What Does 2 Samuel 10:12 Mean in the King James?
Be of good courage, and let us play the men for our people, and for the cities of our God: and the LORD do that which seemeth him good.
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 pairs a call to be strong with a collective act of strengthening themselves, while leaving the outcome to the LORD’s judgment.
THE MEANING
When people and places you love are threatened, this verse names courage as a shared willingness to fight for them, not a guarantee that the fight will go your way. The resolve to act stands beside the acknowledgment that the outcome is beyond your control.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that surrendering the outcome means surrendering the struggle: the verse holds active defense and yielded control together.
THE ROOT
חֲזַק
ḥazaq
GROWS FROM
חזק
Be strong, grow firm, prevail; in the reflexive form, strengthen oneself.
“Be strong; let us strengthen ourselves” in this verse is ḥazaq. The same root appears first as a command to be strong, then as a shared act of strengthening themselves. Its repetition makes courage both personal and collective, without making it depend on certainty about the outcome.
ALSO GROWS
ḥāzāq: Strong or firm.
חָזָק
The people are called to stand firm for those and places they defend.
ḥizzēq: To make strong or firm.
חִזֵּק
This branch echoes the verse’s movement from receiving a call to courage to actively taking strength together.
THE PATTERN
Courage takes responsibility for what it can defend while releasing the outcome it cannot command.
And David was greatly distressed; for the people spake of stoning him, because the soul of all the people was grieved, every man for his sons and for his daughters: but David encouraged himself in the LORD his God.Be ye strong therefore, and let not your hands be weak: for your work shall be rewarded.Watch ye, stand fast in the faith, quit you like men, be strong.THE THREAD
And David was greatly distressed; for the people spake of stoning him, because the soul of all the people was grieved, every man for his sons and for his daughters: but David encouraged himself in the LORD his God.The verb translated “encouraged himself” is וַיִּתְחַזֵּק (wayyitḥazzēq, “he strengthened himself”), from the same root חזק (ḥ-z-q, “be strong; strengthen”) used here. That shared root shows courage taken up under pressure, moving in this verse from one person’s resolve to a community standing for its people and cities.
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