What Does Joshua 1:6 Mean in the King James?
Be strong and of a good courage: for unto this people shalt thou divide for an inheritance the land, which I sware unto their fathers to give them.
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 courage here serves a whole people: it turns a sworn promise into an inheritance they can inhabit.
THE MEANING
This word meets the reader where a promise still has to become a place people can live in. Courage is bound to the work of making the land an inheritance for a people, so strength takes shape as something shared. The promise becomes a concrete allotment.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The land is not Joshua’s private reward for being strong; his courage serves the people’s inheritance.
THE ROOT
תַּנְחִיל
tanḥil
GROWS FROM
נחל
To inherit, receive, or hold as a possession.
“divide for an inheritance” in this verse is tanḥil. The Hebrew verb comes from the same root as “inheritance”: Joshua’s act makes this people inheritors. The root holds both the gift and the act of bringing a people into possession, so the land is presented as a received share.
ALSO GROWS
naḥălāh: Inheritance, allotted possession.
נַחֲלָה
This noun names the inheritance that Joshua’s action brings to the people.
nāḥal: To inherit or receive as a possession.
נָחַל
This verb makes receiving the inheritance part of the same root as granting it.
חֲזַק
ḥazaq
GROWS FROM
חזק
To be strong, firm, or steadfast; to prevail.
“strong” in this verse is ḥazaq. The command’s strength shares its root with becoming firm and with strengthening another. Here, strength is oriented toward carrying the people’s inheritance into reality.
ALSO GROWS
ḥāzāq: Strong or firm.
חָזָק
The adjective gives the quality named by the command.
ḥizzēq: To strengthen or make firm.
חִזֵּק
This form shows the root can describe strengthening, not only possessing strength.
וֶאֱמָץ
ve'emats
GROWS FROM
אמץ
To be firm, resolute, or courageous.
Alongside חזק, this root gives courage the sense of durable resolve. The paired commands connect firmness within the leader to an inheritance distributed beyond him.
ALSO GROWS
ʾāmēṣ: Strong, firm, or courageous.
אָמֵץ
This form carries the quality named in the command to be courageous.
ʾimmēṣ: To strengthen or encourage.
אִמֵּץ
This form shows the root can describe making someone else firm.
THE PATTERN
A promise becomes a people’s inheritance through a concrete act of giving and receiving.
Behold, I have set the land before you: go in and possess the land which the LORD sware unto your fathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, to give unto them and to their seed after them.The LORD is the portion of mine inheritance and of my cup: thou maintainest my lot.And now, brethren, I commend you to God, and to the word of his grace, which is able to build you up, and to give you an inheritance among all them which are sanctified.THE THREAD
The lines are fallen unto me in pleasant places; yea, I have a goodly heritage.“Heritage” here is נַחֲלָה (naḥălāh), from the same נחל (n-ḥ-l) root as Joshua’s “cause to inherit.” Joshua names the work of bringing a people into possession; the psalm shows that inheritance as a goodly portion whose lines fall in pleasant places.
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