What Does Ezra 10:9 Mean in the King James?
Then all the men of Judah and Benjamin gathered themselves together unto Jerusalem within three days. It was the ninth month, on the twentieth day of the month; and all the people sat in the street of the house of God, trembling because of this matter, and for the great rain.
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 “matter” that shakes this crowd is הַדָּבָר (ha-dābār), a Hebrew word for both a spoken word and a concrete thing, joining what is said to what people must face.
THE MEANING
You are shown a whole people sitting in the open, trembling under the rain and before a matter they cannot contain privately. The pressure is both bodily and inward: the storm overhead and the issue before them meet in one exposed scene.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that a serious matter is only an idea held privately; here the whole gathered people physically bear it together.
THE ROOT
הַדָּבָר
ha-dābār
GROWS FROM
דבר
D-B-R
To speak; a word, thing, or matter.
English can make “matter” sound like a private topic, but דָּבָר (dābār) also means “word” and “thing.” The same root holds what is spoken and what stands as a concrete matter before the people, so their trembling concerns something they face together.
ALSO GROWS
dābār: Word, thing, or matter.
דָּבָר
This is the word translated “matter” in the verse, linking the people’s distress to something concrete before them.
dibbēr: He spoke; to speak.
דִּבֵּר
This verbal branch shares the root with “matter,” joining what is spoken with what becomes an issue people must face.
devarim: Words or matters.
דְּבָרִים
The plural form shows the root can name both spoken words and matters, a connection echoed in Ezra 9:4.
THE PATTERN
When a matter bears weight, its impact becomes bodily and can gather people into shared response.
Then were assembled unto me every one that trembled at the words of the God of Israel, because of the transgression of those that had been carried away; and I sat astonied until the evening sacrifice.For all those things hath mine hand made, and all those things have been, saith the LORD: but to this man will I look, even to him that is poor and of a contrite spirit, and trembleth at my word.Now when they heard this, they were pricked in their heart, and said unto Peter and to the rest of the apostles, Men and brethren, what shall we do?THE THREAD
Then were assembled unto me every one that trembled at the words of the God of Israel, because of the transgression of those that had been carried away; and I sat astonied until the evening sacrifice.Ezra 9:4 speaks of trembling at the “words” of God; Ezra 10:9 speaks of trembling because of “this matter.” Both use forms of דבר (d-b-r), bringing spoken word and concrete matter into one semantic field.
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