What Does Genesis 32:18 Mean in the King James?
Then thou shalt say, They be thy servant Jacob’s; it is a present sent unto my lord Esau: and, behold, also he is behind us.
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 gift goes ahead, but the heel-named Jacob is still following behind.
THE MEANING
What you send can reach another before you do, carrying your approach without becoming your presence. Jacob is still behind the gift; even his name echoes the one who follows at the heel.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
Once the gift arrives, the giver’s presence is unnecessary.
THE ROOT
שְׁלוּחָה
sheluchah
GROWS FROM
שׁלח
shalach
Send, send forth; release, let go.
The gift is not merely described as present; it is described as sent forth. The same root holds sending and release together, so the verse pictures something leaving Jacob’s hand and moving ahead of him.
ALSO GROWS
shalach: Send, send forth, release, let go.
שָׁלַח
This is the verb beneath “sent”; here the gift moves ahead while Jacob follows.
shilluach: Sending away, dismissal, release.
שִׁלּוּחַ
The same root can describe what is let go from someone’s hand, extending “sent” toward “released.”
Shiloach: Siloam; sent forth.
שִׁילֹחַ
The name of the sent waters carries the same outward movement found in the gift sent ahead.
אַחֲרֵינוּ
aḥarenu
GROWS FROM
אחר
achar
Behind, after; what comes later in a sequence.
Hebrew uses the same root for being behind in space and coming after in time. The gift goes ahead, while Jacob remains after it in both senses.
ALSO GROWS
aḥarei: After, behind.
אַחֲרֵי
This form makes the order explicit: Jacob follows what has been sent ahead.
aḥaron: Last, later, the one that follows.
אַחֲרוֹן
The same root can mark what comes at the rear of a sequence, echoing Jacob’s position behind the gift.
יַעֲקֹב
Yaʿaqov
GROWS FROM
עקב
ʿaqav
Heel; follow at the heel, and by extension supplant.
Jacob’s name carries the heel image, and the verse places him behind the gift that goes before him. The name and the scene echo one another: the one associated with the heel is still following.
ALSO GROWS
aqev: Heel.
עָקֵב
The heel is the body’s rear, linking Jacob’s name to his position behind the procession.
ʿaqav: Follow at the heel, catch up, supplant.
עָקַב
This branch gives the name its sense of following close behind, as Jacob does here.
THE PATTERN
What is sent ahead announces and prepares the arrival of the one who follows.
And say ye moreover, Behold, thy servant Jacob is behind us. For he said, I will appease him with the present that goeth before me, and afterward I will see his face; peradventure he will accept of me.Behold, I will send my messenger, and he shall prepare the way before me: and the Lord, whom ye seek, shall suddenly come to his temple, even the messenger of the covenant, whom ye delight in: behold, he shall come, saith the LORD of hosts.After these things the Lord appointed other seventy also, and sent them two and two before his face into every city and place, whither he himself would come.THE THREAD
Then the LORD said unto Moses, Go in unto Pharaoh, and tell him, Thus saith the LORD God of the Hebrews, Let my people go, that they may serve me.The word rendered “sent” here shares the root שלח (shalach, send forth or release) with the command “Let my people go.” In this verse a gift is sent ahead; in Exodus the same root names a people being released.
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