What Does Job 5:23 Mean in the King James?
For thou shalt be in league with the stones of the field: and the beasts of the field shall be at peace with 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 field itself enters the promise of wholeness: stones are in covenant with you, and its wild creatures can be at peace with you.
THE MEANING
The verse speaks of a life where the ground beneath you and the creatures around you are no longer set against you. The peace named here reaches beyond human relationships into the whole field you inhabit.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
Safety depends on subduing everything around you. The verse pictures safety as covenant and peace with the land and its creatures.
THE ROOT
הָשְׁלְמָה
hashlemāh
GROWS FROM
שלם
sh-l-m
To be whole, sound, or complete; here, to be at peace with.
The word translated “at peace” belongs to the language of wholeness. The verse pictures a sound relationship between you and the field’s creatures, not merely a pause in danger.
ALSO GROWS
shalom: Wholeness, peace
שָׁלוֹם
This familiar branch makes the verse’s peace part of a wider picture of wholeness.
shalem: Whole, complete
שָׁלֵם
This branch shows the condition behind the peace: a relationship made sound.
חַיַּת
chayyat
GROWS FROM
חיה
ḥ-y-h
To live; to be alive.
The word for beasts comes from the language of life. English can make them sound like a separate category, while the Hebrew connects them to the living world with which you share the field.
ALSO GROWS
chai: Living, alive
חַי
This branch makes the creatures in the verse explicitly part of the language of life.
chayyim: Life
חַיִּים
This branch widens the image from individual animals to life itself, present around you in the field.
THE PATTERN
Wholeness reaches beyond human relationships, bringing the land and its creatures into safety.
And in that day will I make a covenant for them with the beasts of the field, and with the fowls of heaven, and with the creeping things of the ground: and I will break the bow and the sword and the battle out of the earth, and will make them to lie down safely.The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; and the calf and the young lion and the fatling together; and a little child shall lead them.Because the creature itself also shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God.THE THREAD
And in that day will I make a covenant for them with the beasts of the field, and with the fowls of heaven, and with the creeping things of the ground: and I will break the bow and the sword and the battle out of the earth, and will make them to lie down safely.Job’s verse places stones and beasts within a covenant of peace; Hosea names covenant with beasts, birds, and creatures of the ground while battle is removed from the earth. Together they reveal safety as a changed relationship with the whole field, not only an inward feeling.
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