What Does Lamentations 3:46 Mean in the King James?

All our enemies have opened their mouths against us.

Lamentations 3:46 · 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

The word for “enemies” shares its Hebrew root with “enmity”: hostility itself is what speaks through the mouths turned against you.

THE MEANING

When hostility gathers against you, it does not remain abstract; it opens its mouth and becomes audible in words aimed at you and those with you. The verse names that exposure plainly: opposition is speaking against the shared “us” now.

WHAT THIS UNDOES

It undoes the belief that words spoken against you are weightless because they are only words; here, the open mouths are the form the opposition takes.

THE ROOT

אֹיְבֵינוּ

ʾōyvēnū

GROWS FROM

איב

ʾ-y-b

to be hostile; enmity

⁨אֹיְבֵינוּ⁩ (ʾōyvēnū, our enemies) carries the same ⁨א־י־ב⁩ consonants as ⁨אֵיבָה⁩ (ʾēvāh, enmity). The verse names more than a group: hostility itself is what speaks through their open mouths.

ALSO GROWS

ʾōyēv: enemy; one who is hostile

אֹיֵב

This singular form keeps the same ⁨א־י־ב⁩ consonants, so the collective “enemies” grows from the same hostility-root.

ʾēvāh: enmity; hostility

אֵיבָה

This abstract noun uses the same root and names the condition expressed by the people called enemies here.

THE PATTERN

Hostility becomes audible when opposition opens its mouth against another.

They gaped upon me with their mouths, as a ravening and a roaring lion.

Psalm 22:13 · KJVThe gaping mouths make hostility an open assault rather than a distant label.

Yea, they opened their mouth wide against me, and said, Aha, aha, our eye hath seen it.

Psalm 35:21 · KJVThe mouth opens wide against the speaker, and accusation follows.

Who, when he was reviled, reviled not again; when he suffered, he threatened not; but committed himself to him that judgeth righteously:

1 Peter 2:23 · KJVReviling and threats show verbal opposition at work, even as the verse describes a response that does not echo it.

THE THREAD

And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel.

Genesis 3:15 · KJV

Genesis names ⁨אֵיבָה⁩ (ʾēvāh, enmity), built from the same ⁨א־י־ב⁩ root as ⁨אֹיְבֵינוּ⁩ (ʾōyvēnū, our enemies) here. The shared root reveals hostility as a condition made audible through the enemies’ mouths.

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