What Does Nahum 2:13 Mean in the King James?
Behold, I am against thee, saith the LORD of hosts, and I will burn her chariots in the smoke, and the sword shall devour thy young lions: and I will cut off thy prey from the earth, and the voice of thy messengers shall no more be heard.
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 predator’s fall reaches beyond its force: the verse cuts off the prey that lets predation continue.
THE MEANING
The verse speaks now as a declaration against a power that takes: its chariots burn, its young lions are devoured, its prey is cut off, and its messengers go unheard. Its force is stripped in sequence, transport, predation, gain, voice, until it can no longer project itself.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The belief that power remains secure as long as it can seize prey and keep its commands heard.
THE ROOT
וְהִכְרַתִּי
ve-hikhratti
GROWS FROM
כרת
To cut, sever, or cut down.
The verb translated “cut off” comes from the same root used in the Hebrew phrase for making a covenant. Here the severing reaches the source of predation itself: the prey is removed from the earth.
ALSO GROWS
karat: To cut or sever.
כָּרַת
This is the root verb behind the verse’s declaration that the prey will be cut off.
karat berit: Literally, to cut a covenant; translated “made a covenant.”
כָּרַת בְּרִית
Genesis 15:18 uses this same verb for making a covenant, showing how one root can name both severing and binding.
טַרְפֵּךְ
ṭarpēḵ
GROWS FROM
טרף
To tear or seize as prey.
The Hebrew word for prey carries the action of tearing inside it. What the city holds as spoils is named by the violence that takes it.
ALSO GROWS
ṭāraph: To tear or rend.
טָרַף
This is the action contained in the word for prey: the thing seized is defined by the tearing.
ṭeref: Prey or food torn away.
טֶרֶף
This related form makes the verse’s target concrete: not an abstract resource, but what has been seized for consumption.
THE PATTERN
When predatory power is judged, its means of force and its public voice are stripped away together.
He maketh wars to cease unto the end of the earth; he breaketh the bow, and cutteth the spear in sunder; he burneth the chariot in the fire.And I will cause the noise of thy songs to cease; and the sound of thy harps shall be no more heard.And the light of a candle shall shine no more at all in thee; and the voice of the bridegroom and of the bride shall be heard no more at all in thee: for thy merchants were the great men of the earth; for by thy sorceries were all nations deceived.THE THREAD
In the same day the LORD made a covenant with Abram, saying, Unto thy seed have I given this land, from the river of Egypt unto the great river, the river Euphrates:Nahum’s “cut off” comes from כרת (karat), the same verb in Genesis 15:18 for “made a covenant,” literally “cut a covenant.” One root names both severing and covenant-making; here it ends the prey that sustains predation.
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