What Does Jeremiah 16:17 Mean?
For my eyes are upon all their ways. They are not concealed from before my face, nor is their crookedness stored away from before my eyes.
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
For mine eyes are upon all their ways: they are not hid from my face, neither is their iniquity hid from mine eyes.THE KEY
The “ways” God sees are tracks made by your steps, so even what you tuck away remains in view.
THE MEANING
Your paths and your crookedness are fully visible to God. The verse holds both the steps you take openly and what you keep concealed in the same field of vision.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The belief that what you hide is therefore unseen dissolves here: concealment from people does not make it hidden from God.
THE ROOT
דַּרְכֵיהֶם
darkeihem
GROWS FROM
דרך
To tread, step, or make a track.
“Ways” can sound like an abstract set of behaviors, but דרך (darak, to tread) makes a way a track formed by steps. The verse says even the path your steps make is in view.
ALSO GROWS
derekh: Way, road, or path.
דֶּרֶךְ
This is the noun used in “their ways”: a path understood through the act of treading it.
darak: To tread or step.
דָּרַךְ
This verb exposes the movement beneath the English “ways”, each way is made by steps.
midrakh: A place to tread, a track or footing.
מִדְרָךְ
This branch makes the path concrete: repeated steps leave a place where the foot has gone.
נִסְתְּרוּ
nisteru
GROWS FROM
סתר
To hide or conceal.
The first “hid” comes from סתר (satar, to conceal), and its family includes both the act of hiding and a hiding place. The verse makes clear that neither the path nor the concealment puts anything beyond God’s sight.
ALSO GROWS
satar: To hide or conceal.
סָתַר
This verb names the attempt at concealment that the verse says does not succeed.
seter: A hiding place or secret.
סֵתֶר
The hiding place itself belongs to this root family, yet the verse says even what is hidden is not beyond God’s sight.
נִצְפַּן
nitsphan
GROWS FROM
צפן
To hide, conceal, or store away.
“stored away” in this verse is nitsphan. English uses “hid” twice, but the second word comes from צפן (tsaphan, to hide or store away). Beside the path that cannot be concealed, even what is tucked away in crookedness remains visible.
ALSO GROWS
tsaphan: To hide or store away.
צָפַן
This verb gives the second “hid” its sense of something kept out of sight or put away.
tsaphun: Hidden or stored away.
צָפוּן
This related form shows the state of what has been tucked away, the very thing the verse says is not hidden from God’s eyes.
THE PATTERN
No path or concealed thing falls outside God’s sight.
For his eyes are upon the ways of man, and he sees all his steps.You winnow my path and my lying down, and you are accustomed to all my ways.And no creation is hidden before him, but all things are naked and bared at the throat to the eyes of him to whom our account belongs.THE THREAD
For his eyes are upon the ways of man, and he sees all his steps.Job uses the same Hebrew root דרך (darak, to tread) for “ways,” beside eyes that see every going. Jeremiah’s verse names more than an abstract record: the path formed by each step is already in view.
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