What Does Psalm 135:16 Mean in the King James?
They have mouths, but they speak not; eyes have they, but they see not;
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 exposes the gap between carrying the visible shape of life and having the capacity to answer or perceive.
THE MEANING
These images have mouths and eyes, yet no voice answers and no sight takes in what is before them. A visible likeness can resemble life while remaining unable to speak or perceive. The verse names that gap wherever a form is mistaken for a living presence.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
Resemblance alone does not prove a living presence; a convincing form may still be unable to answer or see.
THE ROOT
יְדַבֵּרוּ
yedabberū
GROWS FROM
ד־ב־ר
d-b-r
To speak; the same root also gives words for a word or matter.
The root behind “speak” also gives דָּבָר (dābār), “word” or “matter,” and דִּבֵּר (dibber), “he spoke.” These images have the mouth’s shape, but no word or matter comes forth from them.
ALSO GROWS
dābār: Word, matter, or thing.
דָּבָר
The root links speaking with what is brought into expression; the images have mouths but produce no word.
dibber: He spoke.
דִּבֵּר
This verb names the action the images lack: speech that issues from a living speaker.
יִרְאוּ
yirʾū
GROWS FROM
ר־א־ה
To see, look, or perceive.
“see” in this verse is yirʾū. The verse sets the visible presence of eyes beside the act of seeing. The same root gives a word for “appearance,” sharpening the gap between what looks like a perceiver and what actually perceives.
ALSO GROWS
marʾeh: Appearance, sight, or vision.
מַרְאֶה
An appearance can be visible without possessing the seeing capacity the eyes suggest.
rōʾeh: One who sees; a seer.
רֹאֶה
This branch names a perceiver, making clear that having eyes and being a seer are not the same.
THE PATTERN
Possessing the signs of a faculty is not the same as exercising it; living perception and speech show themselves in what they do.
They have mouths, but they speak not: eyes have they, but they see not:He that planted the ear, shall he not hear? he that formed the eye, shall he not see?Having eyes, see ye not? and having ears, hear ye not? and do ye not remember?THE THREAD
They have mouths, but they speak not: eyes have they, but they see not:This verse repeats the same wording and Hebrew roots for speaking and seeing. The echo makes the contrast unmistakable: an image can bear the organs of life while lacking the actions that reveal a living presence.
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