What Does Psalm 106:33 Mean in the King James?
Because they provoked his spirit, so that he spake unadvisedly with his lips.
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 links rebellion against the breath to words that escape the lips before they are weighed.
THE MEANING
This verse names a living chain: resistance stirs the breath, and words leave the lips before discernment catches them. The mouth makes audible what the inner life is carrying.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
This undoes the belief that rash words are only a momentary failure of the mouth; the verse traces them to pressure already moving through the breath.
THE ROOT
הִמְרוּ
himru
GROWS FROM
מָרָה
marah
To rebel, resist, or contend against.
The verb carries rebellion and resistance, giving “provoked” the shape of opposition. That resistance reaches his breath, and what follows is speech released without care.
ALSO GROWS
meri: Rebellion.
מְרִי
It names the resistance contained in the verb rendered “provoked.”
morim: Rebels.
מֹרִים
The same root appears in Moses’ address to the people in Numbers 20:10, linking the provocation with rebellion.
רוּחוֹ
rucho
GROWS FROM
רוּחַ
ruach
Breath, wind, moving air.
Ruach names breath and wind with one word, so “his spirit” keeps bodily breathing in view. The next clause places that breath beside lips and utterance: inner disturbance becomes audible speech.
ALSO GROWS
ruach qadim: An east wind.
רוּחַ קָדִים
The word for spirit also names moving wind.
ruach chayyim: The breath of life.
רוּחַ חַיִּים
This phrase shows ruach as the breath that animates life.
בִּשְׂפָתָיו
bisfataiv
GROWS FROM
שָׂפָה
safah
Lip, edge, or language.
The Hebrew word for lips also names language and the edge of a shore. Speech is pictured at a boundary: what is carried within crosses outward through the lips.
ALSO GROWS
safah: Language or speech.
שָׂפָה
The same word used for a lip can name the language spoken by a people.
sefat hayam: The shore, or edge of the sea.
שְׂפַת הַיָּם
This use reveals the lip as an edge where what is contained meets what lies beyond.
THE PATTERN
When agitation reaches the mouth before discernment, words come out rashly.
Be not rash with thy mouth, and let not thine heart be hasty to utter any thing before God: for God is in heaven, and thou upon earth: therefore let thy words be few.Seest thou a man that is hasty in his words? there is more hope of a fool than of him.Wherefore, my beloved brethren, let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath:THE THREAD
And Moses and Aaron gathered the congregation together before the rock, and he said unto them, Hear now, ye rebels; must we fetch you water out of this rock?“Provoked” and “rebels” come from the same Hebrew root of resistance. This connection places Moses’ rash words within the same rebellion named in the people, showing how their resistance reaches his breath and speech.
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