What Does Job 11:14 Mean?
If trouble is in your hand, put it far off, and let not crookedness settle in your tents.
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 iniquity be in thine hand, put it far away, and let not wickedness dwell in thy tabernacles.THE KEY
The verse makes wrongdoing a question of both reach and residence: what is held in the hand is sent far off, and what might settle in the dwelling is given no home.
THE MEANING
Here, wrongdoing is addressed in two spaces at once: what lies within reach is moved far away, and what could settle in the dwelling is denied a place to remain. The verse speaks now to the difference between holding wrong close and giving it room to inhabit a household.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that wrongdoing matters only when the hand acts: the verse also names the wrong that is given room to reside.
THE ROOT
תַּשְׁכֵּן
tashken
GROWS FROM
שכן
to settle, inhabit, dwell
The KJV says “tabernacles,” but the Hebrew noun is אָהֶל (ohel), “tent”; the verb “dwell” comes from שכן (shakan), the same root behind מִשְׁכָּן (mishkan), “dwelling place” or “tabernacle.” English hides how the line makes the dwelling itself a place where wrongdoing might settle.
ALSO GROWS
mishkan: dwelling place, tabernacle
מִשְׁכָּן
It shares the seed of dwelling, giving the verb in Job a resonance with a place made for someone or something to dwell.
shakhan: dwell, settle
שָׁכַן
This is the root verb; in Job, the issue is whether wrongdoing is allowed to settle in the tents.
הַרְחִיקֵהוּ
harḥiqehu
GROWS FROM
רחק
to be far; to make distant
“put it far off” in this verse is harḥiqehu. The Hebrew imperative means to make it distant, giving the command a concrete spatial force. The verse describes a change in wrongdoing’s proximity to the hand, not merely a label placed on it.
ALSO GROWS
raḥoq: far, distant
רָחוֹק
This adjective shares the root and names the distance the verse commands.
merḥaq: distance, a distant place
מֶרְחָק
This noun makes explicit the spatial idea carried by the verb: wrongdoing is sent out of close reach.
עַוְלָה
ʿavlah
GROWS FROM
עול
to act wrongly or unjustly
“crookedness” in this verse is ʿavlah. “Wickedness” can sound like a broad label, while עַוְלָה (ʿavlah) names wrong or injustice. The verse pairs what is held in the hand with injustice as a presence that might take up residence.
ALSO GROWS
ʿāwel: wrong, injustice
עָוֶל
This related form names the injustice that the verse refuses a dwelling place.
ʿawwāl: an unjust person
עַוָּל
This branch applies the same root family to one marked by unjust dealing, showing how the word can name both wrongdoing and its doer.
THE PATTERN
Wrong is portrayed as something removed from reach and denied a place to settle.
I will set no worthless thing before my eyes. I hate the deed of those who turn aside; it shall not cling to me.Nor give ground to the Slanderer.Nevertheless the solid foundation of God stands, holding this seal, "The Lord knows those who are his." And, "Let everyone who names the nature of the Anointed One stand away from misalignment."THE THREAD
And let them make me a set-apart place, that I may pitch my tent among them.Job’s “let … dwell” and Exodus’s “that I may dwell” share the root שכן (shakan), “to dwell, settle.” Job names what is denied a home; Exodus uses the same root for the presence that dwells among people.
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