What Does Genesis 18:10 Mean?
And he said, I will surely turn back to you at this season of life, and look, Sarah your wife will have a son. And Sarah heard it at the tent opening, which was behind him.
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 he said, I will certainly return unto thee according to the time of life; and, lo, Sarah thy wife shall have a son. And Sarah heard it in the tent door, which was behind him.THE KEY
The promise is spoken as a return, literally, “returning I will return”, and its timing is named with the word for life.
THE MEANING
You meet a promise at the threshold of sight: it is spoken before the son appears, yet his arrival already has a time. Sarah hears from behind him at the tent door as life is named where it is not yet visible.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that what has not yet appeared is already impossible: the promise names a son and gives his coming a time.
THE ROOT
שׁוֹב אָשׁוּב
shov ashuv
GROWS FROM
שׁוּב
shuv
turn back, return
“surely turn back” in this verse is shov ashuv. The Hebrew intensifies return by saying shov ashuv, literally, “returning I will return.” This root also names the return of the year, joining the promise’s return with the arrival of a recurring season.
ALSO GROWS
shov: returning; the infinitive absolute form of “return”
שׁוֹב
It precedes ashuv in the verse, intensifying the certainty of the return.
teshuvat ha-shanah: the return of the year
תְּשׁוּבַת הַשָּׁנָה
The same root describes a year turning back into its season in 2 Samuel 11:1, echoing the appointed time here.
חַיָּה
ḥayyāh
GROWS FROM
חיה
chayah
live, be alive
“season of life” in this verse is ḥayyāh. The Hebrew phrase keeps life inside the timing: chayyah belongs to the word family of being alive. The promised son is placed at a “time of life,” so the moment is described through life, not only as a date on a calendar.
ALSO GROWS
ḥay: alive, living
חַי
This related form makes the life-family in “the time of life” concrete: what is named is living existence.
ḥayyim: life, living
חַיִּים
This common noun from the same root keeps the phrase connected to life as a condition, not merely a future point in time.
THE PATTERN
What is appointed to come into life arrives in its season, even while its completion is not yet visible.
To everything there is an appointed time, and a time for every delight under the heavens.For the vision is yet for the appointed time, and at the end it will breathe and not lie. Though it lingers, wait for it. Because it will surely come, it will not stay behind.While making good, let us not give out, for in its own season we reap, if we do not go slack.THE THREAD
And it came to pass at the turning of the year, at the time when kings go out to battle, that David sent Joab, and his servants with him, and all Israel. And they laid waste to the children of Ammon, and pressed in against Rabbah. But David settled in Jerusalem.The Hebrew phrase translated “after the year was expired” is literally “at the return of the year,” built from the same שׁוב root repeated as “return” here. The root ties return to a season coming around again, while this verse names the time as life.
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