What Does Judges 4:3 Mean in the King James?
And the children of Israel cried unto the LORD: for he had nine hundred chariots of iron; and twenty years he mightily oppressed the children of Israel.
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 names oppression as pressure applied to a people, and their cry as a sound aimed directly toward the LORD.
THE MEANING
When force keeps pressing your life, the verse calls that pressure what it is; its long duration does not make it small. The cry rising from it is directed toward the LORD, and both the pressure and the cry remain visible.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
Years of oppression do not make it harmless, and the cry it produces is not meaningless.
THE ROOT
לָחַץ
lāḥaṣ
GROWS FROM
לחץ
l-ḥ-ṣ
To press or squeeze; to exert pressure.
“oppressed” in this verse is lāḥaṣ. The verb pictures oppression as pressure applied to a people, not a vague condition. Exodus 3:9 uses the same root in both “oppression” (לַחַץ, laḥaṣ) and “oppress” (לֹחֲצִים, loḥăṣîm), joining the pressure itself to the action that causes it.
ALSO GROWS
laḥaṣ: Pressure, oppression
לַחַץ
This noun names the pressure as a condition people are made to live under.
loḥăṣîm: Pressing, oppressing
לֹחֲצִים
This form names those applying the pressure, as Exodus 3:9 does of the Egyptians.
וַיִּצְעֲקוּ
wayyiṣʿăqû
GROWS FROM
צעק
ṣ-ʿ-q
To cry out, call aloud, or cry for help.
“cried” in this verse is wayyiṣʿăqû. This is an outcry directed אל יהוה (ʾel YHWH, toward the LORD), not merely distress kept inside. Exodus 3:9 places this cry beside the same pressure-root, so the text’s repeated pattern holds the pressing and the cry together.
ALSO GROWS
ṣĕʿāqāh: A cry, an outcry
צְעָקָה
The noun gives the cry a name as an audible expression of distress.
ṣōʿēq: One crying out
צֹעֵק
This form keeps the root’s focus on a voice rising in appeal.
THE PATTERN
The cry produced by pressure reaches toward the LORD.
Now therefore, behold, the cry of the children of Israel is come unto me: and I have also seen the oppression wherewith the Egyptians oppress them.Then they cried unto the LORD in their trouble, and he delivered them out of their distresses.Behold, the hire of the labourers who have reaped down your fields, which is of you kept back by fraud, crieth: and the cries of them which have reaped are entered into the ears of the Lord of sabaoth.THE THREAD
Now therefore, behold, the cry of the children of Israel is come unto me: and I have also seen the oppression wherewith the Egyptians oppress them.Exodus 3:9 repeats both roots: צעק (ṣ-ʿ-q), “cry out,” and לחץ (l-ḥ-ṣ), “press, oppress.” The pairing shows that the pressure and the outcry belong to the same unfolding pattern, even when the pressure has lasted for years.
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