What Does Exodus 22:22 Mean in the King James?
Ye shall not afflict any widow, or fatherless child.
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 Hebrew verb names the act of pressing someone down, so the verse draws its boundary around exploitation itself.
THE MEANING
The verse names a boundary around the widow or fatherless child, whose protection has been stripped away: they are not to be pressed down. Its force reaches active affliction, not only the absence of care.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It dissolves the lie that having less protection makes someone fair game for harm.
THE ROOT
תְעַנּוּן
teʿannûn
GROWS FROM
ענה
to afflict, oppress, or bring low
“afflict” in this verse is teʿannûn. The verb תְעַנּוּן (teʿannûn) names the doing of affliction; עִנּוּי (ʿinnûy) names the resulting state, and מְעַנֶּה (məʿannēh) names the one who causes it. The root keeps both the pressure and its agent in view: this is a prohibition against inflicting harm, not merely overlooking it.
ALSO GROWS
ʿinnûy: affliction, oppression
עִנּוּי
It names the condition produced by the action the verse forbids.
məʿannēh: one who afflicts
מְעַנֶּה
It makes the agent of the pressure visible: the verse forbids someone from taking that role toward the vulnerable.
THE PATTERN
A community is measured by whether it refuses to exploit the unprotected and attends to their hardship.
He doth execute the judgment of the fatherless and widow, and loveth the stranger, in giving him food and raiment.The LORD preserveth the strangers; he relieveth the fatherless and widow: but the way of the wicked he turneth upside down.Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world.THE THREAD
And the LORD said, I have surely seen the affliction of my people which are in Egypt, and have heard their cry by reason of their taskmasters; for I know their sorrows;The “affliction” here is עֳנִי (ʿoni, affliction), from the same ענה (ʿanah, afflict) family as the verb in Exodus 22:22. One verse forbids causing that pressure; the other shows it seen and heard.
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