What Does Numbers 29:39 Mean in the King James?
These things ye shall do unto the LORD in your set feasts, beside your vows, and your freewill offerings, for your burnt offerings, and for your meat offerings, and for your drink offerings, and for your peace offerings.
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 “peace offerings” are offerings of wholeness, held within appointed worship alongside vows and freely given gifts.
THE MEANING
This verse speaks of a whole rhythm of offerings to the LORD: those brought at appointed feasts, those connected to vows, and those given freely. The offering called “peace” carries the root sense of wholeness, placing wholeness within that recurring rhythm. Here ordered practice and personal response share one space.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the assumption that devotion must be either prescribed or freely chosen: this verse names both together.
THE ROOT
שְׁלָמִים
shelamim
GROWS FROM
שלם
To be whole or complete; to bring to wholeness.
“Peace offerings” belong to the same root family as shalom, meaning wholeness. The word opens a wider sense beneath “peace”: wholeness has a place among the offerings brought at appointed times.
ALSO GROWS
shalom: Wholeness, completeness
שָׁלוֹם
This familiar branch shows the wider meaning carried by the offering’s root.
shalem: Whole, complete
שָׁלֵם
It makes the root’s sense of completeness visible within the offering’s name.
מוֹעֲדֵיכֶם
mo'adeikhem
GROWS FROM
יעד
To appoint or designate; to set a time for meeting.
The word rendered “set feasts” carries the sense of appointed times. The verse frames these offerings within a recurring rhythm, not as events without a place or time.
ALSO GROWS
mo'ed: Appointed time; meeting
מוֹעֵד
It names the set time that frames the offerings in this verse.
ya'ad: Appoint, designate
יָעַד
The verb shows the root action beneath the appointed time.
נְדָבוֹת
nedavot
GROWS FROM
נדב
To offer willingly or volunteer.
“freewill offerings” in this verse is nedavot. The freewill offering is named from a root of willing generosity. The verse places this freely offered gift alongside the appointed offerings and vows.
ALSO GROWS
nedavah: Freewill offering; willing gift
נְדָבָה
This is the offering named in the verse, carrying the root’s sense of willing giving.
nadiv: Willing, generous
נָדִיב
This branch shows the disposition associated with what is freely offered.
THE PATTERN
A sacred rhythm can hold appointed forms of giving alongside offerings made freely.
These are the feasts of the LORD, which ye shall proclaim to be holy convocations, to offer an offering made by fire unto the LORD, a burnt offering, and a meat offering, a sacrifice, and drink offerings, every thing upon his day:And thither ye shall bring your burnt offerings, and your sacrifices, and your tithes, and heave offerings of your hand, and your vows, and your freewill offerings, and the firstlings of your herds and of your flocks:Every man according as he purposeth in his heart, so let him give; not grudgingly, or of necessity: for God loveth a cheerful giver.THE THREAD
The children of Israel brought a willing offering unto the LORD, every man and woman, whose heart made them willing to bring for all manner of work, which the LORD had commanded to be made by the hand of Moses.“Willing offering” here comes from the same root, נדב (nadav), as “freewill offerings” in Numbers. The shared root makes willingness part of the gift’s name, opening the verse’s freely offered gift as more than an item in a list.
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