What Does 1 Samuel 15:27 Mean in the King James?
And as Samuel turned about to go away, he laid hold upon the skirt of his mantle, and it rent.
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 robe tears in the king’s grasp before Samuel names the kingdom’s tearing: the fabric exposes what the grip cannot hold together.
THE MEANING
A hand catches the edge of a departing mantle, and the fabric splits. The tear makes separation visible at the very point of grasp; the next verse names the deeper rupture as the kingdom torn from Saul. The scene holds the reader at the instant when holding on exposes what cannot be kept together.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The belief that a firm grip can keep loss from coming is undone: Saul catches the robe, yet it tears in his hand.
THE ROOT
וַיִּקָּרַע
wayyiqqāraʿ
GROWS FROM
ק־ר־ע
q-r-ʿ
To tear open, split, or rend.
English can make “rent” sound like an isolated accident, but the same root names both this tear in the cloth and the kingdom’s rupture in the next verse. It also appears in “rend your heart,” carrying the image from fabric to inward reality: what tears on the outside can disclose a deeper severance.
ALSO GROWS
qeraʿ: A tear or rupture.
קֶרַע
The garment’s opening is a physical instance of the root’s central image.
qirʿu: “Rend!”, the imperative used in Joel 2:13.
קִרְעוּ
The same root applies to the heart, linking a visible tear to an inward rupture.
THE PATTERN
A tear in what is visible can disclose a deeper rupture beneath it.
And Samuel said unto him, The LORD hath rent the kingdom of Israel from thee this day, and hath given it to a neighbour of thine, that is better than thou.Wherefore the LORD said unto Solomon, Forasmuch as this is done of thee, and thou hast not kept my covenant and my statutes, which I have commanded thee, I will surely rend the kingdom from thee, and will give it to thy servant.And rend your heart, and not your garments, and turn unto the LORD your God: for he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness, and repenteth him of the evil.THE THREAD
And Samuel said unto him, The LORD hath rent the kingdom of Israel from thee this day, and hath given it to a neighbour of thine, that is better than thou.The Hebrew root qaraʿ (קָרַע), “to tear or rend,” appears in both verses: first the mantle tears, then Samuel says the kingdom is rent. The cloth’s rupture gives the reader a visible image for the separation named in the next line.
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