What Does Job 20:24 Mean?
He flees from the iron weapon, and the bronze bow pierces him through.
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
He shall flee from the iron weapon, and the bow of steel shall strike him through.THE KEY
The verb for the bow’s strike also means “to change”: one weapon gives way to another, and escape does not become safety.
THE MEANING
He moves away from the iron weapon, but the bow’s shot passes through him. Escape from one danger does not put the body beyond harm; the violence reaches him from another direction.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that getting clear of one immediate threat means the danger is over. Here, he escapes the iron weapon, yet the next blow still reaches him.
THE ROOT
תַּחְלְפֵהוּ
taḥlefehu
GROWS FROM
חלף
ḥ-l-p
To pass by or through; to change or exchange.
“pierces him through” in this verse is taḥlefehu. The bow’s shot is pictured as passing through him. Its root also names change or exchange, so the line joins a weapon passing through the body with one threat giving way to another.
ALSO GROWS
ḥalaph: To pass by or through; to change.
חָלַף
The shot’s movement through him is carried by this root of passage.
yaḥalifu: They shall renew or change.
יַחֲלִיפוּ
In Isaiah 40:31, the same root is rendered “renew”; its range holds both a blow passing through and strength changing.
THE PATTERN
Escaping one danger can bring a person within reach of another.
As when a man flees from a lion, and a bear meets him, or he goes into the house and leans his hand against the wall, and a serpent bites him.And it shall be that he who flees the sound of dread shall fall into the pit, and he who climbs from the midst of the pit shall be caught in the snare, for the windows from on high are opened, and the foundations of the earth quake.THE THREAD
If a strong man dies, does he live? All the days of my service I wait, until my relief comes.The word translated “change” comes from the same root as the bow’s “strike him through” here. In this verse the root describes a weapon passing through a body; there it names the change Job awaits, bringing piercing and transformation into one word-family.
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