What Does Jeremiah 25:37 Mean in the King James?
And the peaceable habitations are cut down because of the fierce anger of the LORD.
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 says the peaceable dwellings are silenced, so even a place named for wholeness can fall quiet under the LORD’s anger.
THE MEANING
The verse says that places you experience as settled and safe can be cut down under the LORD’s fierce anger. It holds shelter and devastation together without softening what the anger does.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that a peaceful setting guarantees immunity from judgment.
THE ROOT
וְנָדַמּוּ
venadammu
GROWS FROM
דמם
דמם (damam): to fall silent, be still, or cease.
“cut down” in this verse is venadammu. The Hebrew verb carries the sense of falling silent or ceasing. The dwellings are not only described as destroyed; their silence makes the loss of habitation audible.
ALSO GROWS
demamah: silence, stillness
דְּמָמָה
The same root gives silence a name, making the quiet after the dwellings fall part of the verse’s image.
dommu: be still
דֹּמּוּ
This form appears in Psalm 4:4, where the same root describes a call to stillness rather than a place silenced by destruction.
שָׁלוֹם
shalom
GROWS FROM
שׁלם
שׁלם (shalem): wholeness, completeness, soundness.
English “peaceable” can suggest mere quiet, but שָׁלוֹם (shalom, wholeness) comes from the root of completeness. The dwelling is named for wholeness, and the verse shows that this wholeness can be shattered.
ALSO GROWS
shalem: whole, complete, sound
שָׁלֵם
This form makes clear that the peace in שָׁלוֹם (shalom) includes being intact, not merely being undisturbed.
shillem: repay, make good, recompense
שִׁלֵּם
This same root can describe making something good or complete again, placing the broken wholeness of the dwellings in sharp relief.
THE PATTERN
When divine anger brings judgment, even places that seem secure can be shaken or laid waste.
I beheld, and, lo, the fruitful place was a wilderness, and all the cities thereof were broken down at the presence of the LORD, and by his fierce anger.Therefore I will shake the heavens, and the earth shall remove out of her place, in the wrath of the LORD of hosts, and in the day of his fierce anger.And said to the mountains and rocks, Fall on us, and hide us from the face of him that sitteth on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb: For the great day of his wrath is come; and who shall be able to stand?THE THREAD
Stand in awe, and sin not: commune with your own heart upon your bed, and be still. Selah.The word וְנָדַמּוּ (venadammu, “are silenced”) shares the root דמם (damam, “fall silent”) with דֹּמּוּ (dommu, “be still”) in this verse. The shared root lets stillness hold two faces: a place brought to silence under anger, and a person becoming still.
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