What Does Psalm 103:8 Mean in the King James?
The LORD is merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and plenteous in mercy.
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 measures mercy by how slowly anger flares and how abundantly faithful love remains.
THE MEANING
The LORD meets you with compassion, favor, and abundant faithful love. Anger is slow to flare; compassion and care are not scarce.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that one failure brings immediate anger or that the LORD’s mercy runs thin.
THE ROOT
אֶרֶךְ אַפַּיִם
erekh appayim
GROWS FROM
ארך
ʾ-r-kh
To be long or to lengthen.
“slow to anger” in this verse is erekh appayim. The Hebrew phrase is literally “long of nostrils”: אַפַּיִם (appayim, nostrils) also carries the sense of anger, as in a flaring nose. The image makes anger slow to flare, giving patience a physical shape within the phrase.
ALSO GROWS
ʾārēkh: Long; enduring.
אָרֵךְ
The same root gives the phrase its sense of length: anger takes a long time to flare.
heʾerikh: Lengthened or prolonged.
הֶאֱרִיךְ
This form shows the root’s sense of extending something, echoed in the long interval before anger rises.
רַחוּם
raḥum
GROWS FROM
רחם
r-ḥ-m
To show compassion; the root is also found in the word for womb.
The word for compassion shares its consonants with רֶחֶם (reḥem, womb) and רַחֲמִים (raḥamim, compassion). English “merciful” can sound like leniency alone; the Hebrew word carries a sense of deep, protective tenderness.
ALSO GROWS
reḥem: Womb.
רֶחֶם
This shared root connects compassion with a place of protection and life.
raḥamim: Compassion; tender mercies.
רַחֲמִים
This related word makes explicit the compassion contained in raḥum.
חֶסֶד
ḥesed
GROWS FROM
חסד
ḥ-s-d
Faithful, steadfast love and kindness.
The final “mercy” is ḥesed: faithful love that holds steady. The verse says this love is abundant, so mercy is not merely a reprieve from anger but a plentiful, enduring quality of the LORD’s nature.
ALSO GROWS
ḥāsîd: A faithful or devout person.
חָסִיד
This related form describes someone characterized by the steadfast quality of ḥesed.
ḥasadim: Acts or expressions of faithful love.
חֲסָדִים
The plural form shows ḥesed expressed in many acts of care, fitting the verse’s claim of abundance.
THE PATTERN
The LORD’s compassion is patient in its response and abundant in its care.
And the LORD passed by before him, and proclaimed, The LORD, The LORD God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abundant in goodness and truth,And he prayed unto the LORD, and said, I pray thee, O LORD, was not this my saying, when I was yet in my country? Therefore I fled before unto Tarshish: for I knew that thou art a gracious God, and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness, and repentest thee of the evil.But God, who is rich in mercy, for his great love wherewith he loved us,THE THREAD
And the LORD passed by before him, and proclaimed, The LORD, The LORD God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abundant in goodness and truth,Exodus 34:6 gathers the same Hebrew qualities found in Psalm 103:8: compassion, favor, patience before anger, and abundant ḥesed, faithful love. The shared language presents them as one nature: patience joined to overflowing care.
Read the SDV Bible.
Every verse has a Deep Dive in the app.
The iPhone Bible app with the Selah Decoded Version.
Does something in this reading look wrong? Tell us