsupported hand.
sheqet: Quiet, calm.
שֶׁקֶט
This noun shares the root’s sense of undisturbed quiet and echoes the verse’s ease.
hišqîṭ: To quiet, still, or make calm.
הִשְׁקִיט
This form shows the root can describe causing quiet, adding depth to the verse’s picture of ease.
THE PATTERN
Abundance is exposed by whether it becomes concrete support for the poor and needy.
If there is among you one in want, from one of your brothers, within any of your gates in the land the LORD your God gives you, you shall not harden your heart, nor close your hand from your brother, the one in want.She spreads her palm to the bowed, and stretches out her hands to the craving.And one of you says to them, Go in wholeness, be warmed and filled, but you do not give them what the body needs. What is the profit?THE THREAD
And if your brother totters, and his hand slips beside you, then you shall take hold of him, though he be a sojourner or one who settles beside you, that he may live with you.The Hebrew verb הֶחֱזַקְתָּ (heḥĕzaqta, you strengthen or uphold him) comes from the same root חזק (ḥazaq, to make firm) as Ezekiel’s “strengthen.” One verse names the hand left unsupported; the other names the act of upholding a poor neighbor so that he may live among you.
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