What Does Leviticus 20:6 Mean in the King James?
And the soul that turneth after such as have familiar spirits, and after wizards, to go a whoring after them, I will even set my face against that soul, and will cut him off from among his people.
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 answers a soul’s turn toward hidden guidance with God’s face set against that same soul, and its removal from the people.
THE MEANING
When you turn toward mediums and those associated with hidden knowing, the verse calls that pursuit “going a whoring after them.” It depicts God setting his face against that same living self and cutting the person off from among the people; the consequence is severe and communal.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that seeking hidden counsel is a harmless private act: the verse names the pursuit as unfaithfulness and its consequence as severance from the people.
THE ROOT
וְהִכְרַתִּי
ve-hikhrati
GROWS FROM
כרת
To cut, sever, or excise.
“cut him off” in this verse is ve-hikhrati. The same root is used for “cutting a covenant,” while here it names a person severed from the people. The Hebrew makes communal belonging the stakes of the sentence, and its force is actual excision.
ALSO GROWS
karat berit: Cut a covenant.
כָּרַת בְּרִית
The root כרת (karat, cut or sever) can mark a bond made; here it marks a person cut away from the community.
keritut: Severance; divorce.
כְּרִיתוּת
This noun from the same consonants names a formal breaking of a bond, echoing the verse’s language of separation.
נֶפֶשׁ
nefesh
GROWS FROM
נפש
The living self, person, or life; a related verb means to rest or be refreshed.
“soul” in this verse is nefesh. נֶפֶשׁ (nefesh, the living self) names the person, not merely an inner fragment detachable from the body. A related verb describes being refreshed, so this consonant family holds life as a living, refreshable person; here that whole self is addressed.
ALSO GROWS
naphash: To rest or be refreshed.
נָפַשׁ
This related verb links the living self with the possibility of refreshment.
vayinnaphash: And he was refreshed.
וַיִּנָּפֵשׁ
This inflected form uses the same consonants for a living being’s rest or renewal.
הַיִּדְּעֹנִים
hayidde'onim
GROWS FROM
ידע
To know, recognize, or perceive.
The term for these “wizards” is connected to ידע (yada, know), carrying the sense of “knowers.” The verse’s warning centers on where the living self turns for what it claims to know.
ALSO GROWS
yada: To know or recognize.
יָדַע
This is the verb whose consonants underlie the term for the “knowers.”
yedi'ah: Knowledge or information.
יְדִיעָה
This noun shares the root’s consonants and brings the emphasis on knowing into view.
THE PATTERN
Scripture treats seeking or serving other spiritual powers as consequential allegiance, not private curiosity.
Regard not them that have familiar spirits, neither seek after wizards, to be defiled by them: I am the LORD your God.There shall not be found among you any one that maketh his son or his daughter to pass through the fire, or that useth divination, or an observer of times, or an enchanter, or a witch,But I say, that the things which the Gentiles sacrifice, they sacrifice to devils, and not to God: and I would not that ye should have fellowship with devils.THE THREAD
And the uncircumcised man child whose flesh of his foreskin is not circumcised, that soul shall be cut off from his people; he hath broken my covenant.This verse uses the same Hebrew roots: נֶפֶשׁ (nefesh, living self) and כָּרַת (karat, cut off), with the same severance from one’s people. Genesis explicitly names a broken covenant, opening Leviticus’s cutting off as communal excision rather than merely inward disapproval.
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