What Does Deuteronomy 1:28 Mean in the King James?
Whither shall we go up? our brethren have discouraged our heart, saying, The people is greater and taller than we; the cities are great and walled up to heaven; and moreover we have seen the sons of the Anakims there.
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 report reaches the heart before the people reach the cities, and melts the place from which they would face them.
THE MEANING
When a threat comes through the voices around you, its scale can rise until the way ahead seems closed and unreachable. The verse shows speech melting the heart that would meet the danger: the cities seem to reach heaven, and the people ask where they can go. The question gives that inward collapse a voice.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that fear is an exact measure of the path ahead: a report can melt the heart before the journey begins.
THE ROOT
הֵמַסּוּ
hēmassû
GROWS FROM
מסס
māsas
To melt, dissolve, or lose firmness.
“discouraged” in this verse is hēmassû. The Hebrew pictures the heart melting, rather than simply losing enthusiasm. The same root can describe a heart melting like wax, showing fear as an inward loss of firmness.
ALSO GROWS
wayyimmās: Melted.
וַיִּמַּס
In Joshua 2:11, the same root describes hearts melting after a frightening report; the word here carries that same image.
nāmēs: Melting.
נָמֵס
In Psalm 22:14, a heart melts like wax, extending the root’s image from fear to deep distress.
בְּצֻרוֹת
bĕṣurōt
GROWS FROM
בצר
bāṣar
To fortify or make inaccessible.
“walled up” in this verse is bĕṣurōt. The word presents the cities as inaccessible, not merely tall or impressive. With the walls reaching heaven, the report makes the way forward seem sealed beyond reach.
ALSO GROWS
bāṣar: To fortify or make inaccessible.
בָּצַר
This verb names the quality behind the cities’ defenses: they seem shut against approach.
mivṣār: Fortress or stronghold.
מִבְצָר
This noun uses the same root for a fortified place, echoing how the report frames the cities as barriers.
THE PATTERN
Threat and distress are felt in the heart as a loss of firmness, whether they arrive through a report, suffering, or intimidation.
And as soon as we had heard these things, our hearts did melt, neither did there remain any more courage in any man, because of you: for the LORD your God, he is God in heaven above, and in earth beneath.I am poured out like water, and all my bones are out of joint: my heart is like wax; it is melted in the midst of my bowels.But and if ye suffer for righteousness’ sake, happy are ye: and be not afraid of their terror, neither be troubled;THE THREAD
And as soon as we had heard these things, our hearts did melt, neither did there remain any more courage in any man, because of you: for the LORD your God, he is God in heaven above, and in earth beneath.The same melt-root appears when Rahab says the people in Jericho hear news and their hearts melt. The people who seem imposing in this verse are also hearers whose hearts can be shaken by what reaches them.
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