What Does Isaiah 55:2 Mean in the King James?
Wherefore do ye spend money for that which is not bread? and your labour for that which satisfieth not? hearken diligently unto me, and eat ye that which is good, and let your soul delight itself in fatness.
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
What you labor to buy cannot feed the living self; the verse sets weighed-out silver against nourishment that is received and truly enjoyed.
THE MEANING
You can spend and labor for what leaves you unsatisfied. The invitation reaches you now: hear and respond, eat what is good, and let your living soul delight in abundance. The verse places fruitless striving beside a meal that actually nourishes.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that more spending or harder striving can satisfy a hunger that the thing being pursued cannot feed.
THE ROOT
נַפְשְׁכֶם
nafsh'khem
GROWS FROM
נפש
n-p-sh
The living self: life as an embodied person with appetite and desire.
English “soul” can make the eater sound like a separate, inward part; nefesh names the living self, including the appetite that receives food and pleasure. Here the same nefesh that eats is the one that delights in richness, so the nourishment reaches the whole living person.
ALSO GROWS
nefesh chayyah: Living being
נֶפֶשׁ חַיָּה
This phrase uses nefesh for a living creature, keeping the verse’s soul embodied.
naphash: Be refreshed or rest
נָפַשׁ
This related verb links nefesh with life renewed after toil; here delight follows labor that could not satisfy.
שִׁמְעוּ שָׁמוֹעַ
shimʿu shamoaʿ
GROWS FROM
שמע
sh-m-ʿ
To hear, listen, and respond.
“hearken diligently” in this verse is shimʿu shamoaʿ. The root appears twice in an emphatic form: “hear, hearing.” Listening is the doorway to the verse’s meal; the movement from hearing to eating makes reception part of how nourishment arrives.
ALSO GROWS
shemaʿ: Hear and respond
שְׁמַע
This familiar form carries the responsive sense of the verse’s call to listen.
shemuʿah: Report or news heard
שְׁמוּעָה
The same root can name what is heard; here the message directs the listener toward what is good.
תִּשְׁקְלוּ
tishqelu
GROWS FROM
שקל
sh-q-l
To weigh out.
The verb pictures silver being weighed out, so “spend” carries the image of a measured exchange. The question sharpens: weight is handed over for what cannot become bread or satisfaction.
ALSO GROWS
sheqel: Weight; a monetary unit
שֶׁקֶל
The unit of payment preserves the root’s image of weighed value.
mishqal: Weight or measure
מִשְׁקָל
This branch makes the weighing explicit: what is measured and paid does not necessarily nourish.
THE PATTERN
What effort cannot make satisfying stands against nourishment received as a gift.
And he humbled thee, and suffered thee to hunger, and fed thee with manna, which thou knewest not, neither did thy fathers know; that he might make thee know that man doth not live by bread only, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of the LORD doth man live.O taste and see that the LORD is good: blessed is the man that trusteth in him.Labour not for the meat which perisheth, but for that meat which endureth unto everlasting life, which the Son of man shall give unto you: for him hath God the Father sealed.THE THREAD
Ho, every one that thirsteth, come ye to the waters, and he that hath no money; come ye, buy, and eat; yea, come, buy wine and milk without money and without price.Isaiah uses the same Hebrew verb for “eat” in both verses: verse 1 offers eating without money, and verse 2 asks why you spend for what is not bread. The shared אכל root ties the offered meal to the contrast with costly substitutes that leave you unsatisfied.
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