What Does Amos 6:9 Mean in the King James?
And it shall come to pass, if there remain ten men in one house, that they shall die.
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 word “remain” names a remainder, but the verse gives that remainder no refuge: all ten men left in the house die.
THE MEANING
This verse speaks of a household where even those still present are not preserved. Remaining inside the house does not secure life; the sentence says they die.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that a group left together or a house around them is itself protection.
THE ROOT
יִוָּתְרוּ
yivvateru
GROWS FROM
יתר
y-t-r
To remain, be left over, or be in excess.
“remain” in this verse is yivvateru. The verb comes from a root for what is left over. That root names the remainder, but does not promise that it is spared; here the verse says even those left in the house die.
ALSO GROWS
yether: Surplus; what is left over.
יֶתֶר
It makes the ten men a remainder within the house, while the verse makes clear that being left over is no guarantee of safety.
yitron: Profit; advantage.
יִתְרוֹן
This branch shows the root can name what remains as an advantage, but Amos strips that implication away: the remainder here dies.
THE PATTERN
A house or accumulated provision cannot make human life invulnerable when death arrives.
And a man’s uncle shall take him up, and he that burneth him, to bring out the bones out of the house, and shall say unto him that is by the sides of the house, Is there yet any with thee? and he shall say, No. Then shall he say, Hold thy tongue: for we may not make mention of the name of the LORD.And Pharaoh rose up in the night, he, and all his servants, and all the Egyptians; and there was a great cry in Egypt; for there was not a house where there was not one dead.But God said unto him, Thou fool, this night thy soul shall be required of thee: then whose shall those things be, which thou hast provided?THE THREAD
And Jacob was left alone; and there wrestled a man with him until the breaking of the day.Genesis uses the same root when Jacob is “left” alone: the root names what remains, but does not determine what happens next. Amos makes the outcome explicit, the ten left in the house die.
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