What Does Genesis 37:26 Mean in the King James?

And Judah said unto his brethren, What profit is it if we slay our brother, and conceal his blood?

Genesis 37:26 · 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

Judah’s word for “profit” carries the sense of cutting off: the proposed gain is already bound to the severing of a brother’s life.

THE MEANING

The verse puts a question before the reader: what can be gained by taking a life and covering its blood? Concealment can hide what happened from sight, but it cannot undo the act or restore the life.

WHAT THIS UNDOES

The belief that an advantage becomes clean once its cost is hidden.

THE ROOT

בֶּצַע

betsaʿ

GROWS FROM

בצע

⁨בצע⁩ (batsaʿ) means to cut off or break off; as a noun, it can mean gain or profit, including gain made by taking.

The word for “profit” grows from a root associated with cutting off or taking away. Here, the gain cannot be separated from the brother whose life would be cut short.

ALSO GROWS

batsaʿ: To cut off, break off, or gain by taking.

בָּצַע

This verbal branch gives the verse’s “profit” an edge of severance: the proposed gain is tied to what would be taken away.

botseaʿ: One who makes gain or takes profit.

בֹּצֵעַ

This participle names the person pursuing gain, making the question reach beyond the act to the one who profits from it.

וְכִסִּינוּ

vekhissinu

GROWS FROM

כסה

⁨כסה⁩ (kasah) means to cover, hide, or conceal.

“conceal” in this verse is vekhissinu. The verb pictures blood being covered over and made unseen. The proposed gain depends on hiding the evidence of a life taken; covering changes what can be seen, not what has happened.

ALSO GROWS

kasah: To cover or hide.

כָּסָה

This is the root verb behind “conceal,” showing that the act is literally framed as covering over.

mekhasseh: One who covers; covering.

מְכַסֶּה

This form keeps the same root consonants and makes the covering action visible as something done by an agent.

THE PATTERN

Gain pursued at the cost of life carries that cost within it, even when harm is hidden or renamed.

So are the ways of every one that is greedy of gain; which taketh away the life of the owners thereof.

Proverbs 1:19 · KJVThe verse links greedy gain directly to taking life, echoing the cost embedded in the proposed profit.

For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?

Mark 8:36 · KJVThe question of profit becomes a question of what is lost when gain is pursued at life’s expense.

Behold, the hire of the labourers who have reaped down your fields, which is of you kept back by fraud, crieth: and the cries of them which have reaped are entered into the ears of the Lord of sabaoth.

James 5:4 · KJVHidden profit gained by withholding what belongs to others still carries their cries with it.

THE THREAD

I acknowledged my sin unto thee, and mine iniquity have I not hid. I said, I will confess my transgressions unto the LORD; and thou forgavest the iniquity of my sin. Selah.

Psalm 32:5 · KJV

“Have I not hid” uses the same Hebrew root, ⁨כסה⁩ (kasah, to cover or hide), as “conceal” in Genesis 37:26. Here the covering is left undone and the hidden matter is spoken before the LORD, opening the same root in the opposite direction.

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