What Does 1 Samuel 12:21 Mean in the King James?
And turn ye not aside: for then should ye go after vain things, which cannot profit nor deliver; for they are vain.
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 verse measures every pursuit by its power to help and rescue, exposing what looks desirable as empty when it can do neither.
THE MEANING
You can feel the pull of what promises gain, but this verse asks whether it can actually help or bring you out. What has no such power is empty, however compelling it looks. Turning toward it draws you away from what can sustain you.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The belief that whatever attracts you or promises an advantage can also sustain or rescue you dissolves here: desire does not give an empty thing power to help.
THE ROOT
יַצִּילוּ
yatsilu
GROWS FROM
נצל
natsal
To snatch away or rescue.
“deliver” in this verse is yatsilu. The verse asks whether what you pursue can actually pull you out of danger. Wanting something does not give it the power to rescue.
ALSO GROWS
natsal: To snatch away, rescue, or strip off.
נָצַל
The root carries the sense of something being taken out of a grip.
hitsil: He rescued or delivered.
הִצִּיל
This form shows rescue as an act that brings someone out.
תָסוּרוּ
tasuru
GROWS FROM
סור
sur
To turn aside or depart.
“turn” in this verse is tasuru. The warning concerns a change of direction, not just an inward thought. The same root can mean turning away or departing, showing how pursuit carries you somewhere.
ALSO GROWS
sur: Turn aside or depart.
סוּר
This form makes the verse’s movement explicit: attention turns, and the path changes.
sar: Turned aside or departed.
סָר
This form describes the result of leaving a direction or course.
יוֹעִילוּ
yo'ilu
GROWS FROM
יעל
ya'al
To be useful or of benefit.
“profit” in this verse is yo'ilu. The Hebrew tests whether these things can actually avail you. Paired with rescue, benefit covers both what helps and what brings you out; the verse says these pursuits do neither.
ALSO GROWS
ya'il: Useful or beneficial.
יָעִיל
This form names the practical capacity the verse says is absent.
to'elet: Benefit or advantage.
תּוֹעֶלֶת
This noun makes the promised gain concrete: the verse says there is none.
THE PATTERN
What is empty cannot make good on the help or rescue it promises.
The priests said not, Where is the LORD? and they that handle the law knew me not: the pastors also transgressed against me, and the prophets prophesied by Baal, and walked after things that do not profit.They that make a graven image are all of them vanity; and their delectable things shall not profit; and they are their own witnesses; they see not, nor know; that they may be ashamed.As concerning therefore the eating of those things that are offered in sacrifice unto idols, we know that an idol is nothing in the world, and that there is none other God but one.THE THREAD
And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.The Hebrew word תֹּהוּ (tohu), rendered “vain things” here, also describes the earth as “without form” in Genesis. The shared word reveals emptiness as a condition with no power to give benefit or rescue.
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