What Does Psalm 132:7 Mean in the King James?
We will go into his tabernacles: we will worship at his footstool.
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 word for “worship” pictures the body bowing at the feet of the one whose dwelling we enter.
THE MEANING
We enter the place where he dwells and bow at his footstool. Nearness and reverence meet in this movement: we come into the dwelling and lower ourselves before him.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
Worship is only an inward attitude. Here it takes visible form as we bow before the one whose dwelling we enter.
THE ROOT
נִשְׁתַּחֲוֶה
nishtachaveh
GROWS FROM
שחה
to bow low, prostrate oneself
The root gives worship a visible posture: the body bows low. Here that bowing happens at the footstool of the one whose dwelling we enter, binding approach and reverence together.
ALSO GROWS
shachah: to bow down, prostrate oneself
שָׁחָה
This verb names the bodily lowering that gives the verse’s “worship” its concrete posture.
hishtachavah: to bow oneself down, prostrate oneself
הִשְׁתַּחֲוָה
This form makes the act personal and embodied, as it is in the verse’s “we will worship.”
מִשְׁכְּנוֹתָיו
mishkenotav
GROWS FROM
שכן
to dwell, settle, remain
The word translated “tabernacles” carries the sense of dwellings: the verse depicts entering the place where God dwells, then bowing at his footstool. The root holds habitation and nearness together.
ALSO GROWS
mishkan: dwelling, tabernacle
מִשְׁכָּן
This related noun makes the dwelling sense of “tabernacles” explicit.
shakhen: neighbor, dweller
שָׁכֵן
A neighbor is one who dwells nearby, echoing the nearness implied by entering his dwelling.
THE PATTERN
Approach to the divine becomes visible in the body’s act of bowing.
O come, let us worship and bow down: let us kneel before the LORD our maker.And when they were come into the house, they saw the young child with Mary his mother, and fell down, and worshipped him: and when they had opened their treasures, they presented unto him gifts; gold, and frankincense, and myrrh.The four and twenty elders fall down before him that sat on the throne, and worship him that liveth for ever and ever, and cast their crowns before the throne, saying,THE THREAD
O come, let us worship and bow down: let us kneel before the LORD our maker.Both verses use שחה (shachah), meaning to bow down or prostrate oneself, for the act translated “worship.” Psalm 95:6 stretches the same movement into a sequence, worship, bowing, kneeling, making the bodily posture in Psalm 132:7 explicit.
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