What Does Genesis 31:36 Mean in the King James?
And Jacob was wroth, and chode with Laban: and Jacob answered and said to Laban, What is my trespass? what is my sin, that thou hast so hotly pursued after me?
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 Hebrew root for “hotly pursued” also means “burn,” so the chase itself carries heat.
THE MEANING
Accusation becomes pursuit before it becomes an answerable charge. The paired questions distinguish rebellion from missing and ask what, specifically, is being alleged. The verse exposes how pressure can masquerade as proof while leaving the alleged wrong unnamed.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
Being pursued does not itself prove guilt; pressure is not the name of an offense.
THE ROOT
דָּלַקְתָּ
dālaqta
GROWS FROM
דלק
To burn or be kindled; also to pursue or chase.
“hotly pursued” in this verse is dālaqta. English makes pursuit sound like movement alone, but this root also names burning. The chase in this verse carries the force of heat.
ALSO GROWS
dālaq: Burn, kindle, or catch fire.
דָּלַק
The same root supplies the fire beneath the word for pursuit.
wədāləqû: They will burn or kindle.
וְדָלְקוּ
Obadiah 1:18 uses this form for fire spreading among stubble, making the heat within pursuit visible.
פִּשְׁעִי
pishʿi
GROWS FROM
פשע
To break away, revolt, or rebel.
Under “trespass” is the idea of breaking away or rebelling, giving the question a specific edge. It asks whether the pursuit answers to a real act of revolt.
ALSO GROWS
pāshaʿ: To rebel or break away.
פָּשַׁע
This verb gives the charge of trespass its sense of deliberate rupture.
peshaʿ: Rebellion, revolt, or breach.
פֶּשַׁע
This noun names the kind of offense Jacob asks Laban to identify.
חָטָאתִי
ḥāṭāʾtî
GROWS FROM
חטא
To miss, err, or go wrong.
“sin” in this verse is ḥāṭāʾtî. This second question gives wrongdoing a different shape: a miss or failure. The verse separates rebellion from missing and presses the accusation to name what kind of breach it claims.
ALSO GROWS
ḥāṭāʾ: To miss or err.
חָטָא
This verb supplies the root sense beneath Jacob’s question about sin.
ḥaṭṭāʾt: Sin, guilt, or an offering associated with sin.
חַטָּאת
The related noun shows how the root can name both the wrong and what addresses it.
THE PATTERN
When accusation bears down, the text presses it to name a specific offense.
How many are mine iniquities and sins? make me to know my transgression and my sin.Jesus answered him, If I have spoken evil, bear witness of the evil: but if well, why smitest thou me?And he said unto them the third time, Why, what evil hath he done? I have found no cause of death in him: I will therefore chastise him, and let him go.THE THREAD
And the house of Jacob shall be a fire, and the house of Joseph a flame, and the house of Esau for stubble, and they shall kindle in them, and devour them; and there shall not be any remaining of the house of Esau; for the LORD hath spoken it.Genesis uses the דלק root for Laban’s pursuit; here the same root describes fire spreading through stubble. That connection lets you hear the pursuit in Jacob’s question as burning pressure.
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