What Does Isaiah 15:3 Mean in the King James?

In their streets they shall gird themselves with sackcloth: on the tops of their houses, and in their streets, every one shall howl, weeping abundantly.

Isaiah 15:3 · 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.

This verse in the Selah Decoded Version

THE KEY

The verse makes mourning a shared sound: grief is worn on the body, voiced from rooftops, and carried through the streets.

THE MEANING

Grief does not stay inside one heart here: it is worn on bodies, voiced from rooftops, and heard in the streets. The lament gathers a whole community into one sound, filling ordinary places with sorrow.

WHAT THIS UNDOES

This undoes the belief that grief is proper only when kept private and quiet; here it covers the body and fills common space.

THE ROOT

יְיַלֵּל

yəyalēl

GROWS FROM

ילל

Y-L-L

to howl or wail

The root’s noun forms name the howl itself, so the cry is more than a single utterance: it becomes a sustained sound that fills the shared landscape. English preserves the sound of “howl,” while the Hebrew root family makes the lament feel like a condition spreading through the community.

ALSO GROWS

yelālāh: wailing, a howl

יְלָלָה

The noun names the wailing as a continuing sound, echoing how mourning fills both rooftops and streets.

yelēl: a howl, a wail

יְלֵל

This branch names the cry itself, linking each person’s voice to the wider communal lament.

THE PATTERN

When loss enters shared life, sorrow becomes visible and audible, and the community bears it together.

And in that day did the Lord GOD of hosts call to weeping, and to mourning, and to baldness, and to girding with sackcloth:

Isaiah 22:12 · KJVWeeping and sackcloth make grief visible in the community’s shared life.

Gird yourselves, and lament, ye priests: howl, ye ministers of the altar: come, lie all night in sackcloth, ye ministers of my God: for the meat offering and the drink offering is withholden from the house of your God.

Joel 1:13 · KJVThe call to howl and wear sackcloth gives communal sorrow a public voice and shape.

Rejoice with them that do rejoice, and weep with them that weep.

Romans 12:15 · KJVGrief is shared through the presence of others who weep alongside the one who suffers.

THE THREAD

Therefore shall Moab howl for Moab, every one shall howl: for the foundations of Kir-hareseth shall ye mourn; surely they are stricken.

Isaiah 16:7 · KJV

The same Hebrew root, ⁨ילל⁩ (yalal, to howl), returns as Moab’s cry is repeated back toward Moab. The shared root reveals the lament as a continuing voice moving through the people, not an isolated outcry.

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