What Does 1 Kings 17:21 Mean in the King James?
And he stretched himself upon the child three times, and cried unto the LORD, and said, O LORD my God, I pray thee, let this child’s soul come into him again.
The analysis reads the King James wording.
King James Version The King James Version, first published in 1611. Selah Verse shows the standard text.
THE KEY
The hinge is return: the child’s nefesh, his living self, comes back into him.
THE MEANING
The child’s living self returns into him, and he lives; restoration takes the form of life coming back to the person. The verse holds the reader at the edge where life appears gone and return is still being asked of the LORD.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that death closes every possibility of return.
THE ROOT
נֶפֶשׁ
nefesh
GROWS FROM
נ־פ־שׁ
n-p-sh
The living self or person; its verbal branch can mean to be refreshed.
“soul” in this verse is nefesh. Nefesh names the living person, not only an abstract part of that person. Its branch for being refreshed gives the returning nefesh the shade of life restored to the child himself.
ALSO GROWS
nefashot: persons, lives
נְפָשׁוֹת
The plural makes clear that nefesh can name living persons or lives; here the returning life belongs to this child as a person.
wayyinnaphash: was refreshed, rested
וַיִּנָּפַשׁ
This verb shares the root and connects the living self with restored vitality, echoing the child’s return to life.
תָּשָׁב
tashov
GROWS FROM
שׁ־ו־ב
sh-v-b
Turn back, return.
“again / come into him again” in this verse is tashov. The request is shaped by a Hebrew return verb: the child’s nefesh turns back to him. Restoration carries the shape of something returning to the person, not merely arriving there.
ALSO GROWS
shuv: return, turn back
שׁוּב
This root gives the verse’s plea its central movement: the child’s living self returns.
teshuvah: return, turning back
תְּשׁוּבָה
This noun from the same root reinforces the idea of restoration as a turning back toward life.
THE PATTERN
Life is restored through the return of the living self, and the person’s life becomes visible again.
He restoreth my soul: he leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name’s sake.Then he returned, and walked in the house to and fro; and went up, and stretched himself upon him: and the child sneezed seven times, and the child opened his eyes.And her spirit came again, and she arose straightway: and he commanded to give her meat.THE THREAD
And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.Genesis uses the same Hebrew word, nefesh, for the human who becomes a living soul. Here that nefesh returns into the child, holding life and the living person together.
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