What Does Isaiah 17:8 Mean in the King James?
And he shall not look to the altars, the work of his hands, neither shall respect that which his fingers have made, either the groves, or the images.
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 same Hebrew gaze that turns toward the Maker in verse 7 turns away from what human hands have made in verse 8.
THE MEANING
The verse speaks to the moment what your hands have made no longer receives the regard you gave it. The altars, groves, and images remain visible, but they no longer command your sight or define what is worthy of trust. The gaze shifts from fashioned things toward their Maker.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that something made by your own hands can become the source you must look to.
THE ROOT
יִשְׁעֶה
yishʿeh
GROWS FROM
שעה
Shaʿah means to look toward or regard; the root names directed attention.
“look to” in this verse is yishʿeh. The verb repeats across verses 7 and 8: in verse 7 the gaze is directed toward the Maker, and here it is withheld from altars made by human hands. The root makes the passage’s turn visible as a reorientation of regard, not simply a change in what is being seen.
ALSO GROWS
yishʿeh: look toward, regard
יִשְׁעֶה
In Isaiah 17:7, this same form describes the gaze directed toward the Maker, setting up the reversal in this verse.
hashʿu: turn your gaze away
הַשְׁעוּ
Isaiah 22:4 uses this form to tell someone to look away; the shared root shows regard as something that can be directed or withheld.
THE PATTERN
Human-made images cannot carry the divine reality or authority people project onto them.
Their idols are silver and gold, the work of men’s hands.What profiteth the graven image that the maker thereof hath graven it; the molten image, and a teacher of lies, that the maker of his work trusteth therein, to make dumb idols?Forasmuch then as we are the offspring of God, we ought not to think that the Godhead is like unto gold, or silver, or stone, graven by art and man’s device.THE THREAD
At that day shall a man look to his Maker, and his eyes shall have respect to the Holy One of Israel.The Hebrew root שעה, “look toward, regard,” appears in both verses. Verse 7 directs the gaze toward the Maker; verse 8 turns it from the altars and images made by human hands.
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