What Does Psalm 74:16 Mean in the King James?

The day is thine, the night also is thine: thou hast prepared the light and the sun.

Psalm 74:16 · KJV

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 day and the night belong equally to God, whose ordering reaches even beyond what you can see.

THE MEANING

Your life passes through both day and night, and neither falls outside God’s possession. The light and sun are set in place within an order held by God.

WHAT THIS UNDOES

The lie that darkness places you beyond God’s reach dissolves here: the night also belongs to God.

THE ROOT

הֲכִינוֹתָ

hakhinota

GROWS FROM

כון

kun

To be firm or established; in this verb form, to set in place or prepare.

“Prepared” carries the sense of setting something firmly in place. The verse presents light and sun as part of an order God establishes, while day and night alike remain within God’s claim.

ALSO GROWS

nakhon: Firm, established, or ready.

נָכוֹן

This branch echoes the verse’s prepared order: what is ready has been made firm or set in place.

makhon: An established place, foundation, or dwelling.

מָכוֹן

This branch shows the root extending from making ready to the place made firm; the lights in the verse belong to a world set in order.

THE PATTERN

The cycles of darkness and light remain within an order God sets and sustains.

And God made two great lights; the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night: he made the stars also.

Genesis 1:16 · KJVThe lights marking day and night appear within an order God establishes.

While the earth remaineth, seedtime and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night shall not cease.

Genesis 8:22 · KJVThe verse places the repeating cycles of day and night within a continuing order.

Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning.

James 1:17 · KJVThe Father of lights is named as the source of gifts, with no variation in his nature.

THE THREAD

It shall be established for ever as the moon, and as a faithful witness in heaven. Selah.

Psalm 89:37 · KJV

The same root translated “prepared” here appears as “established” there. It links the ordered lights of this verse to the moon as a continuing witness in heaven.

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