What Does Psalm 72:13 Mean in the King James?
He shall spare the poor and needy, and shall save the souls of the needy.
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 “souls” being delivered are the needy themselves, their whole living selves, not a part detached from them.
THE MEANING
The verse presents authority as protection that reaches people where need makes them vulnerable. Their living selves and actual lives are what is delivered, so the care is concrete and whole. Need does not put a person beyond the reach of preserving power.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that being needy makes a person disposable: here, need is precisely where protection and deliverance meet.
THE ROOT
יוֹשִׁיעַ
yoshi'a
GROWS FROM
ישע
y-sh-ʿ
To deliver or bring out of danger into safety.
The verb gives “save” the force of being brought out of peril. The needy are not merely spared from loss; they are carried toward safety and room to live.
ALSO GROWS
yeshuah: Deliverance.
יְשׁוּעָה
The same root names the deliverance this verse says reaches the needy.
moshia: Deliverer.
מוֹשִׁיעַ
This form names the one who brings someone out, making the verse’s saving an active protection.
hoshia-na: Save, please; deliver, please.
הוֹשִׁיעָה נָּא
This plea from the same root makes deliverance a cry for help answered by being brought out.
נַפְשׁוֹת
nefashot
GROWS FROM
נפש
n-p-sh
The living self; the word also has concrete uses for throat, appetite, and life.
“Souls” here is nefashot, the plural of nefesh: living selves, lives. The word gathers personhood into one living whole, so the verse’s deliverance reaches the needy people themselves, not some separable part of them.
ALSO GROWS
nefesh: Living soul, self, or life.
נֶפֶשׁ
This singular form shows that each needy person’s whole life is in view.
nafshi: My life; myself.
נַפְשִׁי
The possessive form makes clear how nefesh can name the living person as a whole.
nefashot: Living souls; lives.
נְפָשׁוֹת
This is the plural form used in the verse, extending deliverance to the needy as living people.
THE PATTERN
Scripture shows care for the poor and needy as a defining mark of power that preserves and lifts life.
He raiseth up the poor out of the dust, and lifteth the needy out of the dunghill;When the poor and needy seek water, and there is none, and their tongue faileth for thirst, I the LORD will hear them, I the God of Israel will not forsake them.The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised,THE THREAD
This poor man cried, and the LORD heard him, and saved him out of all his troubles.“Saved” here and “save” in Psalm 72:13 come from the same root, ישע (yasha), meaning to deliver. Psalm 34 makes the movement vivid: the poor man is heard and brought out of his troubles; Psalm 72 extends that deliverance to the living selves of the needy.
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