What Does Isaiah 49:15 Mean?
Can a woman forget her nursing child, that she would not have compassion on the son of her womb? Even they may forget, but I will not forget you.
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
Can a woman forget her sucking child, that she should not have compassion on the son of her womb? yea, they may forget, yet will I not forget thee.THE KEY
The word for compassion shares its root with the word for womb, so the verse pictures care as life held close, and says even that bond’s failure cannot make God forget you.
THE MEANING
The verse speaks to you where care has failed: a mother may forget, but God does not forget you. Human abandonment does not define whether you remain held in divine remembrance.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
When the person who should hold me forgets me, I am forgotten by God too.
THE ROOT
תְרַחֵם
terachem
GROWS FROM
רחם
racham
Womb; the root also carries the sense of tender compassion.
The Hebrew word for compassion belongs to the same root as the word for womb. Compassion here is more than a feeling: it is care pictured as life held close, and God’s promise remains even when the strongest human bond is imagined failing.
ALSO GROWS
rechem: Womb.
רֶחֶם
This is the bodily image beneath the verse’s phrase “son of her womb,” linking compassion with the place where life is carried.
rachamim: Compassion; tender mercies.
רַחֲמִים
This noun carries the same root into the language of compassion, showing that the verse’s two images share one Hebrew seed.
rachum: Compassionate; tender.
רַחוּם
This word describes the quality of compassion that the verse says remains even when a human mother might forget.
THE PATTERN
When human bonds fail, God’s presence remains.
When my father and my mother let go of me, then the LORD gathers me in.Hold fast and be firm. Do not fear, and do not quake before them. For the LORD your God is the one who walks with you. He will not release you, nor leave you.Let your way of living be without the love of silver, and let what is at hand be enough, for he has said, I will never let go of you, nor leave you behind.THE THREAD
As a father has compassion on his children, so the LORD has compassion on those in awe of him.Isaiah’s verb for compassion and the Psalm’s “pitieth” share the root that also names the womb. The same tenderness appears through a mother’s image in Isaiah and a father’s image in the Psalm.
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