What Does Isaiah 43:27 Mean in the King James?
Thy first father hath sinned, and thy teachers have transgressed against me.
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 verse places two different breaks side by side: a first father misses the mark, while the teachers break away.
THE MEANING
The line names a fracture in both inheritance and instruction: your first father misses the mark, and your teachers break away from God. Failure can travel from a point of origin into the very voices meant to guide you.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The lie that a revered origin or trusted teacher must be aligned with God dissolves here: the verse names failure in both.
THE ROOT
פָּשְׁעוּ
pāšəʿū
GROWS FROM
פשע
p-š-ʿ
Revolt; break away.
“transgressed” in this verse is pāšəʿū. This verb carries the force of revolt and broken allegiance. The teachers’ failure is framed as a rupture in their relation to God, not merely a mistake.
ALSO GROWS
pešaʿ: Rebellion; breach.
פֶּשַׁע
The noun names the kind of break the teachers enact.
pōšēaʿ: A rebel; one who breaks away.
פֹּשֵׁעַ
The root names both rebellion and the person who embodies it.
חָטָא
ḥāṭāʾ
GROWS FROM
חטא
ḥ-ṭ-ʾ
Miss; go wrong; fail.
“sinned” in this verse is ḥāṭāʾ. The first father’s act is named with the language of missing or going wrong. Beside פשע (p-š-ʿ), “revolt” or “breaking away,” it gives the verse a sharper shape: an origin can miss, while its teachers can break away.
ALSO GROWS
ḥaṭṭāʾt: Missing; in offering contexts, an offering for the missing.
חַטָּאת
The noun keeps the idea of missing concrete and names a way of addressing it.
ḥōṭēʾ: One who misses or sins.
חוֹטֵא
The root describes both the failure and the person whose way has gone wrong.
THE PATTERN
A community’s inherited story and its appointed guides can both carry a breach into its present life.
The priests said not, Where is the LORD? and they that handle the law knew me not: the pastors also transgressed against me, and the prophets prophesied by Baal, and walked after things that do not profit.Her priests have violated my law, and have profaned mine holy things: they have put no difference between the holy and profane, neither have they shewed difference between the unclean and the clean, and have hid their eyes from my sabbaths, and I am profaned among them.Thou therefore which teachest another, teachest thou not thyself? thou that preachest a man should not steal, dost thou steal?THE THREAD
And the destruction of the transgressors and of the sinners shall be together, and they that forsake the LORD shall be consumed.The Hebrew roots פשע (p-š-ʿ), “rebel” or “break away,” and חטא (ḥ-ṭ-ʾ), “miss” or “go wrong,” appear together here as “transgressors” and “sinners.” Isaiah keeps the two roots distinct, opening this verse’s difference between a first father’s missing and the teachers’ rebellion.
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