What Does Genesis 39:14 Mean in the King James?
That she called unto the men of her house, and spake unto them, saying, See, he hath brought in an Hebrew unto us to mock us; he came in unto me to lie with me, and I cried with a loud voice:
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 behind “mock” also means laugh and play, so one word-family holds both play and the accusation of mockery.
THE MEANING
You hear an accusation gather force: he supposedly mocks “us,” then came to lie “with me.” As she says she cries aloud, the claim moves from shared injury to private encounter and takes on public urgency.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
A loud cry and a gathered audience do not make a charge true.
THE ROOT
לְצַחֶק
le-tsacheq
GROWS FROM
צחק
to laugh, play, or sport
Here the root carries the sharp accusatory force of “mock,” while the same seed appears in Isaac’s name and in the word for “sporting” with Rebekah. Laughter, play, and humiliation share one linguistic root.
ALSO GROWS
Isaac: His name carries the sense “he laughs.”
יִצְחָק
The name preserves the root’s laughter sense in the same word-family as “mock.”
sporting: Playing or sporting.
מְצַחֵק
Genesis 26:8 uses this form when Isaac is seen sporting with Rebekah, showing the root’s range beyond ridicule.
וַתִּקְרָא
vattiqra
GROWS FROM
קרא
to call, summon, or proclaim
“called / cried” in this verse is vattiqra. The same root appears when she calls the household and when she says, “I cried.” One use gathers the audience; the other gives urgency to her account, making the act of calling part of how the accusation takes shape.
ALSO GROWS
summon: To call or summon.
קָרָא
The first form calls the household to hear the charge.
name: To call or name something.
קָרָא שֵׁם
The same verb can attach a name to someone or something, linking a voice with how others identify what happened.
THE PATTERN
The first account can recruit hearers and frame another person’s actions before the account is tested.
He that is first in his own cause seemeth just; but his neighbour cometh and searcheth him.And set two men, sons of Belial, before him, to bear witness against him, saying, Thou didst blaspheme God and the king. And then carry him out, and stone him, that he may die.Now the chief priests, and elders, and all the council, sought false witness against Jesus, to put him to death;THE THREAD
And it came to pass, when he had been there a long time, that Abimelech king of the Philistines looked out at a window, and saw, and, behold, Isaac was sporting with Rebekah his wife.Genesis 26:8 uses the same root צחק (tsachaq, laugh or play) for Isaac “sporting” with Rebekah; here it becomes the word for “mock.” The shared root lets you hear how the language of play can carry a hostile accusation.
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