What Does Isaiah 46:4 Mean in the King James?
And even to your old age I am he; and even to hoar hairs will I carry you: I have made, and I will bear; even I will carry, and will deliver you.
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
Creation here is not a finished event behind you; the same voice that made you names itself as the one still carrying you.
THE MEANING
The voice is with you into old age and gray hair, carrying you through the years. The one who made you remains active in what comes next: bearing the weight, continuing the carry, and delivering you.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The belief that God’s care ends when your strength fades is undone here: the promise to carry and deliver explicitly reaches old age and gray hair.
THE ROOT
אֶסְבֹּל
esbol
GROWS FROM
סבל
sabal
To bear or carry a load.
“carry” in this verse is esbol. The verse uses this load-bearing word twice. Its root also names both the burden and the bearer, keeping the weight carried and the one who carries it within one word family.
ALSO GROWS
sevel: Burden, load
סֵבֶל
The root names the weight itself, so the promise of carrying includes what weighs on you.
sabbal: Porter, bearer of loads
סַבָּל
The same root names the one who carries, making the promise active bearing rather than distant concern.
אֶשָּׂא
essa
GROWS FROM
נשא
nasa
To lift up, carry, or bear.
“bear” in this verse is essa. This is the first carrying verb in the sequence, before the verse repeats sabal. English makes the actions sound nearly interchangeable; the Hebrew adds the sense of lifting you up as well as bearing the load.
ALSO GROWS
massa: Burden, load
מַשָּׂא
The root connects lifting with taking up what weighs on you.
nasi: Leader, prince; one elevated
נָשִׂיא
The same root family reaches from bearing to being raised up, echoing the verse’s promise to lift and carry.
THE PATTERN
What God brings forth is sustained through ongoing bearing, from life’s beginning through every later span.
Hearken unto me, O house of Jacob, and all the remnant of the house of Israel, which are borne by me from the belly, which are carried from the womb:And in the wilderness, where thou hast seen how that the LORD thy God bare thee, as a man doth bear his son, in all the way that ye went, until ye came into this place.Who being the brightness of his glory, and the express image of his person, and upholding all things by the word of his power, when he had by himself purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high;THE THREAD
Hearken unto me, O house of Jacob, and all the remnant of the house of Israel, which are borne by me from the belly, which are carried from the womb:“Carried” here comes from נשא (nasa), the same root behind “I will bear” in verse 4. The carrying reaches from the womb to gray hair through one root family.
Read the SDV Bible.
Every verse has a Deep Dive in the app.
The iPhone Bible app with the Selah Decoded Version.
Does something in this reading look wrong? Tell us