What Does Genesis 11:21 Mean?
And Reu lived after he brought forth Serug two hundred and seven years, and brought forth sons and daughters.
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 Reu lived after he begat Serug two hundred and seven years, and begat sons and daughters.THE KEY
A life here is measured both by how long it continues and by what it brings into the world.
THE MEANING
This verse holds duration and continuation together: Reu’s life extends beyond Serug’s birth, and his line continues through sons and daughters. It places a life within a chain that reaches beyond its own beginning; being alive is both span and participation in what comes after.
THE ROOT
וַיּוֹלֶד
wayyoled from yālad
GROWS FROM
ילד
yalad
To bear, bring forth, or beget.
“brought forth” in this verse is wayyoled from yālad. English “begat” can sound like a bare genealogical marker, but Hebrew’s yalad also forms yeled, “child,” and toledot, “generations.” The repeated begetting is the seed of a whole line: one bringing-forth opens into generations.
ALSO GROWS
yeled: Child
יֶלֶד
The child is the one brought forth by the act named in the verse.
toledot: Generations; descendants or an account of what was brought forth
תּוֹלְדוֹת
This branch names the unfolding line that each act of begetting begins.
וַיְחִי
wayechi from ḥāyâ
GROWS FROM
חיה
chayah
To live, be alive, or remain alive.
English “lived” can sound like a date marker, while the same root appears in words for the living and for life. The verse gives Reu’s years as more than a number: his life continues beyond Serug’s birth.
ALSO GROWS
chai: Living; alive
חַי
The adjective keeps the living quality inside the same root as the verse’s “lived.”
chayyim: Life
חַיִּים
This branch makes visible the life carried by the verb that marks Reu’s years.
THE PATTERN
Life unfolds through generations, carrying one span into the next.
And Adam lived one hundred and thirty years, and brought forth a son in his own likeness, after his image, and called his name Seth.And God blessed them, and God said to them, "Bear fruit and multiply, and fill the earth, and tread it under your foot, and rule over the fish of the sea, and over the winged of the heavens, and over every living thing that creeps upon the earth."Truly, truly, I say to you. Unless a grain of wheat falls into the ground and dies, it remains alone. But if it dies, it bears much fruit.THE THREAD
And Adam lived one hundred and thirty years, and brought forth a son in his own likeness, after his image, and called his name Seth.Genesis 5:3 uses the same Hebrew roots as this verse for “lived” (חיה, chayah: to live) and “begat” (ילד, yalad: to bring forth). The shared pairing opens each genealogy as both a measure of life and a record of what that life brings forth.
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