What Does Jeremiah 11:17 Mean in the King James?
For the LORD of hosts, that planted thee, hath pronounced evil against thee, for the evil of the house of Israel and of the house of Judah, which they have done against themselves to provoke me to anger in offering incense unto Baal.
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 one root for the wrong they do and the harm spoken against them, saying their devotion has already turned against themselves.
THE MEANING
God’s planting does not make you immune to what your own choices cultivate; the text says the people’s deeds are against themselves. It holds the LORD’s anger at devotion to Baal in full view.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
God’s planting makes me immune to the consequences of what I choose to serve.
THE ROOT
רָעָה
ra’ah
GROWS FROM
רעע
To be bad, do harm, or bring trouble.
“evil” in this verse is ra’ah. The two forms share the same root: one names the harm spoken against the people, the other the wrong they have done. The verse binds conduct to consequence in a single word-family, while stating that their actions are already against themselves.
ALSO GROWS
ra: Bad, evil, harmful.
רַע
This form shows the root’s range for naming what is harmful or wrong.
ra’ah: Evil, trouble, or calamity.
רָעָה
The verse uses this form both for the trouble pronounced against them and for the wrong behind it.
הַנּוֹטֵעַ
han-notea
GROWS FROM
נטע
To plant or set into the ground for growth.
“planted” in this verse is han-notea. The LORD is named as the planter, the source of the people’s establishment. Planting does not guarantee that later growth is untouched by the consequences of what is cultivated.
ALSO GROWS
neta: A plant or planting.
נֵטַע
The branch makes the planted people part of an image of living growth.
matta: A plantation or planted place.
מַטָּע
This branch keeps the focus on a life or place set out to grow.
THE PATTERN
What people set in motion ripens into consequences that return to them.
For they have sown the wind, and they shall reap the whirlwind: it hath no stalk: the bud shall yield no meal: if so be it yield, the strangers shall swallow it up.He made a pit, and digged it, and is fallen into the ditch which he made. His mischief shall return upon his own head, and his violent dealing shall come down upon his own pate.Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap.THE THREAD
Yet I had planted thee a noble vine, wholly a right seed: how then art thou turned into the degenerate plant of a strange vine unto me?The same Hebrew root, נטע (nata, plant), names the LORD’s planting here and in Jeremiah 2:21. That verse opens this one further: being planted well does not erase what a life cultivates afterward.
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