What Does Hosea 4:10 Mean in the King James?
For they shall eat, and not have enough: they shall commit whoredom, and shall not increase: because they have left off to take heed to the LORD.
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
Appetite without guarded attention to the LORD becomes a closed loop: it takes in but never fills, and reaches outward without breaking into increase.
THE MEANING
You can eat and remain unsated; more does not guarantee fullness. Whoring can spend itself without bringing increase. The verse places both outcomes beside a departure from keeping attention on the LORD.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The lie this reverses is that more consumption or more intense desire must eventually make you full or fruitful.
THE ROOT
יִשְׂבָּעוּ
yisbaʿu
GROWS FROM
שׂבע
ś-b-ʿ
To be full or satisfied.
The verse uses the root of fullness for what eating fails to give: they take food in, but do not become full. English “have enough” can sound like a matter of quantity; the root points to satiety itself, which more intake does not secure.
ALSO GROWS
śāvēaʿ: Sated, full.
שָׂבֵעַ
This adjective names the state their eating does not reach.
śōvaʿ: Fullness, satiety.
שֹׂבַע
This noun makes the missing outcome explicit: the appetite continues, but fullness does not arrive.
יִפְרֹצוּ
yifrotzu
GROWS FROM
פרץ
p-r-ṣ
To break through, burst forth, or spread.
The verb rendered “increase” carries the image of breaking out or bursting forth. The verse says their whoring does not open into that kind of expansion; desire does not become fruitfulness.
ALSO GROWS
pereṣ: A breach or breaking forth.
פֶּרֶץ
This noun preserves the image of something bursting through, which “increase” can conceal.
pāraṣ: To break through or spread out.
פָּרַץ
This verb shows the movement the verse says does not occur.
לִשְׁמֹר
lishmor
GROWS FROM
שמר
sh-m-r
To keep, guard, or watch.
“Take heed” carries the root’s image of keeping watch. The verse sets unsated eating and fruitless desire alongside abandoning that attentiveness to the LORD.
ALSO GROWS
shōmēr: A keeper, guard, or watchman.
שֹׁמֵר
This branch makes attentiveness an active keeping, not a passing glance.
mishmeret: A charge, guard, or watch.
מִשְׁמֶרֶת
This branch shows keeping as sustained watchfulness, the posture the verse says has been left behind.
THE PATTERN
When attention leaves its source, taking in does not become fullness and effort does not become increase.
Ye have sown much, and bring in little; ye eat, but ye have not enough; ye drink, but ye are not filled with drink; ye clothe you, but there is none warm; and he that earneth wages earneth wages to put it into a bag with holes.Wherefore do ye spend money for that which is not bread? and your labour for that which satisfieth not? hearken diligently unto me, and eat ye that which is good, and let your soul delight itself in fatness.And Jesus said unto them, I am the bread of life: he that cometh to me shall never hunger; and he that believeth on me shall never thirst.THE THREAD
Ye have sown much, and bring in little; ye eat, but ye have not enough; ye drink, but ye are not filled with drink; ye clothe you, but there is none warm; and he that earneth wages earneth wages to put it into a bag with holes.Hosea’s “have enough” and Haggai’s “not enough” draw on the same Hebrew root, שׂבע (ś-b-ʿ), meaning to be full or satisfied. Haggai extends the image beyond eating: labor and earnings can keep flowing while the result still feels like a bag with holes.
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