What Does Jonah 1:14 Mean?
Therefore they called out to the LORD and said, We beg you, O LORD, we beg you, do not let us perish for the living soul of this man. Do not set innocent blood upon us. For you, O LORD, have done as you pleased.
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
Wherefore they cried unto the LORD, and said, We beseech thee, O LORD, we beseech thee, let us not perish for this man’s life, and lay not upon us innocent blood: for thou, O LORD, hast done as it pleased thee.THE KEY
The sailors ask to survive without carrying the bloodguilt of an innocent man, even as they confess that the storm is the LORD’s doing.
THE MEANING
The verse speaks into a moment when danger narrows your field of sight: the other person’s life remains present as innocent, not merely as the cause of your trouble. The prayer names the LORD as doing what he desires and asks that the burden of innocent blood not be laid on the speakers.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
If the LORD wills an outcome, those who carry it out bear no responsibility for what happens. The prayer holds both claims together: the LORD has done as he pleased, and the speakers still fear being charged with innocent blood.
THE ROOT
נָקִי
naqiy
GROWS FROM
נקה
N-Q-H
To be clean or clear; to be free of guilt or liability.
The Hebrew word rendered “innocent” carries the language of being clean or cleared. The sailors are asking that the blood of a life they recognize as innocent not leave them bearing its guilt.
ALSO GROWS
yenakkeh: Clear, acquit, or hold guiltless.
יְנַקֶּה
This verbal form makes the question of being cleared of guilt explicit: the sailors fear that the blood will be charged to them.
niqqayon: Cleanness or innocence.
נִקָּיוֹן
This noun preserves cleanness as the image behind innocence, echoing the sailors’ plea that the blood not rest on them.
THE PATTERN
The danger of innocent blood remains a question of responsibility even when the outcome is outside a person’s control.
Cover your people Israel, whom you have ransomed, O LORD, and do not set innocent blood in the midst of your people Israel. And the blood is covered for them.But perceive this for certain, that if you put me to death, you will surely set clean blood upon yourselves, and upon this city, and upon those who settle in it, for in truth the LORD has sent me to you to speak all these words in your ears.When Pilate saw that he gained nothing, but that instead an uproar was rising, he took water and washed his hands before the crowd, saying, I am innocent of the blood of this aligned man. You see to it.THE THREAD
Cover your people Israel, whom you have ransomed, O LORD, and do not set innocent blood in the midst of your people Israel. And the blood is covered for them.Jonah’s phrase “innocent blood” repeats the Hebrew phrase דָּם נָקִי (dam naqi) in this verse, and “lay not upon us” echoes its plea not to lay that blood to account. The sailors are asking not only to survive, but not to be charged with an innocent man’s death.
Read the SDV Bible.
Every verse has a Deep Dive in the app.
The iPhone Bible app with the Selah Decoded Version.
Does something in this reading look wrong? Tell us