What Does Psalm 136:15 Mean in the King James?
But overthrew Pharaoh and his host in the Red sea: for his mercy endureth for ever.
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 places Pharaoh’s violent overthrow inside the enduring movement of faithful love.
THE MEANING
Pharaoh’s force is violently brought down in the sea, and the verse names that overthrow alongside love that endures. It holds together the fall of a power that grips others and a love that does not abandon them. The scene is not gentle: the army is destroyed.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that faithful love must be harmless or leave domination untouched: here, love is named alongside the destruction of Pharaoh’s force.
THE ROOT
וְנִעֵר
wəniʿēr
GROWS FROM
נער
Shake, shake loose or off.
English “overthrew” names the outcome; the Hebrew verb pictures Pharaoh and his army being shaken off into the sea. The same root can describe shaking off dust or freeing hands, so the verb carries a concrete image of forceful removal and keeps the violence in view.
ALSO GROWS
hitnaʿari: Shake yourself free from dust.
הִתְנַעֲרִי
Isaiah 52:2 uses this form for Jerusalem shaking dust from herself; the image is physical removal, not merely a change in status.
noʿēr: Shaking his hands free.
נֹעֵר
Isaiah 33:15 uses the same root for shaking hands free of bribes; here it describes the forceful removal of Pharaoh’s army.
חַסְדּוֹ
ḥasdô
GROWS FROM
חסד
Faithful love, steadfast kindness expressed in continuing commitment.
The KJV word “mercy” carries the broader sense of faithful love: committed loyalty that continues. The refrain does not make the sea’s violence gentle; it places the overthrow within the continuing faithfulness that carries the threatened people out.
ALSO GROWS
ḥāsîd: A faithful or devoted person.
חָסִיד
This related form names a person by a quality of faithfulness, giving the word family a relational sense rather than the sense of passing pity.
ḥasîdîm: Faithful or devoted people.
חֲסִידִים
The plural form applies the same quality to a community; here, faithful love sustains a people through the overthrow of the power holding them.
THE PATTERN
Scripture depicts deliverance as a reversal in which dominating powers are brought down while the lowly are brought through or lifted.
And Moses stretched forth his hand over the sea, and the sea returned to his strength when the morning appeared; and the Egyptians fled against it; and the LORD overthrew the Egyptians in the midst of the sea.And made Israel to pass through the midst of it: for his mercy endureth for ever:He hath put down the mighty from their seats, and exalted them of low degree.THE THREAD
And Moses stretched forth his hand over the sea, and the sea returned to his strength when the morning appeared; and the Egyptians fled against it; and the LORD overthrew the Egyptians in the midst of the sea.“Overthrew” is the same Hebrew verb in both verses; its image is to shake off. Exodus makes the physical force explicit: Pharaoh’s army is shaken off into the sea.
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