What Does Job 18:19 Mean in the King James?
He shall neither have son nor nephew among his people, nor any remaining in his dwellings.
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 verse measures total ruin by the collapse of both continuities: no descendant carries the line, and no survivor remains at home.
THE MEANING
The ruin described here reaches beyond one person’s death: no son or descendant remains among his people, and no survivor is left in his dwellings. It is an image of a life with neither a next generation nor anyone left in the place that held it.
THE ROOT
בֵּן
ben
GROWS FROM
בנה
build, establish
The word for son shares a root with building. The absence here is more than a missing person: the line that would build forward has no next member.
ALSO GROWS
ben: son, child
בֵּן
This is the word in the verse; its root links a son with what is built and carried forward.
banah: build, establish
בָּנָה
The same root makes the family line sound like a structure built through generations.
nivneh: be built, be established
נִבְנֶה
The passive form echoes the possibility of a family being built up, which this verse depicts as cut off.
מְגוּרָיו
megurav
GROWS FROM
גור
gur
sojourn, dwell
The last phrase places the absence inside the dwellings themselves. The root also names a sojourner, so the verse closes both avenues of continuity: the kin who might follow and the one who might remain at home.
ALSO GROWS
gur: sojourn, dwell
גּוּר
The dwelling is connected to the act of inhabiting a place.
ger: sojourner, resident outsider
גֵּר
The same root names someone who lives in a place, sharpening the image of no one remaining there.
THE PATTERN
Scripture pictures complete ruin as the severing of every continuation: descendants, survivors, and the place that shelters them.
For I will rise up against them, saith the LORD of hosts, and cut off from Babylon the name, and remnant, and son, and nephew, saith the LORD.Let his posterity be cut off; and in the generation following let their name be blotted out.And now also the axe is laid unto the root of the trees: therefore every tree which bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down, and cast into the fire.THE THREAD
And Sarai said unto Abram, Behold now, the LORD hath restrained me from bearing: I pray thee, go in unto my maid; it may be that I may obtain children by her. And Abram hearkened to the voice of Sarai.The phrase rendered “obtain children” uses אִבָּנֶה (ibaneh, “be built up”), from בנה (banah, “build”), the root associated with בֵּן (ben, “son”). Job 18:19 shows the inverse: the family line has no son to carry its building forward.
Read the SDV Bible.
Every verse has a Deep Dive in the app.
The iPhone Bible app with the Selah Decoded Version.
Does something in this reading look wrong? Tell us