What Does Job 13:25 Mean?
Will you shake a driven leaf, and pursue dry stubble?
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
Wilt thou break a leaf driven to and fro? and wilt thou pursue the dry stubble?THE KEY
The question exposes an unbearable mismatch: power keeps pursuing what wind has already scattered and dryness has already spent.
THE MEANING
When you are already scattered and depleted, this verse gives the pressure a stark shape: a leaf the wind has driven and dry stubble still pursued. It names the disproportion between exposed fragility and the force bearing down on it.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that being pursued proves you are still dangerous or strong: the image is of what is already wind-driven and dried out.
THE ROOT
תַּעֲרוֹץ
taʿarots
GROWS FROM
ערץ
ʿ-r-ṣ
to terrify, cause dread, or overwhelm with fear
“shake” in this verse is taʿarots. The verb translated “break” carries the force of terror as well as damage. Its root also names the fierce or oppressive, bringing the weight of the pursuer into the image.
ALSO GROWS
ʿāraṣ: to terrify, cause dread
עָרַץ
This verbal form shows that the breaking in the verse includes fear imposed on something fragile.
ʿārîṣ: fierce, oppressive one
עָרִיץ
The same root describes an oppressor, giving the pursued leaf’s vulnerability a stark counterpart.
תִּרְדֹּף
tirdof
GROWS FROM
רדף
r-d-p
to chase, pursue, or press after
English separates “pursue” here from “follow” in Psalm 23:6, but Hebrew uses the same root for both. Pursuit can threaten the fragile here, while goodness and faithful love follow the speaker in the psalm.
ALSO GROWS
rādaph: to pursue, chase
רָדַף
This is the root verb behind the force that keeps pressing after the dry stubble.
rōdēph: pursuer, persecutor
רֹדֵף
The branch names the one who chases, making the verse’s power imbalance visible.
עָלֶה
ʿālêh
GROWS FROM
עלה
ʿ-l-h
to go up, rise, or ascend
“driven leaf” in this verse is ʿālêh. The word for leaf belongs to the root of rising and going up, placing an upward-growing thing in a scene where it is blown loose. The image holds growth’s upward motion beside the force that scatters it.
ALSO GROWS
ʿālāh: to rise, go up, ascend
עָלָה
This verbal branch gives the leaf’s word a hidden upward movement, sharpened by its being driven to and fro.
ʿōlāh: burnt offering, that which goes up
עֹלָה
This related word preserves the same rising sense, echoing the upward movement carried in the word for leaf.
THE PATTERN
Pursuit can name crushing pressure on the fragile or an active movement of care and peace toward someone.
Will you shake a driven leaf, and pursue dry stubble?Surely goodness and faithful love pursue me all the days of my life, and I settle in the house of the LORD for the length of days.Pursue wholeness with all, and the setting apart, without which no one will perceive the LORD.THE THREAD
Surely goodness and faithful love pursue me all the days of my life, and I settle in the house of the LORD for the length of days.The Hebrew verb rendered “pursue” in Job and “follow” in Psalm 23:6 comes from the same root. In Job, the force bears down on what is fragile; in the psalm, goodness and faithful love pursue the speaker, holding threat and care in one image.
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