What Does Job 15:2 Mean in the King James?
Should a wise man utter vain knowledge, and fill his belly with the east wind?
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 question is whether knowledge that sounds full can still be only wind inside you.
THE MEANING
This question meets you when your knowing turns into a stream of words: does it feed what is within you, or only fill you with air? Wisdom and wind stand side by side, showing how words can be abundant in sound while leaving the inner life unfed. The east wind enters the image as something that fills the belly without nourishing it.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The belief that sounding knowledgeable means you are being nourished.
THE ROOT
רוּחַ
ruach
GROWS FROM
ר־ו־ח
Breath or moving air: wind.
רוּחַ (ruach, breath or wind) is one word where English often draws a boundary between them. Here, “knowledge of wind” makes knowing sound like air: present and audible, yet unable to nourish the belly.
ALSO GROWS
ruach: Breath or wind.
רוּחַ
The same word holds both meanings, so the verse’s wind image also carries the sense of breath.
ruchot: Winds; plural of ruach.
רוּחוֹת
The plural preserves the same word for wind, showing that the verse’s image belongs to a word that also names breath.
דַּעַת
da'at
GROWS FROM
י־ד־ע
To know or perceive.
דַּעַת (da’at, knowledge) grows from יָדַע (yada, to know or perceive). The verse places this knowing beside wind, asking whether what is called knowledge has substance enough to feed you.
ALSO GROWS
yada: To know or perceive.
יָדַע
The root connects “knowledge” to the act of knowing, not merely to a store of words.
moda: An acquaintance or known kinsman.
מוֹדָע
A person known through relationship is another branch of the same root, giving knowledge a personal, lived dimension.
קָדִים
qadim
GROWS FROM
ק־ד־ם
To come before; to be in front. From this comes the sense of east, the direction of sunrise.
קָדִים (qadim, east wind) carries the root’s sense of what is in front or eastward. The verse names not just wind, but the east wind filling the belly: an image of fullness that gives no food.
ALSO GROWS
qedem: East; what is before or former.
קֶדֶם
This branch holds direction and what lies before together, adding depth to the east wind’s name.
qadimah: Eastward; forward.
קָדִימָה
The same root can describe movement toward the front or east, keeping direction present in the verse’s wind image.
THE PATTERN
Words can fill the inner life with sound while leaving it unfed.
How long wilt thou speak these things? and how long shall the words of thy mouth be like a strong wind?A man’s belly shall be satisfied with the fruit of his mouth; and with the increase of his lips shall he be filled.Now as touching things offered unto idols, we know that we all have knowledge. Knowledge puffeth up, but charity edifieth.THE THREAD
The east wind carrieth him away, and he departeth: and as a storm hurleth him out of his place.The east wind that fills the belly in Job 15:2 becomes the wind that carries a person away here. The shared image opens the question further: what fills you with wind may leave you displaced rather than nourished.
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