What Does Isaiah 57:20 Mean in the King James?
But the wicked are like the troubled sea, when it cannot rest, whose waters cast up mire and dirt.
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 uses the same root for the sea being “troubled” and its waters “cast[ing] up” mire: its unrest is a continual driving outward.
THE MEANING
This verse names a living condition: unrest that cannot quiet keeps bringing mire and dirt to the surface. What fills the depths becomes visible in what the waters cast up.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that what keeps surfacing has no relation to the condition beneath it.
THE ROOT
נִגְרָשׁ
nigrash
GROWS FROM
גרש
garash
Drive out, thrust away; in this verse, be driven or churned.
“troubled” in this verse is nigrash. The verse uses this root twice: the sea is נִגְרָשׁ, driven, and its waters וַיִּגְרְשׁוּ, drive up the mire. The unrest and its visible output are one continuous motion of expulsion.
ALSO GROWS
garash: Drive out, expel.
גָּרַשׁ
This is the root’s basic action: movement forced outward from a place.
yegaresh: He will drive out.
יְגָרֵשׁ
In Exodus 11:1, this form names forceful expulsion, making the root’s outward motion explicit.
הַשְׁקֵט
hashqet
GROWS FROM
שקט
shaqat
Be quiet, settle, be at rest.
“rest” in this verse is hashqet. The verse names quiet as what the sea cannot reach, setting stillness against the repeated force of גרש. Its waters do not merely pass over the surface; they keep driving up what the depths contain.
ALSO GROWS
shaqat: Be quiet, be at rest.
שָׁקַט
This is the state the sea in the verse cannot attain.
sheqet: Quietness, stillness.
שֶׁקֶט
This noun names the settled condition absent from the sea’s ceaseless churning.
THE PATTERN
What remains active within a source emerges through what it sends out.
As a fountain casteth out her waters, so she casteth out her wickedness: violence and spoil is heard in her; before me continually is grief and wounds.A good man out of the good treasure of his heart bringeth forth that which is good; and an evil man out of the evil treasure of his heart bringeth forth that which is evil: for of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaketh.Doth a fountain send forth at the same place sweet water and bitter?THE THREAD
And the LORD said unto Moses, Yet will I bring one plague more upon Pharaoh, and upon Egypt; afterwards he will let you go hence: when he shall let you go, he shall surely thrust you out hence altogether.The words for the sea being driven and its waters casting up mire share the root גרש, “drive out.” Exodus uses the same root for forced expulsion, revealing the outward force carried in the sea’s unrest.
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