What Does Genesis 1:28 Mean in the King James?
And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.
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
Fruitfulness and forceful rule arrive together: the blessing that fills the earth also commands humanity to bring it under control.
THE MEANING
You are included in humanity addressed as blessed and charged with fruitfulness, increase, and filling the earth. The same utterance gives humanity dominion over other living creatures and commands it to subdue the earth, holding generative life and forceful rule together.
THE ROOT
וְכִבְשֻׁהָ
vekhibshuha
GROWS FROM
כבש
kavash
subdue, bring under control
“subdue” in this verse is vekhibshuha. The root also yields a word for a conqueror and a verb for bringing something under authority. Here it keeps its force: the earth is to be brought under human control, while other living creatures are placed under human dominion.
ALSO GROWS
koveish: one who subdues or conquers
כּוֹבֵשׁ
This form names the agent who brings something under control, clarifying the force carried by the command.
hikhbish: to subject or bring under authority
הִכְבִּישׁ
This form makes explicit the act of placing something under another’s authority.
פְּרוּ
peru
GROWS FROM
פרה
parah
bear fruit, become fruitful
The root names bearing fruit itself, while its causative form can mean making fruitful. Here the imperative stands beside “multiply,” so the verse pictures life bearing outward and becoming many.
ALSO GROWS
peri: fruit
פְּרִי
The noun makes the root’s image concrete: fruitfulness is life-bearing.
hifrah: made fruitful, caused to bear fruit
הִפְרָה
This causative form shows the same root expressing the bringing forth of fruitfulness.
מִלְאוּ
mil'u
GROWS FROM
מלא
male
fill, be full
“replenish” in this verse is mil'u. One root holds the action of filling and the state of fullness. In this sequence, fruitfulness and increase move toward a land filled with life.
ALSO GROWS
male: full, filled
מָלֵא
This form names the state that the command to fill brings about.
melo: fullness
מְלֹא
This noun carries the same root into the condition of being filled.
THE PATTERN
The increase of life is joined to God’s blessing and gift, while human work participates in its unfolding.
And God blessed them, saying, Be fruitful, and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas, and let fowl multiply in the earth.And God blessed Noah and his sons, and said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth.I have planted, Apollos watered; but God gave the increase.THE THREAD
And I will make thee exceeding fruitful, and I will make nations of thee, and kings shall come out of thee.The Hebrew root behind “be fruitful” returns in the promise, “I will make thee exceeding fruitful.” The same root opens from the command to bear fruit into the emergence of nations and generations.
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