What Does Numbers 23:21 Mean in the King James?
He hath not beheld iniquity in Jacob, neither hath he seen perverseness in Israel: the LORD his God is with him, and the shout of a king is among them.
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 moves from what God does not behold to what resounds among the people: the king’s shout.
THE MEANING
The verse speaks now: iniquity and perverseness do not occupy God’s sight of Jacob and Israel. The LORD is with them, and the king’s shout is among them, giving that presence an audible form.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that wrongdoing is all God can see and that his presence vanishes where it appears.
THE ROOT
תְּרוּעָה
teru'ah
GROWS FROM
רוע
Raise a shout; cry out.
This shout is a sound in the middle of the people, not a silent title for kingship. The root can carry acclamation or alarm, so the king’s cry signals a presence that changes the whole scene.
ALSO GROWS
hāriʿū: Raise a shout; cry aloud.
הָרִיעוּ
In Psalm 100:1, this form makes the root a public, shared sound of praise.
teru'ah: Shout, alarm, or acclamation.
תְּרוּעָה
Here the word gives the king’s presence an audible place among the people.
מֶלֶךְ
melekh
GROWS FROM
מלך
Reign; rule.
The root binds the king to the act of reigning and the order that reign creates. The king’s shout carries a ruling presence into the people’s midst.
ALSO GROWS
malakh: To reign or rule.
מָלַךְ
The king’s title shares its root with the act of reigning.
malkhut: Kingship, reign, or realm.
מַלְכוּת
This branch names the order associated with the king, widening the verse’s shout into a declaration of rule.
THE PATTERN
The King’s nearness becomes audible as a shared shout among the people.
God is gone up with a shout, the LORD with the sound of a trumpet.Blessed is the people that know the joyful sound: they shall walk, O LORD, in the light of thy countenance.For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first:THE THREAD
God is gone up with a shout, the LORD with the sound of a trumpet.Psalm 47:5 uses the same Hebrew word תְּרוּעָה (teru’ah, a shout), so the sound at the heart of this verse appears again beside the LORD and a trumpet. Numbers places that royal sound among the people; the psalm gives it the scene of God’s ascent.
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