What Does Genesis 21:3 Mean in the King James?

And Abraham called the name of his son that was born unto him, whom Sarah bare to him, Isaac.

Genesis 21:3 · KJV

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 child’s name keeps the laughter of an impossible promise alive as part of who he is.

THE MEANING

The name Isaac carries laughter inside the person who bears it. What begins as astonishment at impossibility can become a sound shared by everyone who encounters its arrival.

WHAT THIS UNDOES

It undoes the belief that laughter at an impossible promise can only be mockery: the name carries that laughter forward as a mark of arrival.

THE ROOT

יִצְחָק

Yitzḥaq

GROWS FROM

צחק

ṣ-ḥ-q

To laugh; the root also carries the sense of playing or making sport.

Under the familiar name Isaac, Hebrew still sounds the root for laughter. The name makes laughter part of the child’s nature, carrying the astonishment of his arrival into the life that follows.

ALSO GROWS

tseḥoq: Laughter

צְחֹק

Sarah says God has made her laugh; this branch shows the feeling held in Isaac’s name becoming shared joy.

metsacheq: Laughing, playing

מְצַחֵק

The same root describes Isaac playing later in life, linking his name’s laughter with visible, embodied life.

THE PATTERN

Laughter shifts from a private response to impossibility into a shared sign that what seemed beyond reach has arrived.

Therefore Sarah laughed within herself, saying, After I am waxed old shall I have pleasure, my lord being old also?

Genesis 18:12 · KJVSarah’s laughter begins inwardly, as she wonders how the promise could come to pass.

And Sarah said, God hath made me to laugh, so that all that hear will laugh with me.

Genesis 21:6 · KJVHer private laughter becomes a joy she expects others to share.

Blessed are ye that hunger now: for ye shall be filled. Blessed are ye that weep now: for ye shall laugh.

Luke 6:21 · KJVLaughter appears as the turn that follows a present experience of lack and grief.

THE THREAD

And Sarah said, God hath made me to laugh, so that all that hear will laugh with me.

Genesis 21:6 · KJV

Sarah’s words give Abraham’s naming its resonance: she says God has made her laugh, and that others will laugh with her. Isaac’s name, Yitzḥaq, condenses that shared laughter into the name of the child.

Read the SDV Bible.

Every verse has a Deep Dive in the app.

Get Selah Verse

The iPhone Bible app with the Selah Decoded Version.

Does something in this reading look wrong? Tell us