What Does Joshua 9:9 Mean in the King James?
And they said unto him, From a very far country thy servants are come because of the name of the LORD thy God: for we have heard the fame of him, and all that he did in Egypt,
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 LORD’s name is known through the deeds carried in a report: what is heard gives the name its nature.
THE MEANING
What the LORD does gives substance to his name: the speakers say the report of those deeds has reached them from far away. Their words place a claim of distance beside what they have heard, so the reader encounters a name whose reach exceeds the place where its deeds occurred.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The LORD’s name is an empty label, unrelated to what he does.
THE ROOT
שָׁמַעְנוּ
shamaʿnu
GROWS FROM
שמע
Hear, listen, heed.
The Hebrew repeats this root in שָׁמַעְנוּ (shamaʿnu, “we heard”) and שָׁמְעוֹ (shamʿo, “his report” or “fame”). The report they receive and the hearing that receives it grow from the same root, so the LORD’s deeds travel as something heard and carried onward.
ALSO GROWS
shamʿo: His report, his fame.
שָׁמְעוֹ
This word appears beside “we heard” in the verse and shares the root שמע, joining the act of hearing to the report that travels.
shemuʿah: A report, tidings, something heard.
שְׁמוּעָה
Its consonants share the root שמע; it names the report carried from one hearer to another.
רְחוֹקָה
reḥoqah
GROWS FROM
רחק
Be distant, be far away.
The verse places רְחוֹקָה מְאֹד (reḥoqah meʾod, “very far”) beside the report the speakers say they have heard. The distance of a place and the reach of a report are different measures: what is far away can still be present through hearing.
ALSO GROWS
raḥoq: Far, distant.
רָחוֹק
This adjective shares the root רחק and names the distance the speakers claim separates them from the deeds they have heard about.
merḥaq: Distance, a distant place.
מֶרְחָק
This noun shares the root רחק and makes the verse’s contrast tangible: distance remains, while the report crosses it.
THE PATTERN
What is done becomes testimony, and testimony carries its meaning beyond the place where it happened.
The people shall hear, and be afraid: sorrow shall take hold on the inhabitants of Palestina.Declare his glory among the heathen, his wonders among all people.For we can not but speak the things which we have seen and heard.THE THREAD
The people shall hear, and be afraid: sorrow shall take hold on the inhabitants of Palestina.Joshua 9:9’s שָׁמַעְנוּ (shamaʿnu, “we heard”) and Exodus 15:14’s “shall hear” share the Hebrew root שמע (shamaʿ, “hear”). In both verses, what the LORD has done becomes a report that reaches people beyond the place where it happened.
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