What Does Hosea 3:2 Mean in the King James?

So I bought her to me for fifteen pieces of silver, and for an homer of barley, and an half homer of barley:

Hosea 3:2 · 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

The silver paid for her shares a Hebrew root with yearning, so the price itself carries the language of longing.

THE MEANING

Here, being taken back into relation has a measurable shape: silver, a homer of barley, and a half-homer of barley are paid for her. The verse places money and food in one exchange, holding a person’s return to the speaker together with its material cost.

THE ROOT

כֶּסֶף

kesef

GROWS FROM

כ־ס־ף

k-s-p

Yearn, long for; the related noun ⁨כֶּסֶף⁩ (kesef) means silver or money.

The same consonants bind payment to yearning: kesef is silver, while a verb from ⁨כסף⁩ means to long for. The verse keeps the material price intact and lets desire resonate beneath it.

ALSO GROWS

kesef: silver; money

כֶּסֶף

This is the word for the silver paid in the verse, linking the concrete price to the root’s yearning sense.

nikhsof: to long for; yearn

נִכְסֹף

Genesis 31:30 uses this form for longing after one’s father’s house, making the root’s desire-sense explicit.

THE PATTERN

Scripture names silver when a person or relationship is assigned a value in an exchange.

Then there passed by Midianites merchantmen; and they drew and lifted up Joseph out of the pit, and sold Joseph to the Ishmeelites for twenty pieces of silver: and they brought Joseph into Egypt.

Genesis 37:28 · KJVJoseph’s sale names a person’s price in silver, making the exchange’s valuation visible.

And I said unto them, If ye think good, give me my price; and if not, forbear. So they weighed for my price thirty pieces of silver.

Zechariah 11:12 · KJVThe price is weighed in silver, exposing the value assigned to the speaker.

And said unto them, What will ye give me, and I will deliver him unto you? And they covenanted with him for thirty pieces of silver.

Matthew 26:15 · KJVSilver makes the betrayal’s exchange countable.

THE THREAD

And now, though thou wouldest needs be gone, because thou sore longedst after thy father’s house, yet wherefore hast thou stolen my gods?

Genesis 31:30 · KJV

Genesis 31:30 uses ⁨נִכְסֹף⁩ (nikhsof), “longed,” from the same ⁨כסף⁩ root family as Hosea’s ⁨כֶּסֶף⁩ (kesef), “silver.” The shared root lets Hosea’s price carry an undertone of longing.

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