What Does Jeremiah 7:4 Mean in the King James?
Trust ye not in lying words, saying, The temple of the LORD, The temple of the LORD, The temple of the LORD, are these.
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
Three repetitions of “The temple of the LORD” cannot turn a claim into a shelter; the verse exposes confidence in sacred words detached from truth.
THE MEANING
This verse addresses your confidence now: a sacred name or place cannot make a claim true by repetition. When words promise safety while concealing what is false, their repetition becomes a shelter made of words. The verse exposes that borrowed certainty.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
A sacred place or repeated religious phrase guarantees God’s protection regardless of what the words and life actually contain.
THE ROOT
תִּבְטְחוּ
tivteḥu
GROWS FROM
בטח
batach
To feel secure, rely on, or place confidence in.
English makes “trust” sound like a private opinion; this same root forms words for confidence and refuge. The verse asks what is functioning as refuge: the repeated temple claim, or the truth it is supposed to name.
ALSO GROWS
biṭṭāḥôn: Confidence, security
בִּטָּחוֹן
This branch makes trust concrete as a sense of security, the very thing the repeated claim offers.
miḇṭāḥ: Refuge, place of confidence
מִבְטָח
This branch shows trust acting as shelter, sharpening the question of whether the temple claim can truly serve as one.
הַשֶּׁקֶר
ha-sheqer
GROWS FROM
שקר
shaqer
Falsehood or acting falsely; dealing deceptively.
“Lying” in this verse is ha-sheqer. The wording names the phrase as falsehood before repeating the temple claim three times; repetition heightens the spectacle but does not change its nature. The noun and verb bind false speech to false dealing: what is said and what is done cannot be separated.
ALSO GROWS
sheqer: Falsehood, lie
שֶׁקֶר
This is the noun used in the verse: the temple claim is explicitly called falsehood.
shāqar: To lie, deal falsely
שָׁקַר
The verb form connects the false words to the act of dealing falsely.
THE PATTERN
A sacred claim cannot give security when the life beneath it contradicts the claim.
The heads thereof judge for reward, and the priests thereof teach for hire, and the prophets thereof divine for money: yet will they lean upon the LORD, and say, Is not the LORD among us? none evil can come upon us.Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven.An horse is a vain thing for safety: neither shall he deliver any by his great strength.THE THREAD
Blessed is the man that trusteth in the LORD, and whose hope the LORD is.“Trust” here and “trusteth” in Jeremiah 17:7 come from בטח (batach), the root of relying on and finding security. The shared root shows that the verse exposes a misplaced refuge, not trust itself.
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