What Does Exodus 34:7 Mean in the King James?
Keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, and that will by no means clear the guilty; visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, and upon the children’s children, unto the third and to the fourth generation.
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
Mercy bears the real offense without calling guilt clean or stopping its consequences at one generation.
THE MEANING
This verse speaks now of mercy that bears and releases wrongdoing without declaring the guilty clear. The fathers’ crookedness, rebellion, and missing reach their children and grandchildren through the third and fourth generation, while faithful love is kept for thousands.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that forgiveness means every consequence disappears, or that consequences mean mercy is absent.
THE ROOT
נֹשֵׂא
nōśēʾ
GROWS FROM
נשא
nasa
Lift, carry, bear; in this construction, bear wrongdoing, hence forgive or pardon.
“forgiving” in this verse is nōśēʾ. English names the result as forgiveness; the Hebrew also pictures the offense being lifted and borne. Set beside the refusal to clear the guilty and the generational accounting, this keeps forgiveness from meaning that the wrong is imaginary or its effects vanish.
ALSO GROWS
nasa: To lift, carry, or bear.
נָשָׂא
This is the root verb behind the verse’s image of bearing wrongdoing.
massa: A burden or load.
מַשָּׂא
The same word family makes wrongdoing something borne, giving forgiveness the texture of carrying a real burden.
פֶּשַׁע
peshaʿ
GROWS FROM
פשע
pashaʿ
To rebel or break away; a breach of trust or allegiance.
“transgression” in this verse is peshaʿ. The verse names rebellion among the wrongs being borne, so forgiveness reaches beyond overlooking a harmless mistake. Its three terms hold together crookedness, rebellion, and missing, giving different shapes to what is carried.
ALSO GROWS
pashaʿ: To rebel or break away.
פָּשַׁע
The verb shows the force inside the noun: transgression is a breach, not merely an error.
poshēaʿ: A rebel or one who breaks away.
פֹּשֵׁעַ
This related form makes the breach a description of a person’s action, clarifying what the verse says is forgiven.
פֹּקֵד
pōqēd
GROWS FROM
פקד
paqad
Attend to, take account of, muster, or visit.
This root can mean attending, mustering, or visiting: its sense is active accounting, not passing by. Here that accounting reaches children through the third and fourth generation, holding long-range consequence beside mercy kept for thousands.
ALSO GROWS
paqad: To attend to, muster, or visit.
פָּקַד
This is the root verb behind the verse’s language of visitation and consequence.
pequddah: Oversight, charge, or appointed responsibility.
פְּקֻדָּה
The related noun carries the sense of something entrusted to active oversight, illuminating the verse’s image of consequences being attended to across generations.
THE PATTERN
Mercy and accountability remain together: releasing wrongdoing does not render its consequences weightless.
Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the LORD thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me; And shewing mercy unto thousands of them that love me, and keep my commandments.The LORD is slow to anger, and great in power, and will not at all acquit the wicked: the LORD hath his way in the whirlwind and in the storm, and the clouds are the dust of his feet.Who will render to every man according to his deeds:THE THREAD
So shall ye say unto Joseph, Forgive, I pray thee now, the trespass of thy brethren, and their sin; for they did unto thee evil: and now, we pray thee, forgive the trespass of the servants of the God of thy father. And Joseph wept when they spake unto him.Joseph’s brothers use שָׂא (śāʾ, lift or carry) for forgive, from the same root נשא (nasa, lift, carry, or bear) as the word rendered forgiving here; both lines also name פֶּשַׁע (peshaʿ, rebellion or breach). The shared roots picture forgiveness as taking up the actual breach, rather than treating it as if it never happened.
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