What Does Isaiah 13:9 Mean in the King James?
Behold, the day of the LORD cometh, cruel both with wrath and fierce anger, to lay the land desolate: and he shall destroy the sinners thereof out of it.
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 word for “wrath” shares its root with “crossing,” adding movement beneath the emotion as the day lays the land waste.
THE MEANING
The day of the LORD comes as a cruel force, with wrath and burning anger that lay the land desolate and destroy its sinners. The violence reaches both the land and those who live in it.
THE ROOT
עֶבְרָה
ʿevrāh
GROWS FROM
עבר
עבר (ʿ-b-r; ʿāvar): pass, cross over, go across.
The word translated “wrath” belongs to the same family as words for passing and crossing, layering movement beneath the emotion-word. Here that force is directed toward making the land desolate.
ALSO GROWS
ʿāvar: To pass, cross over.
עָבַר
This verb makes visible the motion carried by the same consonants as the noun for wrath.
ʿēver: The other side; beyond or across.
עֵבֶר
This noun preserves the root’s crossing sense and adds a spatial resonance beneath “wrath.”
חַטָּאֶיהָ
ḥaṭṭāʾêhā
GROWS FROM
חטא
חטא (ḥ-ṭ-ʾ; ḥāṭāʾ): miss, fail, sin.
“sinners thereof” in this verse is ḥaṭṭāʾêhā. The word for “sinners” shares its seed with חֵטְא (ḥēṭʾ, sin or missing) and חַטָּאת (ḥaṭṭāʾt, sin; in ritual use, an offering for the missing). The verse names people through this root, then states their fate directly: destruction from the land.
ALSO GROWS
ḥēṭʾ: Sin; a missing or failure.
חֵטְא
It shows the root’s range from the act or condition of missing to the people named by it.
ḥaṭṭāʾt: Sin; in ritual use, an offering for the missing.
חַטָּאת
This branch keeps the same root while showing how the word-family can name both the missing and a response associated with it.
לְשַׁמָּה
ləšammāh
GROWS FROM
שמם
שמם (š-m-m; šāmēm): be desolate, be appalled.
The form translated “desolate” shares its seed with words for desolation and for being desolate or appalled. The land itself becomes waste, while the verse also names the destruction of its inhabitants.
ALSO GROWS
šəmāmāh: Desolation; waste.
שְׁמָמָה
This noun makes the condition named in the verse explicit: the land becomes desolation.
šāmēm: To be desolate; to be appalled.
שָׁמֵם
This verb shows the same root describing a state of desolation or shock.
THE PATTERN
The LORD’s judgment is portrayed as an upheaval that reaches both the land and those who inhabit it.
The land shall be utterly emptied, and utterly spoiled: for the LORD hath spoken this word.The mountains quake at him, and the hills melt, and the earth is burned at his presence, yea, the world, and all that dwell therein.But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night; in the which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat, the earth also and the works that are therein shall be burned up.THE THREAD
And it came to pass, that, when the sun went down, and it was dark, behold a smoking furnace, and a burning lamp that passed between those pieces.Isaiah’s עֶבְרָה (ʿevrāh, wrath) shares the root עבר (ʿ-b-r, pass or cross) with וַיַּעֲבֹר (wayyaʿăvōr, passed) in this verse. The shared root gives the word for wrath a movement resonance that English does not show.
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