What Does Jeremiah 18:19 Mean?
Bend your ear to me, O LORD, and hear and respond to the voice of those who contend with me.
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
Give heed to me, O LORD, and hearken to the voice of them that contend with me.THE KEY
The prayer places both the speaker and the voices contending against them within the LORD’s hearing.
THE MEANING
You can place the conflict itself before the LORD: your request and the voice of those contending with you both belong in the prayer. The verse leaves the dispute open while asking God to attend to its voices.
THE ROOT
יְרִיבָי
yerivai
GROWS FROM
ריב
to contend, dispute, or plead a case
“contend” in this verse is yerivai. The word for “contenders” comes from a root that also describes disputing or pleading a case. The voice at issue is an active claim in a conflict, and the verse explicitly brings it into God’s hearing.
ALSO GROWS
riv: to contend or plead a case
רִיב
The conflict word can describe bringing a claim forward, placing the opponents’ words within an active dispute.
merivah: strife or quarrel; also the name Meribah
מְרִיבָה
This branch names the strife that forms when parties contend, showing the conflict as more than vague antagonism.
הַקְשִׁיבָה
haqshivah
GROWS FROM
קשב
to listen attentively or give focused attention
“Bend your ear” in this verse is haqshivah. The opening request is more than asking for sound to register: qashab asks the hearer to give focused attention. Paired with shama, it presses the request to attend to the speaker and hear the opposing voices.
ALSO GROWS
maqshiv: one who listens attentively
מַקְשִׁיב
This form describes a hearer giving attention, illuminating the focused quality of the appeal.
haqshivu: give ear; listen attentively
הַקְשִׁיבוּ
The same root can call hearers to attend closely, reinforcing that the prayer seeks deliberate attention.
וּשְׁמַע
u-shema
GROWS FROM
שמע
to hear or listen
“hear and respond” in this verse is u-shema. The same root reaches from hearing to what is heard and carried as a report. The prayer asks for the opponents’ voice itself to be received, not merely for the speaker’s plea to register.
ALSO GROWS
shema: hear; listen (the imperative in Deuteronomy 6:4)
שְׁמַע
This familiar command shows the root as direct hearing, the very act requested here.
shemuah: report, news, or what is heard (Isaiah 53:1)
שְׁמוּעָה
This branch names the message that comes through hearing, connecting the request to hear a voice with receiving what it says.
THE PATTERN
Voices caught in conflict or oppression are brought within God’s hearing.
Stretch your ear to the voice of my outcry, my King and my God, for to you I pray.And the LORD said, I have surely seen the bending low of my people who are in Egypt, and have heard their cry because of their drivers. For I know their pains.Look, the wages of the workers who mowed your fields, stripped away by your fraud, cry out, and the cries of those who reaped have gone into the ears of the LORD of hosts.THE THREAD
A Psalm of David. Grapple, LORD, with those who grapple with me; fight against those who fight against me.Jeremiah’s “contend with me” and the psalm’s “strive with me” come from the Hebrew root ריב (riv), meaning to contend or plead a case. The psalm turns that same conflict into a direct appeal for the LORD to take up the case.
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