What Does Joshua 8:22 Mean?
And the others came out of the city against them, so they were in the midst of Israel, some on this side and some on that side. And they struck them, so that none of them remained or escaped.
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
And the other issued out of the city against them; so they were in the midst of Israel, some on this side, and some on that side: and they smote them, so that they let none of them remain or escape.THE KEY
The verse closes both forms of survival at once: no one is left as a remnant, and no one gets away as a fugitive.
THE MEANING
This verse names the blunt finality of encirclement: the attackers close in from both sides, strike the people in the middle, and leave neither survivor nor escapee. The paired terms make the violence total, no one is left behind, and no one gets away.
THE ROOT
הִשְׁאִיר
hish'ir
GROWS FROM
שאר
sha'ar
To remain or be left over; in this form, to leave something behind.
The Hebrew verb behind “remain” carries the idea of leaving something over. Paired with “fugitive,” it denies both a remnant left behind and anyone who gets away.
ALSO GROWS
she'erit: Remnant, surviving remainder.
שְׁאֵרִית
The verse denies that any remnant is left.
she'ar: The rest, remainder.
שְׁאָר
The root makes the absence of anyone left over part of the verse’s claim.
פָּלִיט
palit
GROWS FROM
פלט
palat
To slip away or escape; as a noun, a fugitive or escapee.
The Hebrew names a פָּלִיט (palit), a person who gets away, rather than only describing an abstract escape. Alongside the denied remnant, it closes both possibilities for survival: staying behind and fleeing.
ALSO GROWS
palat: To escape, slip away.
פָּלַט
This is the action contained in the name of the fugitive the verse says is absent.
peletah: Escape, escaped remnant.
פְּלֵיטָה
The branch joins escape with survival, the two possibilities the verse closes.
THE PATTERN
Scripture marks total reach by closing both the possibility of a surviving remnant and the possibility of escape.
And the waters turned back and covered the chariots and the horsemen, all the army of the Great House that came after them into the sea; not even one of them remained.Where shall I go from your breath? And where shall I flee from your face?How shall we escape, if we neglect so great a deliverance? It first began to be spoken through the Lord, and was made firm to us by those who heard him.THE THREAD
Do not stand in the breach, to cut off the ones who slip free from him. Do not hand over those left behind in the day of the narrow place.Joshua’s וּפָלִיט (u-palít, fugitive) recurs in Obadiah as פְּלִיטָיו (pelitav, his fugitives), beside שְׂרִידָיו (seridav, his survivors), the same two categories the Joshua verse closes. Obadiah reverses their fate: it forbids cutting off those who escape or handing over those who remain.
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