What Does Jeremiah 23:37 Mean in the King James?
Thus shalt thou say to the prophet, What hath the LORD answered thee? and, What hath the LORD spoken?
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
A prophet’s authority rests in the message’s source: the question is what the LORD has actually answered and spoken, not what the prophet claims.
THE MEANING
This verse makes the source of claimed spiritual speech a live question: What has the LORD answered, and what has the LORD spoken? The words must be traced to the LORD rather than accepted simply because someone speaks as a prophet.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
A confident claim of revelation is not itself proof that the LORD has spoken.
THE ROOT
דִּבֶּר
dibber
GROWS FROM
דבר
d-b-r
To speak or utter; its related noun can mean a word or a matter.
The Hebrew verb for “spoken” grows from the same root as the noun for “word” or “matter.” Speech and the substance being spoken about belong together: the question is not only whether a prophet speaks, but what the LORD’s speech actually carries.
ALSO GROWS
dābār: A spoken word, matter, or thing.
דָּבָר
The same root joins an utterance with the matter it carries, so the LORD’s word is not detached from its substance.
devarim: Words or matters; the plural form of דָּבָר (dābār).
דְּבָרִים
The plural preserves the root’s joining of speech and matter, opening the question toward the actual content of a claimed message.
עָנָה
ʿānâ
GROWS FROM
ענה
ʿ-n-h
To answer or respond.
“answered” in this verse is ʿānâ. The verse asks about a response from the LORD, not merely a message attributed to him. The question keeps the prophet’s speech answerable to a source beyond the prophet.
ALSO GROWS
maʿaneh: An answer or response.
מַעֲנֶה
This noun from the same root names the response the verse asks the prophet to report.
ʿānâ: To answer or respond.
עָנָה
The verb places the LORD as the one answering, keeping the origin of the message in view.
THE PATTERN
A message that claims to come from God is accountable to what God actually speaks.
The prophet that hath a dream, let him tell a dream; and he that hath my word, let him speak my word faithfully. What is the chaff to the wheat? saith the LORD.But the prophet, which shall presume to speak a word in my name, which I have not commanded him to speak, or that shall speak in the name of other gods, even that prophet shall die.Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God: because many false prophets are gone out into the world.THE THREAD
The prophet that hath a dream, let him tell a dream; and he that hath my word, let him speak my word faithfully. What is the chaff to the wheat? saith the LORD.Here “spoken” is דִּבֶּר (dibber, “he spoke”), while “word” is דָּבָר (dābār, “word, matter”); both grow from דבר (d-b-r). The image of wheat and chaff makes the distinction tangible: the question is whether the message carries the LORD’s word.
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