What Does Genesis 19:26 Mean in the King James?
But his wife looked back from behind him, and she became a pillar of salt.
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 word for pillar carries the sense of being stationed, so her backward gaze ends with her fixed in place.
THE MEANING
The verse speaks now in a stark image: she looks back while behind him, then becomes a pillar of salt. The departing movement continues, but she is fixed in the landscape as a marker of the turn.
THE ROOT
נְצִיב
natsiv
GROWS FROM
נצב
n-ts-b
to stand, be set, or be stationed
“pillar” in this verse is natsiv. The noun grows from a root of standing or being stationed, so this is more than a shape: she becomes something fixed in place. The word gives the scene its stark ending, a person turned into a marker in the landscape.
ALSO GROWS
nitsav: standing; stationed
נִצָּב
This related form makes the pillar’s stillness part of the word’s family.
matzevah: standing stone; monument
מַצֵּבָה
This related word for a set stone shows how the root can name something fixed upright as a marker.
וַתַּבֵּט
vattabbet
GROWS FROM
נבט
n-b-t
to look toward; regard
“looked” in this verse is vattabbet. This gaze-word can carry the sense of regarding, not merely moving the eyes. Here it names the direction of her attention just before the scene fixes her in place.
ALSO GROWS
habbet: look; gaze toward
הַבֵּט
In Genesis 15:5, the same root directs Abraham’s gaze toward the heavens, showing how the object of the look gives it direction.
mabbat: gaze; regard; expectation
מַבָּט
This noun can name both a look and what is looked toward or expected, linking vision with orientation.
THE PATTERN
Scripture links the direction of a person’s gaze with the direction of their movement.
Let thine eyes look right on, and let thine eyelids look straight before thee.And Jesus said unto him, No man, having put his hand to the plough, and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God.Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended: but this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before,THE THREAD
Thou art of purer eyes than to behold evil, and canst not look on iniquity: wherefore lookest thou upon them that deal treacherously, and holdest thy tongue when the wicked devoureth the man that is more righteous than he?Genesis uses וַתַּבֵּט (vattabbet), “she looked,” from נבט (n-b-t), meaning “to look or regard”; Habakkuk uses the same root twice for looking. The shared root opens the gaze as directed regard, while Genesis shows where this particular turn leaves her: fixed as a pillar.
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