What Does Leviticus 25:7 Mean in the King James?
And for thy cattle, and for the beast that are in thy land, shall all the increase thereof be meat.
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
Even when human hands leave the land uncultivated, its yield still arrives as food for cattle and wild creatures.
THE MEANING
When the land is left unworked, its yield still feeds the cattle and the wild animals. These living creatures are included in its provision; the land’s growth reaches life beyond human use.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the assumption that an uncultivated field has no value: its growth still nourishes the creatures living there.
THE ROOT
תְּבוּאָתָהּ
tevu’atah
GROWS FROM
בוא
b-w-ʾ
Come, enter, arrive; תְּבוּאָה names yield or produce, what is brought in.
The word translated “increase” is תְּבוּאָתָהּ, “its yield,” from בוא, “come” or “enter.” The root gives the yield the shade of what arrives from the land, food available to the creatures named.
ALSO GROWS
bo: Come; enter.
בּוֹא
This verb shares the root behind תְּבוּאָה, linking the yield with what comes in from the land.
mavo: Entrance; approach.
מָבוֹא
This noun names an arrival point, echoing the yield as what comes in from the land.
חַיָּה
ḥayyah
GROWS FROM
חיה
ḥ-y-h
Live; be alive.
The word translated “beast” comes from the root meaning “live.” The verse includes wild life as a direct recipient of the land’s yield, alongside cattle.
ALSO GROWS
ḥai: Living; alive.
חַי
The same root names the animal through life itself.
ḥayyim: Life; living.
חַיִּים
This form carries the same root into the word for life, underscoring that the wild animal is among the living creatures fed by the land.
לֶאֱכֹל
le’ĕkhol
GROWS FROM
אכל
ʾ-k-l
Eat.
The Hebrew phrase means “for eating,” and the same root forms a noun for food. Here KJV’s “meat” means food, tying the land’s yield directly to nourishment.
ALSO GROWS
ʾakhal: Eat.
אָכַל
This verb shares the root in the phrase “for eating.”
ʾokhel: Food; that which is eaten.
אֹכֶל
This noun from the same root names the food the land’s yield provides.
THE PATTERN
The earth’s growth is provision for animal life as well as human need.
And to every beast of the earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to every thing that creepeth upon the earth, wherein there is life, I have given every green herb for meat: and it was so.He causeth the grass to grow for the cattle, and herb for the service of man: that he may bring forth food out of the earth;Behold the fowls of the air: for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are ye not much better than they?THE THREAD
And to every beast of the earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to every thing that creepeth upon the earth, wherein there is life, I have given every green herb for meat: and it was so.Both verses use the אכל (ʾ-k-l) root for eating and food: Leviticus says the yield is “for eating,” while Genesis gives green growth “for meat” to living creatures. The shared root connects the land’s yield with a creation pattern in which its growth becomes nourishment for animal life.
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