What Does Job 11:13 Mean?
If you set your heart firm, and spread your palms toward him;
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
If thou prepare thine heart, and stretch out thine hands toward him;THE KEY
The verse pairs a heart made ready with palms spread toward God: readiness is inwardly settled and outwardly open.
THE MEANING
Your heart is set in readiness, and your hands stretch toward God. Inward intention and outward reaching appear together as one posture.
THE ROOT
הֲכִינוֹתָ
hakhinota
GROWS FROM
כון
kun
Be firm, established, or set in place.
“set firm” in this verse is hakhinota. The verb carries the sense of making something ready by setting it firm. The heart’s readiness is paired with hands spread toward God, joining inward steadiness with outward openness.
ALSO GROWS
hekin: Set something in readiness.
הֵכִין
This is the verb used here: the heart is made ready for turning toward God.
nakhon: Established, prepared, or in place.
נָכוֹן
It shows the state toward which the heart is set: readiness with steadiness.
konen: Make firm or establish.
כּוֹנֵן
This branch echoes the verse’s picture of readiness as something settled within.
וּפָרַשְׂתָ
ufarasta
GROWS FROM
פרשׂ
paras
Spread out, extend, or unfold.
The verb pictures the hands spread open toward God. The same root can describe something unfurled, so the gesture is not merely movement outward; it is an opening toward him.
ALSO GROWS
pores: One who spreads or extends something.
פּוֹרֵשׂ
It makes the action’s image plain: the hands are spread outward.
mifras: A sail, spread out to catch the wind.
מִפְרָשׂ
Like a sail opened to receive, the spread hands give the verse an image of openness toward God.
THE PATTERN
Turning toward God becomes visible as hands spread open in appeal.
I spread my hands to you; my living soul thirsts for you as a parched land. Selah.And Solomon stood before the altar of the LORD, before the face of all the assembly of Israel, and spread out his palms toward heaven.I will therefore that men pray in every place, lifting up set-apart hands, without anger and divided reasoning.THE THREAD
I spread my hands to you; my living soul thirsts for you as a parched land. Selah.Job’s “stretch out” and the psalmist’s “stretch forth” translate the same verb, פָּרַשׂ (paras, spread out). The thirsty land makes the open hands feel like the visible shape of longing reaching toward God.
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