What Does Judges 6:23 Mean in the King James?

And the LORD said unto him, Peace be unto thee; fear not: thou shalt not die.

Judges 6:23 · KJV

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

“Peace” here is ⁨שָׁלוֹם⁩ (shalom), wholeness spoken into a moment where fear has narrowed everything to death.

THE MEANING

You hear the LORD speak wholeness into the fear of death: “Peace be unto thee; fear not.” In this moment, the voice names the outcome plainly, “thou shalt not die”, and fear no longer has the only word.

WHAT THIS UNDOES

The belief this undoes is that fear’s prediction is already the final truth.

THE ROOT

שָׁלוֹם

shalom

GROWS FROM

שׁלם

sh-l-m

To be complete, intact, or whole; in a causative form, to make good or repay.

“Peace” in this verse is shalom. The word carries more than quiet: ⁨שָׁלוֹם⁩ (shalom) names wholeness. Its root also holds the idea of making good what is owed, joining restored integrity with repair.

ALSO GROWS

shalem: Whole, complete

שָׁלֵם

This branch shows the state named by shalom: what is held intact.

shillem: He repaid, recompensed, or made restitution

שִׁלֵּם

The same root can describe making good a deficit, revealing repair within the idea of wholeness.

THE PATTERN

The LORD’s wholeness meets fear at its imagined edge and speaks beyond fear’s prediction.

And thou shalt go to thy fathers in peace; thou shalt be buried in a good old age.

Genesis 15:15 · KJVPeace accompanies even the approach of death, holding the whole passage of life within wholeness.

I will both lay me down in peace, and sleep: for thou, LORD, only makest me dwell in safety.

Psalm 4:8 · KJVWholeness makes room for rest where vulnerability might otherwise become fear.

Then the same day at evening, being the first day of the week, when the doors were shut where the disciples were assembled for fear of the Jews, came Jesus and stood in the midst, and saith unto them, Peace be unto you.

John 20:19 · KJVA word of peace meets people enclosed by fear, just as the LORD’s shalom meets fear of death here.

THE THREAD

Then Gideon built an altar there unto the LORD, and called it Jehovah-shalom: unto this day it is yet in Ophrah of the Abi-ezrites.

Judges 6:24 · KJV

The Hebrew word translated “Peace” is ⁨שָׁלוֹם⁩ (shalom), meaning wholeness; the next verse gives that same root a name: Jehovahshalom. The spoken assurance and the name point to the LORD as the source of that wholeness.

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