What Does 1 Samuel 25:2 Mean in the King James?
And there was a man in Maon, whose possessions were in Carmel; and the man was very great, and he had three thousand sheep, and a thousand goats: and he was shearing his sheep in Carmel.
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 a man’s “greatness” by his flock, while the story soon shows that what can be counted does not reveal his character.
THE MEANING
You see abundance made visible in a vast flock and the work of shearing. The story keeps outward scale from answering the deeper question of who this man is. A large holding does not tell the whole truth of a life.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
Vast possessions prove that the person who holds them is wise or inwardly great.
THE ROOT
גָּדוֹל
gadol
GROWS FROM
גדל
g-d-l
To grow or become great.
The word גָּדוֹל (gadol, “great”) comes from גדל (g-d-l), a root of growth and becoming large. The verse makes that largeness measurable in livestock; the continuation names the man נָבָל (Nabal, “fool”), showing that material scale and wisdom can diverge.
ALSO GROWS
gadal: To grow, become great.
גָּדַל
It reveals growth beneath the word “great,” while the verse shows the size that growth has reached.
gedullah: Greatness, majesty.
גְּדֻלָּה
It carries the same root’s sense of magnitude, which the flock makes concrete here.
migdal: Tower.
מִגְדָּל
A tower is a structure that rises high, extending the root’s sense of growing tall or becoming great.
מַעֲשֵׂהוּ
ma'asehu
GROWS FROM
עשה
ʿ-s-h
To do or make.
The word rendered “possessions” is מַעֲשֵׂהוּ (ma’asehu, “his work” or “his doing”). Its root keeps work and what is made in view alongside the wealth located in Carmel.
ALSO GROWS
asah: To do, make.
עָשָׂה
This verb is the seed of the word translated “possessions,” bringing doing and making into the verse’s picture of wealth.
ma'aseh: Work, deed, thing made.
מַעֲשֶׂה
This noun shows the work or product sense carried beneath the verse’s English rendering.
גֹזֵז
gozez
GROWS FROM
גזז
g-z-z
To shear, clip, cut off.
“shearing” in this verse is gozez. The verb names the cutting away of the fleece, the act that makes the flock’s increase tangible. Abundance and removal meet here: what has grown is gathered by being shorn.
ALSO GROWS
gazaz: To shear, clip, cut off.
גָּזַז
It is the root action performed on the flock in the verse.
gez: Fleece; shearing or clipping.
גֵּז
It names what the act of shearing removes and makes available.
THE PATTERN
Scripture separates the size of a person’s possessions from the measure of that person’s life and character.
He that trusteth in his riches shall fall: but the righteous shall flourish as a branch.And he said unto them, Take heed, and beware of covetousness: for a man’s life consisteth not in the abundance of the things which he possesseth.Hearken, my beloved brethren, Hath not God chosen the poor of this world rich in faith, and heirs of the kingdom which he hath promised to them that love him?THE THREAD
Now the name of the man was Nabal; and the name of his wife Abigail: and she was a woman of good understanding, and of a beautiful countenance: but the man was churlish and evil in his doings; and he was of the house of Caleb.The continuation gives the man the name נָבָל (Nabal, “fool”) and describes his conduct as churlish and evil, exposing the gap between his great inventory and his character. Abigail’s good understanding sharpens the contrast: wealth and wisdom are not the same measure.
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