What Does Isaiah 16:6 Mean in the King James?
We have heard of the pride of Moab; he is very proud: even of his haughtiness, and his pride, and his wrath: but his lies shall not be so.
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
Moab’s pride is pictured as a rising claim, but the verse refuses to let that self-made height pass for truth.
THE MEANING
When pride and anger fill a claim with force, their intensity still does not make the claim true. The verse sets Moab’s repeated self-exaltation beside a blunt verdict: his boasts do not stand as he says they do.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
A claim made with enough pride or fury becomes true by force.
THE ROOT
גֵּא
gēʾ
GROWS FROM
גאה
גאה (gāʾāh): to rise, be high, or exalt oneself.
The verse calls Moab גֵּא (gēʾ), “proud,” and piles up related language for pride around it. The root’s sense of rising lets that pride read as a self-made height, while the closing verdict denies that height the power to establish its own claims.
ALSO GROWS
gāʾāh: to rise high, be exalted
גָּאָה
The verb shows the rising movement carried in the description of Moab as proud.
gaʾavah: pride, arrogance
גַּאֲוָה
This related noun shares the root consonants ג־א־ה and names the state produced by self-exaltation.
עֶבְרָתוֹ
ʿevrātô
GROWS FROM
עבר
עבר (ʿāvar): to pass, cross, or go beyond.
The word for wrath belongs to the עבר (ʿāvar) root family, whose basic movement is crossing or passing over. That gives the fury a sense of force crossing over, but the verse does not let that force make Moab’s boasts true.
ALSO GROWS
ʿāvar: to pass or cross
עָבַר
This verb shares the root consonants ע־ב־ר and supplies the root’s basic movement.
maʿavār: a passage or crossing
מַעֲבָר
This noun keeps the same consonants and makes the root’s crossing movement concrete.
THE PATTERN
Self-exaltation cannot establish its own height; pride meets a force that brings it low.
Pride goeth before destruction, and an haughty spirit before a fall.The lofty looks of man shall be humbled, and the haughtiness of men shall be bowed down, and the LORD alone shall be exalted in that day.But he giveth more grace. Wherefore he saith, God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace unto the humble.THE THREAD
Pride goeth before destruction, and an haughty spirit before a fall.Proverbs uses גאון (gāʾôn), “pride,” from the same גאה (gāʾāh) root family that describes Moab as גֵּא (gēʾ), “proud.” Isaiah says Moab’s boasts do not stand; Proverbs shows the fall that follows pride’s attempted rise.
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