What Does Judges 16:15 Mean?
And she said to him, How can you say, I love you, when your heart is not with me? You have mocked me these three times, and have not told me where your great strength lies.
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 she said unto him, How canst thou say, I love thee, when thine heart is not with me? thou hast mocked me these three times, and hast not told me wherein thy great strength lieth.THE KEY
The verse measures love by whether the heart is present and the truth is shared.
THE MEANING
The verse names a living fracture: love is spoken while the heart remains absent and the truth is withheld. The words and the relationship occupy different realities, and she exposes the mismatch between them.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that saying “I love thee” alone makes love present; the absent heart and withheld truth contradict the claim.
THE ROOT
לִבֶּךָ
libbekha
GROWS FROM
לבב
l-b-b
The inner person: heart, mind, will, and understanding.
The Hebrew word translated “heart” holds together what English often separates into feeling, thought, and intention. Her question is whether his inner self is actually with her, not merely whether he can speak of love.
ALSO GROWS
lev: heart, inner self
לֵב
The same word can name the center of feeling and intention, keeping his inward presence at the center of her charge.
levav: heart, mind, understanding
לֵבָב
Its fuller form also joins thought and desire within the heart, so “not with me” describes more than a lack of affection.
הִגַּדְתָּ
higgadta
GROWS FROM
נגד
n-g-d
To be in front or made conspicuous; in this verb form, to make known or declare.
“told” in this verse is higgadta. The word for telling carries the sense of bringing something into view. Her complaint is that his strength remains hidden from her, despite his words about love.
ALSO GROWS
higgid: to tell, declare, make known
הִגִּיד
This is the same verb family as “told”; disclosure brings what was concealed before another person.
nagid: leader, one who stands in front
נָגִיד
The related word for a leader evokes someone placed in view, echoing the root’s movement from what is hidden to what stands before others.
חֵילְךָ
cheylkha
GROWS FROM
חיל
ḥ-y-l
Force, capacity, and resources.
The word translated “strength” can also describe force, an army, wealth, or valor. Her question reaches toward the full source of his capacity, what makes him powerful and where that power resides.
ALSO GROWS
chayil: force, army, resources
חַיִל
The word’s range makes his “great strength” larger than a display of physical force; it can name the resources and capacity available to him.
eshet chayil: woman of valor or capacity
אֵשֶׁת־חַיִל
The same word describes a woman of capability, showing that chayil names effective strength and capacity across different contexts.
THE PATTERN
A claim loses force when the heart is distant or conduct withholds what the words promise.
He who hates makes himself a stranger with his lips, and lays deceit within him.This people draws near to me with their mouth, and honors me with their lips; but their heart is held far from me.Little children, let us not love in word, nor in the tongue, but in works and in truth.THE THREAD
And Samuel set before him every word, and hid nothing from him. And he said, It is the LORD. Let him do what is good in his eyes.“Told” in both verses comes from the Hebrew root נגד (n-g-d), to make known or declare. Samuel’s telling leaves nothing hidden, sharpening Delilah’s charge: she says the truth about Samson’s strength has been kept from her.
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