What Does Isaiah 7:1 Mean?
And it came to pass in the days of Ahaz, son of Jotham, son of Uzziah, king of Judah, that Rezin, king of Syria, and Pekah, son of Remaliah, king of Israel, went up toward Jerusalem to wage war against it, but could not overpower it.
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 it came to pass in the days of Ahaz the son of Jotham, the son of Uzziah, king of Judah, that Rezin the king of Syria, and Pekah the son of Remaliah, king of Israel, went up toward Jerusalem to war against it, but could not prevail against it.THE KEY
A threat can rise against wholeness without gaining the power to undo it.
THE MEANING
You can face a real threat without that threat having the capacity to prevail; the verse holds both truths in view. Jerusalem, whose name carries the language of wholeness, stands under attack without being overcome.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that an advancing threat has already won: movement toward you is not the same as power over you.
THE ROOT
יָכֹל
yākōl
GROWS FROM
יכל
To be able, to have capacity.
“could not overpower it” in this verse is yākōl. The Hebrew expresses the attackers’ limit as inability: they cannot carry their assault through to prevailing. English “prevail” can sound like a victory won in battle, while the root keeps attention on the limit of what the attackers can do.
ALSO GROWS
yākōl: Be able, can.
יָכֹל
This is the form behind the verse’s statement that the attackers lack the capacity to prevail.
yekholet: Ability, capacity.
יְכֹלֶת
This related form makes the verse’s emphasis plain: an advancing force and a force with the capacity to overcome are not the same thing.
יְרוּשָׁלַיִם
Yerushalayim
GROWS FROM
שלם
Whole, complete, intact; the root carries the language of wholeness.
“Jerusalem” in this verse is Yerushalayim. The name brings the שׁלם field of wholeness into the scene: war rises against the city, but the verse does not equate the attack with the city’s undoing. The opposition is aimed at wholeness, yet it does not prevail.
ALSO GROWS
shalom: Wholeness, completeness.
שָׁלוֹם
This branch lets the name resonate with the wholeness under assault in the verse.
shalem: Whole, complete, intact.
שָׁלֵם
This branch sharpens the contrast between the attack and the intactness the verse says it cannot overcome.
shillēm: Repay, make good, restore what is owed.
שִׁלֵּם
This branch carries the root’s sense of making whole, deepening the contrast with a war that cannot undo the city.
THE PATTERN
An advancing force does not guarantee that it can accomplish what it intends.
Take counsel together, and it shall be broken; speak the word, and it shall not stand, for God is with us.The LORD breaks the counsel of nations; he undoes the plans of peoples.But if it is of God, you cannot undo them, lest perhaps you be found even fighting against God.THE THREAD
Take counsel together, and it shall be broken; speak the word, and it shall not stand, for God is with us.This verse extends the same pattern: plans and spoken threats may gather, yet their word does not stand. Its final phrase, “for God is with us,” places that limit in the presence of God.
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