What Does Isaiah 48:6 Mean?
You have heard. See it all, and will you not declare it? I have made you hear new things from now, even guarded things, and you did not perceive them.
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
Thou hast heard, see all this; and will not ye declare it? I have shewed thee new things from this time, even hidden things, and thou didst not know them.THE KEY
The “hidden things” are named with a root meaning guarded or preserved: what is now revealed was kept beyond sight until it could be seen and declared.
THE MEANING
What is newly visible to you has been beyond your knowing until now. The verse moves from hearing and seeing to declaration: what is disclosed can now be spoken.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that what you have not known until now must be absent or forever inaccessible; the verse presents it as kept and now disclosed.
THE ROOT
נְצֻרוֹת
netsurot
GROWS FROM
נצר
natsar
to guard, keep, watch over, or preserve
“guarded things” in this verse is netsurot. The word translated “hidden” carries the sense of something kept or guarded. The verse’s new disclosure is not simply the appearance of what was absent; it is the uncovering of what had been preserved beyond your sight.
ALSO GROWS
notser: a keeper, guardian, or watcher
נֹצֵר
The same root names the one who watches over something, giving “hidden things” the sense of things kept from view.
netsor: keep or guard
נְצֹר
This imperative form makes explicit the keeping contained in “hidden things”: what is concealed is described through the language of guarding.
תַגִּידוּ
taggidu
GROWS FROM
נגד
nagad
to make known, tell, or bring into view
“declare it” in this verse is taggidu. The root behind “declare” carries the sense of making something known or bringing it before others. The verse’s movement runs from what was kept out of sight to what can be publicly named.
ALSO GROWS
neged: before, in front of, or opposite
נֶגֶד
The root’s spatial sense helps illuminate declaration as bringing what is hidden into view before others.
nagid: leader or ruler, one who stands in front
נָגִיד
This related word preserves the image of what is brought to the front, as the newly disclosed things are brought before hearers.
THE PATTERN
What is concealed can be disclosed, becoming knowledge that can be seen and spoken.
He uncovers the deep and hidden things. He knows what is in the darkness, and the light rests with him.Therefore do not fear them, for nothing is covered that will not be uncovered, nor hidden that will not be known.But God unveiled them to us through his breath, for the breath searches all things, even the depths of God.THE THREAD
You will keep in wholeness upon wholeness the one whose shaped mind rests upon you, for in you he leans his full weight.The word behind “keep” is תִּצֹּר (titsor), “you will guard or preserve,” from נצר (natsar), “to guard or preserve.” Isaiah uses that same root for the “hidden things”: the things kept from view and the keeping of a mind share one root.
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