What Does Jeremiah 50:21 Mean in the King James?
Go up against the land of Merathaim, even against it, and against the inhabitants of Pekod: waste and utterly destroy after them, saith the LORD, and do according to all that I have commanded thee.
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 targets already carry the verdict: מְרָתַיִם (Merāṯayim, Merathaim, “double rebellion”) names the land, while פְּקוֹד (Pĕqōd, Pekod) echoes פקד (pāqad, “visit, reckon”).
THE MEANING
You meet a command to devastate both the named land and its inhabitants, carrying out the full commission. The verse states the violence plainly: destruction is total and explicitly placed under the LORD’s command. Its names make rebellion and reckoning sound inside the order itself.
THE ROOT
מְרָתַיִם
Merāṯayim
GROWS FROM
מרה
m-r-h
To rebel or resist.
Merathaim is commonly heard as “double rebellion,” with its ending carrying a dual sense. The name makes the land’s supposed character part of the sentence before the command to devastate it.
ALSO GROWS
mārāh: To rebel or resist.
מָרָה
This verb connects the place-name to the rebellion named in the oracle.
mĕrî: Rebellion or defiance.
מְרִי
This noun makes the name’s wordplay audible: the land is named in the language of the charge against it.
פְּקוֹד
Pĕqōd
GROWS FROM
פקד
p-q-d
To attend to, visit, muster, or reckon; context determines whether the visitation is care or accountability.
Pekod echoes the root פקד (pāqad, “attend to, visit, reckon”). Here the command to destroy gives that visitation a punitive force, and Jeremiah 50:18 uses the same root for “punish.”
ALSO GROWS
pāqad: To attend to or visit; also to reckon with.
פָּקַד
The same root underlies the name Pekod and the judgment named in Jeremiah 50:18.
pĕquddāh: A charge, oversight, or appointed duty.
פְּקֻדָּה
This branch shows the root can carry the sense of an assigned accounting or responsibility, sharpening the name’s judicial undertone.
הַחֲרֵם
haḥărēm
GROWS FROM
חרם
ḥ-r-m
To place under a ban or devote irrevocably; in this verse, to devote to destruction.
“Utterly destroy” renders a word for placing something under an irrevocable ban. The command therefore names a total, final destruction, not a limited defeat.
ALSO GROWS
ḥērem: A ban or something placed under it.
חֵרֶם
This noun shows the force of the command: its target is placed under a total, irrevocable prohibition.
heḥĕrîm: To devote something under the ban.
הֶחֱרִים
This verb form belongs to the same root as “utterly destroy” and expresses the act as a complete dedication to destruction.
THE PATTERN
A scriptural name can compress a nature or coming action into the sentence around it.
Neither shall thy name any more be called Abram, but thy name shall be Abraham; for a father of many nations have I made thee.Let not my lord, I pray thee, regard this man of Belial, even Nabal: for as his name is, so is he; Nabal is his name, and folly is with him: but I thine handmaid saw not the young men of my lord, whom thou didst send.And she shall bring forth a son, and thou shalt call his name JESUS: for he shall save his people from their sins.THE THREAD
Therefore thus saith the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel; Behold, I will punish the king of Babylon and his land, as I have punished the king of Assyria.Here “punish” comes from פקד (pāqad, “visit, attend to, reckon”), the root echoed in Pekod. The name carries the same reckoning that this verse states plainly in the verb.
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