What Does Psalm 106:21 Mean in the King James?
They forgat God their saviour, which had done great things in Egypt;
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 Hebrew names God as the one who brings people out, while Mitzrayim carries the shape of the narrowing from which deliverance opens.
THE MEANING
You can lose sight of the one who brings you through constriction even while the acts of deliverance remain part of your story. Here, deliverance is not an idea but something done; the narrow place is not the whole horizon.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The verse loosens the belief that confinement is all there is, or that deliverance has no acts behind it.
THE ROOT
מוֹשִׁיעָם
môšîʿām
GROWS FROM
ישע
To deliver, bring to safety, and open a way out.
“saviour” in this verse is môšîʿām. The word names God by the act of bringing people out. The verse places that nature against Egypt’s narrowing: deliverance is an opening, not merely a title.
ALSO GROWS
yeshuah: deliverance
יְשׁוּעָה
The deliverance in the verse shares the same root as the one called their deliverer.
hôšîaʿ: he delivered
הוֹשִׁיעַ
This verb makes the root’s movement concrete: deliverance is something enacted.
מִצְרַיִם
Mitsrayim
GROWS FROM
מצר
Narrowness, a strait, or constriction.
“Egypt” in this verse is Mitsrayim. Mitzrayim carries the shape of a narrowing, and its -ayim ending holds a twofold form of that constriction. The verse sets this narrow place beside the deliverer and the great deeds that open beyond it.
ALSO GROWS
mēṣar: a narrow place or strait
מֵצַר
The same consonants give the name of Egypt a concrete resonance of constriction.
metsarim: straits or narrow places
מְצָרִים
The plural form echoes the passage’s setting as a place of constriction.
גְּדֹלוֹת
gedolot
GROWS FROM
גדל
To grow or become great.
“great things” in this verse is gedolot. The deeds are called great from a root of growth and increase. Against Egypt’s narrowness, the verse remembers acts that exceed the confines of the place.
ALSO GROWS
gādōl: great, large
גָּדוֹל
This adjective shares the root and describes the scale of what God does.
gidul: growth, increase
גִּדּוּל
This noun brings out the root’s movement toward what expands beyond a confined space.
THE PATTERN
Deliverance opens a way through constriction, and its remembered acts keep that opening visible.
Thus the LORD saved Israel that day out of the hand of the Egyptians; and Israel saw the Egyptians dead upon the sea shore.I will remember the works of the LORD: surely I will remember thy wonders of old.Who delivered us from so great a death, and doth deliver: in whom we trust that he will yet deliver us;THE THREAD
Thus the LORD saved Israel that day out of the hand of the Egyptians; and Israel saw the Egyptians dead upon the sea shore.The Hebrew word translated “saved” comes from ישע, the same root carried in מוֹשִׁיעָם, “their saviour.” The name in Psalm 106:21 points to the very act of deliverance described here.
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