What Does Numbers 23:18 Mean in the King James?
And he took up his parable, and said, Rise up, Balak, and hear; hearken unto me, thou son of Zippor:
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 makes hearing a movement: Balak must rise, hear, and give his ear before the message is even named.
THE MEANING
The call reaches you before its message does: rise, hear, attend. Hearing here is active reception, as the paired commands move from listening to giving the ear itself. The words address you now as someone able to receive what is about to be spoken.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that hearing is passive, that a message can reach you without your attention turning toward it.
THE ROOT
וּשְׁמָע
u-shemaʿ
GROWS FROM
שמע
To hear, heed, and respond.
“hear” in this verse is u-shemaʿ. The Hebrew verb can carry hearing that answers; the call is for more than sound to reach Balak. The next command sharpens that attention by naming the ear.
ALSO GROWS
shama: Hear, listen, heed.
שָׁמַע
This is the verb behind the summons to hear, with room for a response.
shemuah: A report or something heard.
שְׁמוּעָה
The related noun presents a report as something received through hearing.
הַאֲזִינָה
haʾazinah
GROWS FROM
אזן
Ear; to give ear or attend.
The word translated “hearken” comes from the Hebrew word for ear. English makes this sound like another way to say “hear,” while Hebrew gives the second command a bodily focus: incline attention toward the speaker.
ALSO GROWS
ʾozen: Ear.
אֹזֶן
This noun reveals the concrete image beneath “hearken”: the ear is the part being offered to attention.
heʾezin: Listen or give ear.
הֶאֱזִין
This verb is the listening action expressed in the command to Balak.
THE PATTERN
Receiving a word begins with deliberate attention before response.
Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God is one LORD:Incline your ear, and come unto me: hear, and your soul shall live; and I will make an everlasting covenant with you, even the sure mercies of David.Wherefore, my beloved brethren, let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath:THE THREAD
God is not a man, that he should lie; neither the son of man, that he should repent: hath he said, and shall he not do it? or hath he spoken, and shall he not make it good?The call to hear is immediately grounded in a claim about the speaker: God does not speak falsely or leave his word unfinished. That turns the summons into preparation to receive a word that holds steady.
This reading is from Selah Verse.
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