What Does Ezekiel 46:18 Mean?
Moreover the lifted one does not take of the people's portion by pressing, to drive them out of their holding; but he gives his sons a portion out of his own holding, so that my people are not scattered, each one from his holding.
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
Moreover the prince shall not take of the people’s inheritance by oppression, to thrust them out of their possession; but he shall give his sons inheritance out of his own possession: that my people be not scattered every man from his possession.THE KEY
The prince may pass an inheritance to his sons only from his own holding, never by uprooting the people from theirs.
THE MEANING
The verse sets a boundary around power: the prince’s sons receive from his own possession, while each person keeps a place of belonging. Taking the people’s inheritance scatters them from that place; giving from one’s own holding does not. That boundary speaks wherever one person’s security is built from another’s displacement.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The lie this undoes is that a ruler’s authority makes the people’s inheritance available to secure his own family.
THE ROOT
אֲחֻזָּה
ʾăḥuzzāh
GROWS FROM
אחז
to grasp, hold, or take hold
The verse repeats אֲחֻזָּה (ʾăḥuzzāh, holding or possession) for the people’s holdings and the prince’s own. The root אחז (ʾ-ḥ-z, grasp or hold) makes the boundary vivid: the prince’s reach does not turn another person’s holding into his own.
ALSO GROWS
ʾāḥaz: to grasp or hold
אָחַז
The verb gives the shared root beneath the verse’s repeated language of possession.
ʾăḥuzzāh: a holding, estate, or possession
אֲחֻזָּה
This is the word used for the people’s holdings and the prince’s own, placing both under the same boundary.
נַחֲלָה
naḥălāh inheritance or
GROWS FROM
נחל
to inherit or receive an allotted share
“portion” in this verse is naḥălāh inheritance or. The same word names the people’s inheritance and what the prince gives his sons. The verse does not forbid inheritance; it binds the passing of a share to the holder’s own possession, so the prince’s family does not gain by taking the people’s share.
ALSO GROWS
nāḥal: to inherit or receive as an allotment
נָחַל
The verb shows inheritance as receiving a share, not as permission to seize someone else’s.
naḥălāh: inheritance or allotted portion
נַחֲלָה
The noun repeats for the people and the prince’s sons, linking their shares while distinguishing whose holding each comes from.
יָפוּצוּ
yāfūṣū they will
GROWS FROM
פוץ
to scatter or spread apart
“scattered” in this verse is yāfūṣū they will. The verse names scattering as the consequence of being driven from one’s possession. The root holds together the material loss of a place and the dispersal of the people who belong there.
ALSO GROWS
pūṣ: to scatter or spread abroad
פּוּץ
The verb describes the dispersal the verse seeks to prevent.
təfūṣāh: dispersion or scattering
תְּפוּצָה
This noun from the same root makes clear that scattering is a condition of being spread away from one’s place.
THE PATTERN
A person’s rightful share is protected from seizure by those with greater power.
You shall not move your neighbor's boundary, which the former ones marked out in your holding, which you shall take as your share in the land the LORD your God gives you to take hold of.They covet fields and tear them away, and houses, and carry them off. So they press a man and his house, even a man and his inheritance.Look, the wages of the workers who mowed your fields, stripped away by your fraud, cry out, and the cries of those who reaped have gone into the ears of the LORD of hosts.THE THREAD
And Naboth said to Ahab, The LORD keep it far from me, that I should give the holding of my fathers to you.The Hebrew נַחֲלָה (naḥălāh, inheritance or allotted share) links this verse with Ezekiel’s repeated word for inheritance. Here too, a ruler’s desire meets a boundary: a family’s inheritance is not simply his to claim.
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