What Does Isaiah 15:4 Mean in the King James?
And Heshbon shall cry, and Elealeh: their voice shall be heard even unto Jahaz: therefore the armed soldiers of Moab shall cry out; his life shall be grievous unto him.
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
English gives both sounds the same word, but Hebrew moves from a city’s plea for help to the armed men’s answering shout, until the distress reaches the living self.
THE MEANING
The cry travels beyond Heshbon and Elealeh until its voice is heard as far as Jahaz, and Moab’s armed men raise a shout of their own. The calamity reaches the living soul itself, making life grievous to the one who carries it.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
Being armed does not make a person untouchable by grief: even Moab’s fighters cry out, and the anguish reaches their living soul.
THE ROOT
וַתִּזְעַק
vattizʿaq
GROWS FROM
זעק
z-ʿ-q
Cry out, call for help.
Heshbon’s cry uses זעק (zāʿaq, cry out), a call that rises from distress. The voice travels beyond the city and is heard as far as Jahaz, before the verse turns to the armed men’s own shout.
ALSO GROWS
zāʿaq: Cry out or call for aid.
זָעַק
The verb names a distress call, giving Heshbon’s cry the force of a plea.
zeʿāqāh: A cry or public outcry.
זְעָקָה
The noun shows how an individual cry can become an audible expression of wider distress.
יָרִיעוּ
yāriʿū
GROWS FROM
רוע
r-w-ʿ
Raise a shout, cry aloud.
“cry out” in this verse is yāriʿū. The soldiers’ cry uses a different Hebrew root from Heshbon’s plea. English repeats “cry,” while Hebrew shifts from a call of distress to a raised shout among the armed men.
ALSO GROWS
rūaʿ: To shout or raise a cry.
רוּעַ
This verb gives the soldiers’ response the sound of a collective shout.
teruʿāh: A shout, acclamation, or alarm cry.
תְּרוּעָה
This branch carries the sense of a sound raised publicly, matching the armed men’s cry.
נַפְשׁוֹ
nafshō
GROWS FROM
נפש
n-p-š
The living self: a person or living soul.
“his life” in this verse is nafshō. Here נֶפֶשׁ (nefesh, living soul) names the person whose life is made grievous. The crisis does not end at the level of public noise; it reaches the whole living self.
ALSO GROWS
nefesh ḥayyāh: A living being or person.
נֶפֶשׁ חַיָּה
This phrase shows nefesh naming a whole living creature, illuminating the verse’s movement from a public cry to personal anguish.
nāphaš: Rest or be refreshed.
נָפַשׁ
This related form brings out the living self’s capacity for exhaustion and restoration, while this verse holds the anguish of the moment.
THE PATTERN
A voiced cry crosses its point of origin and reaches someone beyond it.
And it came to pass in process of time, that the king of Egypt died: and the children of Israel sighed by reason of the bondage, and they cried, and their cry came up unto God by reason of the bondage.The righteous cry, and the LORD heareth, and delivereth them out of all their troubles.Behold, the hire of the labourers who have reaped down your fields, which is of you kept back by fraud, crieth: and the cries of them which have reaped are entered into the ears of the Lord of sabaoth.THE THREAD
My heart shall cry out for Moab; his fugitives shall flee unto Zoar, an heifer of three years old: for by the mounting up of Luhith with weeping shall they go it up; for in the way of Horonaim they shall raise up a cry of destruction.Verse 5 repeats the root זעק (zāʿaq, cry out) used for Heshbon’s cry in verse 4. Now the cry rises from the heart speaking for Moab, carrying the public grief into an inward voice.
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