What Does Judges 2:17 Mean?
And also they did not hear and respond to their judges, for they went whoring after other gods and bowed down to them. They turned aside quickly from the way which their fathers walked in, hearing and responding to the commands of the LORD. But they did not do so.
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 yet they would not hearken unto their judges, but they went a whoring after other gods, and bowed themselves unto them: they turned quickly out of the way which their fathers walked in, obeying the commandments of the LORD; but they did not so.THE KEY
Here, hearing means response: when the word no longer reaches your actions, another allegiance can take the path.
THE MEANING
A guide’s voice can be present without being received as a response. When you refuse that hearing, desire attaches elsewhere, your body bows to the new allegiance, and your feet leave a path already walked. The verse reveals these as one movement, not unrelated choices.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The lie that guidance being present means it has been received and followed. A voice can stand before you while your allegiance and path move elsewhere.
THE ROOT
שָׁמֵעוּ
shāmeʿū
GROWS FROM
שמע
sh-m-ʿ
Hear, listen, and respond.
“did not hear and respond to” in this verse is shāmeʿū. The verse’s “hearken” comes from שמע, the same root that carries hearing and response. The rupture is not merely in what reaches the ear: the word no longer reaches action, and allegiance shifts.
ALSO GROWS
shemaʿ: Hear; listen and respond.
שְׁמַע
The same root opens Deuteronomy 6:4, where hearing is a call to responsive attention.
shemuʿah: Report, tidings; what is heard.
שְׁמוּעָה
This branch keeps the heard message in view: the question is whether what is heard reaches the hearer.
זָנוּ
zānû
GROWS FROM
זנה
z-n-h
Commit sexual infidelity; whore.
“went whoring” in this verse is zānû. The verse uses the language of sexual betrayal for pursuing other gods. The image holds the force of the transfer as intimate disloyalty, followed at once by bodily bowing.
ALSO GROWS
zonah: Prostitute; sexually unfaithful woman.
זֹנָה
This noun keeps the verse’s language concrete: the pursuit is described as infidelity.
zenunim: Whoredoms; acts of sexual infidelity.
זְנוּנִים
The related plural form shows the same root naming repeated acts of betrayal, fitting the verse’s turn toward other gods.
הַדֶּרֶךְ
haderekh
GROWS FROM
דרך
d-r-k
Tread, step, or travel along.
The word for “way” is tied to treading or stepping. Beside the phrase about the fathers who walked in it, the verse presents a received path as a route made real by repeated steps, and departure as turning from that track.
ALSO GROWS
derek: Way, road, path.
דֶּרֶךְ
This is the word in the verse: the fathers’ way is a traveled route, not an abstract idea.
darak: Tread, step, march.
דָּרַךְ
The related verb reveals the movement inside the noun: a way is something traced by steps.
THE PATTERN
When hearing is severed from response, desire transfers allegiance and the shared path is abandoned.
But if your heart turns aside, so that you will not hear and respond, but you are driven away, and bow down to other gods and serve them.And Samuel said, Does the LORD delight in rising offerings and slaughtered offerings as much as in hearing and responding to the voice of the LORD? Behold, hearing and responding is better than a slaughtered offering; to prick the ear is better than the fat of rams.But be makers of the word, and not hearers only, miscounting yourselves.THE THREAD
Hear and respond, O Israel. The LORD our God is one LORD.Judges 2:17 says they did not hearken, from שמע (shamaʿ, hear and respond); Deuteronomy 6:4 opens with the imperative שְׁמַע (shemaʿ, hear and respond). The shared root makes the contrast sharp: the call to responsive hearing is also the word that describes the breach when hearing is refused.
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