What Does Isaiah 3:19 Mean in the King James?
The chains, and the bracelets, and the mufflers,
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 Hebrew word for “mufflers” is linked to trembling, so even this veil sounds like a moving, removable covering.
THE MEANING
This line gives you a precise inventory of outward adornments: chains, bracelets, and veils. They sit within a sentence of removal, so these things can be taken away without defining the person who wears them. The list makes that loss tangible.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that outward display secures lasting dignity: each object belongs to what can be taken away.
THE ROOT
הָרְעָלוֹת
hā-reʿālōt
GROWS FROM
רעל
r-ʿ-l
Tremble or reel; the rare Hebrew word for veils is commonly linked to this root.
“mufflers” in this verse is hā-reʿālōt. The veil word shares the consonants רעל with תַּרְעֵלָה, “trembling,” in Isaiah 51:17. That echo makes the covering sound movable and unsettled, and the surrounding sentence counts it among things that are taken away.
ALSO GROWS
tarʿēlāh: Trembling, reeling (Isaiah 51:17)
תַּרְעֵלָה
The shared root links the veil with a state of motion or instability.
reʿālōt: Veils (Isaiah 3:19)
רְעָלוֹת
This is the verse’s covering word, carrying the sound-link to trembling.
THE PATTERN
Outward adornment can be stripped away, while lasting worth is described apart from outward display.
In that day the Lord will take away the bravery of their tinkling ornaments about their feet, and their cauls, and their round tires like the moon,For the LORD had said unto Moses, Say unto the children of Israel, Ye are a stiffnecked people: I will come up into the midst of thee in a moment, and consume thee: therefore now put off thy ornaments from thee, that I may know what to do unto thee.But let it be the hidden man of the heart, in that which is not corruptible, even the ornament of a meek and quiet spirit, which is in the sight of God of great price.THE THREAD
Awake, awake, stand up, O Jerusalem, which hast drunk at the hand of the LORD the cup of his fury; thou hast drunken the dregs of the cup of trembling, and wrung them out.The rare veil word in Isaiah 3:19 is commonly linked to רעל (r-ʿ-l, “tremble, reel”), the root behind “trembling” here. The shared root lets the veil carry a sense of motion or instability, while Isaiah 3 places it among outward things that can be removed.
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