What Does Jeremiah 50:5 Mean?
They shall ask the way to Zion, with their faces turned that way, saying, Come, and let us cling to the LORD in a covenant of the ages that shall not be forgotten.
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
They shall ask the way to Zion with their faces thitherward, saying, Come, and let us join ourselves to the LORD in a perpetual covenant that shall not be forgotten.THE KEY
You ask for the way to Zion with your face already turned toward it: the turning begins before the route is known.
THE MEANING
Your search for Zion already has a direction: your face is turned toward it before the route is fully known. Joining the LORD is a shared act, and the covenant is a bond that endures through the age without being forgotten.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that you must see the whole route before turning: here, the face is already set toward Zion while the way is still being asked.
THE ROOT
פְּנֵיהֶם
peneihem
GROWS FROM
פנה
panah
To turn or face toward.
The word for face is connected to the verb for turning. Their search is already a movement of orientation: their faces are turned toward Zion while they ask for the way.
ALSO GROWS
panah: Turn, face toward.
פָּנָה
This verb makes the faces in the verse more than a gaze: they are turned toward their destination.
panim: Face, front, presence.
פָּנִים
The verse places the seekers’ faces toward Zion, making their direction visible before they know the route.
וְנִלְווּ
wenilvu
GROWS FROM
לוה
lavah
To join, attach oneself, or accompany.
“cling” in this verse is wenilvu. The verse describes a people joining themselves to the LORD, not merely approaching a destination. This root also appears in Levi’s name, which Genesis connects with being joined.
ALSO GROWS
lavah: Join, accompany, attach oneself.
לָוָה
This verb names the joining that makes the journey a bond with the LORD.
Levi: Levi, a name linked in Genesis with being joined.
לֵוִי
The name echoes the same joining that Jeremiah describes as a shared covenantal act.
דֶּרֶךְ
derekh
GROWS FROM
דרך
darakh
To tread, step, or travel.
The word for a way or road grows from a verb for treading. The route to Zion is therefore a path made by movement, not merely an answer received as information.
ALSO GROWS
darakh: Tread, step, travel.
דָּרַךְ
The root makes the requested way a path that is walked.
derekh: Way, road, path.
דֶּרֶךְ
This is the route they ask for while their faces are already set toward Zion.
THE PATTERN
A turn toward God can precede full knowledge of the route and become a shared, lasting bond.
And many peoples shall go and say, Come, let us go up to the mountain of the LORD, to the house of the God of Jacob, and he will aim us along his ways, and we will walk in his paths, for out of Zion the instruction shall go forth, and the word of the LORD from Jerusalem.But this is the covenant I will cut with the house of Israel after those days, declares the LORD. I will set my instruction within them, and write it upon their hearts. And I will be their God, and they shall be my people.This is the covenant I will set in place with them after those days, says the LORD, placing my instructions upon their hearts, and upon their minds I will write them;THE THREAD
And she conceived again, and bore a son, and she said, Now this time my husband will cling to me, because I have borne him three sons. Therefore his name was called Levi, Joined.The verb translated “joined” here grows from the same root as Jeremiah’s “join ourselves.” Genesis connects that joining with Levi’s name; Jeremiah extends the same idea from a household bond to a people joining themselves to the LORD.
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