What Does Psalm 145:8 Mean in the King James?
The LORD is gracious, and full of compassion; slow to anger, and of great mercy.
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 does not erase anger; it places anger inside a nature defined by compassion and abundant faithful love.
THE MEANING
The LORD is gracious toward you now, meeting you with compassion that holds vulnerable life close. Anger is slow to flare; faithful love is abundant. The verse does not erase anger, but places it within a nature marked by care and patience.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that anger is God’s first response: the verse names anger as slow to flare and describes compassion and faithful love as abundant.
THE ROOT
חָסֶד
chesed
GROWS FROM
חסד
ḥ-s-d
Faithful love expressed through loyal, enduring care.
The Hebrew word behind “great mercy” is chesed, faithful love. Its root family connects that love with loyal action and with the person marked by loyalty, making the LORD’s abundant mercy a steady character rather than an occasional pardon.
ALSO GROWS
chasad: To show kindness or act loyally.
חָסַד
This verb presents faithful love as something expressed in action.
chasid: A faithful, devout, or kind person.
חָסִיד
This branch describes someone whose character reflects the loyal care named by chesed.
רַחוּם
rachum
GROWS FROM
רחם
r-ḥ-m
Compassion and tender care; the same root as the word for womb.
The root shared by compassion and womb gives this word a life-holding tenderness. Compassion here carries the sense of care that shelters what is vulnerable.
ALSO GROWS
rechem: Womb.
רֶחֶם
This branch makes the root’s connection to protective, life-holding tenderness visible.
rachamim: Compassion; tender mercies.
רַחֲמִים
This plural form carries the same root into the compassion named in the verse.
אַף
af
GROWS FROM
אנף
anaph
To flare up in anger; אַף also means nose or nostril.
The Hebrew phrase behind “slow to anger” is literally “long of nostrils.” The root links anger with the nostril’s flare, so the verse pictures anger taking a long time to flare.
ALSO GROWS
appayim: Nostrils; anger in the idiom “long of nostrils.”
אַפַּיִם
This is the word used in the phrase rendered “slow to anger,” revealing the physical image beneath it.
anaph: To become angry or flare up.
אָנַף
This verb makes the movement inside “anger” explicit: it is a flare that does not rise quickly here.
THE PATTERN
The LORD’s nature is revealed as patient anger held within abundant compassion and faithful love.
And the LORD passed by before him, and proclaimed, The LORD, The LORD God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abundant in goodness and truth,And rend your heart, and not your garments, and turn unto the LORD your God: for he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness, and repenteth him of the evil.Behold, we count them happy which endure. Ye have heard of the patience of Job, and have seen the end of the Lord; that the Lord is very pitiful, and of tender mercy.THE THREAD
The LORD is merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and plenteous in mercy.The same Hebrew sequence joins compassion, favor, “long of nostrils,” and abundant chesed. It lets the words read as one portrait: patient restraint and faithful love belong to the LORD’s nature together.
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