What Does Isaiah 23:6 Mean?
Cross over to Tarshish; howl, you who settle the coast.
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
Pass ye over to Tarshish; howl, ye inhabitants of the isle.THE KEY
The people named as dwellers are told to cross, and to carry their howl with them.
THE MEANING
You are addressed among the dwellers of the coast: cross toward Tarshish and howl. Departure and grief occupy the same line; movement does not require the cry to stop.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The verse undoes the belief that you must finish grieving before you can move: the command to cross stands beside the command to howl.
THE ROOT
עִבְרוּ
ʿivru
GROWS FROM
ע־ב־ר
ʿ-b-r
To pass or cross over; to go through to the other side.
“Cross over” in this verse is ʿivru. The root makes the command a crossing into elsewhere, not simply a change of feeling. The verse holds that movement beside an audible grief.
ALSO GROWS
ever: Beyond; the other side.
עֵבֶר
This keeps the direction in “pass ye over” spatial: the command points toward an elsewhere.
ma’avar: A crossing or passage.
מַעֲבָר
The crossing is itself a passage through, not merely a change of mood.
יֹשְׁבֵי
yoshevê
GROWS FROM
י־ש־ב
y-sh-b
To sit or dwell; to remain settled in a place.
“you who settle the coast” in this verse is yoshevê. The address names people by their settledness, then tells them to cross. The verse moves its dwellers from staying in place to departure.
ALSO GROWS
yashav: To sit or dwell.
יָשַׁב
This verb gives the inhabitants’ title its sense of being settled in a place.
moshav: A dwelling or seat.
מוֹשָׁב
The related noun keeps a place of settlement in view as the verse commands its dwellers to leave.
הֵילִילוּ
heililu
GROWS FROM
י־ל־ל
y-l-l
To howl or wail.
The command gives grief a sound rather than asking it to disappear. Beside the crossing, the howl travels with the departure.
ALSO GROWS
yalal: To howl or wail.
יָלַל
This verb is the root expressed in the verse’s command to cry out.
yelalah: Wailing or a howl.
יְלָלָה
The noun preserves the cry as something heard, not a feeling hidden beneath the crossing.
THE PATTERN
Displacement can be spoken as movement and grief at once; crossing does not cancel the cry.
And all the land wept with a great voice, and all the people crossed over. The king himself also crossed the brook Kidron, and all the people crossed over toward the way of the wilderness.By the rivers of Babylon, there we settled, and we wept when we remembered Zion.THE THREAD
And all the land wept with a great voice, and all the people crossed over. The king himself also crossed the brook Kidron, and all the people crossed over toward the way of the wilderness.“Passed over” translates עָבַר (ʿavar, pass or cross over), the same root as Isaiah’s “Pass ye over.” Here that crossing is heard beside loud communal weeping, making the pairing of departure and howl visible in another verse.
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