What Does Isaiah 14:23 Mean in the King James?
I will also make it a possession for the bittern, and pools of water: and I will sweep it with the besom of destruction, saith the LORD of hosts.
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 verse pictures ownership passing from a city to a bittern and pools of water, before destruction sweeps across the place.
THE MEANING
The reader sees human possession give way to wild life, pooled water, and a sweep of destruction. The verse confronts any claim to permanence with a scene of complete dispossession.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that a powerful place can permanently secure its claim to the future.
THE ROOT
מוֹרָשׁ
morash
GROWS FROM
י־ר־שׁ
y-r-sh
Take possession; inherit; dispossess.
“possession” in this verse is morash. The word can carry the sense of inheritance, so the verse pictures more than an abandoned place: its occupancy is transferred. The bittern becomes the recipient of what the city has become.
ALSO GROWS
yarash: Take possession; inherit
יָרַשׁ
This verb names the act of claiming or inheriting that underlies the verse’s image of transferred possession.
morashah: Possession; inheritance
מוֹרָשָׁה
This related noun makes the inheritance sense of the place’s new status visible.
טָאטָא
ṭāṭāʾ
GROWS FROM
ט־א־ט־א
quadriliteral
Sweep; clear away.
The verse repeats the sweep-root in both the action and the broom named as its instrument. That sound-level pairing sharpens the image of thorough clearing.
ALSO GROWS
veṭēʾāṭēʾtîhā: And I will sweep it
וְטֵאטֵאתִיהָ
This is the sweeping action applied to the place itself.
maṭʾăṭēʾ: Broom
מַטְאֲטֵא
The instrument bears the same root as the action, binding the image of sweeping to its tool.
הַשְׁמֵד
hashmed
GROWS FROM
ש־מ־ד
sh-m-d
Destroy; annihilate.
The broom is explicitly linked with destruction, giving the sweep its hard edge. The verse holds the image at desolation, not gentle repair.
ALSO GROWS
shamad: Destroy; perish
שָׁמַד
This root verb supplies the force behind the destruction named in the verse.
hishmid: Destroy; wipe out
הִשְׁמִיד
This related verb carries the sense of bringing destruction upon something.
THE PATTERN
When a human-ordered place is emptied, wildness takes the vacated space and desolation becomes visible.
But the cormorant and the bittern shall possess it; the owl also and the raven shall dwell in it: and he shall stretch out upon it the line of confusion, and the stones of emptiness.Therefore the wild beasts of the desert with the wild beasts of the islands shall dwell there, and the owls shall dwell therein: and it shall be no more inhabited for ever; neither shall it be dwelt in from generation to generation.And he cried mightily with a strong voice, saying, Babylon the great is fallen, is fallen, and is become the habitation of devils, and the hold of every foul spirit, and a cage of every unclean and hateful bird.THE THREAD
But the cormorant and the bittern shall possess it; the owl also and the raven shall dwell in it: and he shall stretch out upon it the line of confusion, and the stones of emptiness.Isaiah 14:23 calls the place a מוֹרָשׁ (morash, possession or inheritance) for the bittern; Isaiah 34:11 uses יָרַשׁ (yarash, possess or inherit) for that bird’s claim. Both words grow from י־ר־שׁ (y-r-sh, possess or inherit), so the repeated bird and root make the transfer explicit.
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