What Does Judges 14:20 Mean?
But Samson's wife was given to his companion, who had been his companion.
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
But Samson’s wife was given to his companion, whom he had used as his friend.THE KEY
The Hebrew repeats one friendship root for both the man who receives Samson’s wife and the relationship he has shared with Samson, placing companionship beside rupture in the same sentence.
THE MEANING
Friendship remains the word attached to the recipient while a woman is transferred to him; the verse holds those realities side by side. It states her transfer but leaves her own voice absent.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
A friendship label by itself does not guarantee that the bonds around it are protective; here the word stands beside the transfer of Samson’s wife.
THE ROOT
לְמֵרֵעֵהוּ
le-mērēʿēhû
GROWS FROM
רעה
r-ʿ-h
To associate with or be a companion to.
The Hebrew repeats this friendship root: first in naming the man as Samson’s companion, then in describing his relation to Samson. The KJV’s “used as his friend” preserves that bond; the repeated root makes it especially audible beside the transfer, without assigning the friend a motive.
ALSO GROWS
rēaʿ: A person bound to another as a friend or companion.
רֵעַ
This noun names the man who receives Samson’s wife.
rāʿâ: A verbal form expressing companionship.
רָעָה
The verse echoes the same root when it describes the man’s relation to Samson, keeping the friendship present in both halves of the line.
THE PATTERN
Scripture lets the actions beside a relationship word disclose the character of the bond.
But Samson's wife was given to his companion, who had been his companion.A friend loves at all times, and a brother is born for the narrow place.No one has greater love than this, that someone lay down his living soul for his friends.THE THREAD
And her father said, I truly thought you had utterly hated her, so I gave her to your companion. Is not her younger sister more beautiful than she? Take her, I pray you, instead of her.The same companion word returns when her father explains that he gave her to this man. The repeated root links the two lines through their language of friendship, while the added detail names her father as the one who makes the transfer.
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