What Does Jeremiah 15:6 Mean in the King James?
Thou hast forsaken me, saith the LORD, thou art gone backward: therefore will I stretch out my hand against thee, and destroy thee; I am weary with repenting.
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 rupture becomes a direction: a people walking backward meet the LORD’s hand against them after relenting has run out.
THE MEANING
The verse meets you where you turn from the LORD and continue backward: the divine hand stands against that direction, bringing destruction. Its final words speak a severe limit, the LORD is weary of relenting.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It dissolves the assumption that divine relenting can be presumed on forever: the verse says the hand turns against the one who forsakes the LORD and that relenting has reached its limit.
THE ROOT
תֵּלֵכִי אָחוֹר
tēlĕkhî ʾāḥôr
GROWS FROM
הלך
To walk or go.
“gone backward” in this verse is tēlĕkhî ʾāḥôr. The Hebrew verb תֵּלֵכִי (tēlĕkhî, “you go”) makes the phrase a movement, while אָחוֹר (ʾāḥôr, “backward”) gives its direction. The verse locates the rupture in the path being taken, not merely in a past lapse.
ALSO GROWS
hōlēkh: One who walks or goes.
הוֹלֵךְ
The same root names the person in motion, echoing the verse’s focus on a continuing direction.
halikhah: Walking or a journey.
הֲלִיכָה
This form shows how the root can describe a course of movement, illuminating the backward path in the verse.
עָזַבְתְּ
ʿāzavt
GROWS FROM
עזב
To leave, abandon, or forsake.
“forsaken” in this verse is ʿāzavt. This root names an act of leaving, and its related forms can describe both the one who leaves and what has been left behind. The verse presents estrangement as a departure directed toward the LORD, paired with the backward walk.
ALSO GROWS
ʿozēv: One who leaves or forsakes.
עֹזֵב
The form names the agent of departure, bringing out the relational act behind “forsaken.”
ʿāzûv: Left or abandoned.
עָזוּב
This form names the condition created by leaving, completing the root’s movement from action to consequence.
הִנָּחֵם
hinnāḥēm
GROWS FROM
נחם
To relent or regret; in related forms, to comfort or console.
“repenting” in this verse is hinnāḥēm. Here נחם (naḥam, “relent”) names the withholding or changing of a threatened action. The verse ends by saying that relenting has become exhausting; elsewhere this same word family also carries the sense of comfort and consolation.
ALSO GROWS
niḥam: Relented or regretted.
נִחַם
This verbal form shares the sense of changing course that appears in the verse’s final words.
neḥāmāh: Comfort or consolation.
נֶחָמָה
This related form reveals the root’s other shade: easing distress, alongside relenting from a threatened action.
menaḥēm: Comforter or consoler.
מְנַחֵם
The same root can name one who brings comfort, exposing the range held inside the verse’s word for relenting.
THE PATTERN
Persistent forsaking becomes a path whose consequence is divine withdrawal and judgment.
And he went out to meet Asa, and said unto him, Hear ye me, Asa, and all Judah and Benjamin; The LORD is with you, while ye be with him; and if ye seek him, he will be found of you; but if ye forsake him, he will forsake you.Thine own wickedness shall correct thee, and thy backslidings shall reprove thee: know therefore and see that it is an evil thing and bitter, that thou hast forsaken the LORD thy God, and that my fear is not in thee, saith the Lord GOD of hosts.Wherefore God also gave them up to uncleanness through the lusts of their own hearts, to dishonour their own bodies between themselves:THE THREAD
For the LORD shall judge his people, and repent himself for his servants, when he seeth that their power is gone, and there is none shut up, or left.Deuteronomy uses the same נחם (naḥam, “relent”) root when the LORD “repent[s] himself,” and עָזוּב (ʿāzûv, “left”) comes from the same root as “forsaken.” There, the LORD relents when the people are depleted; beside Jeremiah, the shared language reveals both compassion and the limit of relenting.
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