What Does Genesis 21:5 Mean in the King James?
And Abraham was an hundred years old, when his son Isaac was born unto him.
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
Isaac’s name means “he laughs,” so the laughter surrounding the promise remains audible in the child who is born.
THE MEANING
A promise reaches the body of a real person, and its astonishment remains audible in his name: Isaac means “he laughs.” The verse holds fulfillment and laughter together instead of erasing one when the other arrives.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The moment a promise is fulfilled, its earlier doubt must be forgotten.
THE ROOT
יִצְחָק
Yitzḥaq
GROWS FROM
צחק
To laugh; in the name Yitzḥaq, “he laughs.”
“Isaac” in this verse is Yitzḥaq. The name grows from the Hebrew root for laughter, keeping that sound inside the birth itself. The child is not merely given a label: his name carries the astonishment that surrounds the promise.
ALSO GROWS
tzāḥaq: to laugh
צָחַק
This verb is the root from which Isaac’s name grows, placing laughter inside the meaning of the name.
tseḥoq: laughter
צְחֹק
Sarah uses this noun in the next verse when she says God has made her laugh, making the name’s root explicit.
metzaḥeq: playing or mocking
מְצַחֵק
The same root appears in the surrounding scene with a different shade, showing that the laughter word family can hold more than one tone.
THE PATTERN
What begins as laughter at an unlikely promise can become laughter shared aloud.
Therefore Sarah laughed within herself, saying, After I am waxed old shall I have pleasure, my lord being old also?Then was our mouth filled with laughter, and our tongue with singing: then said they among the heathen, The LORD hath done great things for them.And thou shalt have joy and gladness; and many shall rejoice at his birth.THE THREAD
And Sarah said, God hath made me to laugh, so that all that hear will laugh with me.Sarah says God has made her laugh, using the same צחק (tzāḥaq), “to laugh,” root that forms Yitzḥaq’s name. The birth and the laughter are joined in the language itself.
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