What Does Isaiah 61:5 Mean?
And strangers shall stand and feed your flocks, and the sons of the foreigner shall be your plowmen and your vinedressers.
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 strangers shall stand and feed your flocks, and the sons of the alien shall be your plowmen and your vinedressers.THE KEY
The one marked as foreign is pictured as the caretaker of your nourishment and future fruit.
THE MEANING
The verse speaks of a life where the person marked as outside tends what feeds and fruits your world. Your flock, field, and vineyard are sustained through shared work across the boundary of the familiar. Belonging takes visible shape in care that preserves nourishment and cultivates future fruit.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that only those who already belong can care for what sustains you.
THE ROOT
נֵכָר
nēkhār
GROWS FROM
נכר
To recognize, distinguish, or mark as foreign.
“foreigner” in this verse is nēkhār. The Hebrew word for “alien” names the person regarded as outside, while the same root also forms a verb meaning “recognize.” Yet the line gives this person a place in the work that sustains the community: tending flocks and cultivating fields and vines.
ALSO GROWS
nākhrî: Foreigner, outsider.
נָכְרִי
This related form names the person identified as belonging elsewhere, the very person entrusted here with sustaining work.
hikkîr: Recognize, identify.
הִכִּיר
The shared root connects the foreigner with the act of distinguishing or recognizing someone as different.
וְרָעוּ
wə-rāʿû
GROWS FROM
רעה
To graze, tend, or shepherd.
The verb rendered “feed” is also a shepherding verb: it holds nourishment and ongoing care together. The same root names the keeper and the pasture, so provision appears as a relationship between tending hands, flock, and sustaining ground.
ALSO GROWS
rōʿeh: Shepherd, one who tends a flock.
רֹעֶה
The person who feeds the flock is also its keeper, making care part of the provision.
mirʿeh: Pasture, grazing place.
מִרְעֶה
The root links the act of feeding with the place that sustains the flock.
THE PATTERN
Restoration makes room for those marked as outsiders to participate in the work and life of the community.
And the sons of the foreigner, who have attached themselves to the LORD, to serve him, and to love the name of the LORD, to be his servants, every one who guards the sabbath from being pierced, and takes hold of my covenant.They said to him, Because no one has hired us. He said to them, You also go into the vineyard, and whatever is aligned, that you will receive.So then you are no longer strangers and sojourners, but fellow citizens of the set-apart ones, and of the household of God.THE THREAD
And the sons of the foreigner, who have attached themselves to the LORD, to serve him, and to love the name of the LORD, to be his servants, every one who guards the sabbath from being pierced, and takes hold of my covenant.Both verses use בְּנֵי הַנֵּכָר (bənê hannekhār, “sons of the foreigner”), from נכר (n-k-r, “recognize or mark as foreign”). Isaiah 56:6 shows these outsiders joining in service; here that service takes visible form in tending what nourishes and bears fruit.
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