What Does Psalm 78:20 Mean in the King James?
Behold, he smote the rock, that the waters gushed out, and the streams overflowed; can he give bread also? can he provide flesh for his people?
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 waters are already overflowing, yet the verse leaves bread and flesh as an unproved next step.
THE MEANING
The waters pour out after the rock is struck, while bread and flesh still stand as questions. You can witness one need met and still hold the next form of provision as unproven; the verse keeps both truths in view.
THE ROOT
צוּר
tsur
GROWS FROM
צוּר
tsur
The noun means rock; its related verbal family carries senses of binding, enclosing, or besieging, with compact firmness as the bridge.
The same root reaches from the compact rock to words for enclosure and siege. Here water breaks out from what looks sealed, joining constriction with release.
ALSO GROWS
tsur: Rock or cliff.
צוּר
The verse names the struck, hard place from which the waters come.
matsor: Siege or enclosure.
מָצוֹר
This related form brings the root’s sense of confinement into view beside the water breaking out.
יָכִין
yakhin
GROWS FROM
כּוּן
kun
To be firm or established; in a causative form, to establish, set in place, or prepare.
“provide” in this verse is yakhin. The question about flesh uses a verb from a root of establishing and setting in place. The Hebrew carries the sense of preparing provision for the people, alongside the question of whether it can be given.
ALSO GROWS
hekin: Prepare or make ready.
הֵכִין
This causative form from the same root clarifies the sense of provision being prepared for the people.
makhon: A fixed place or foundation.
מָכוֹן
This noun from the same root carries the sense of something established in place.
THE PATTERN
Provision can meet distinct needs through forms that seem unavailable in the moment.
Then said the LORD unto Moses, Behold, I will rain bread from heaven for you; and the people shall go out and gather a certain rate every day, that I may prove them, whether they will walk in my law, or no.Ho, every one that thirsteth, come ye to the waters, and he that hath no money; come ye, buy, and eat; yea, come, buy wine and milk without money and without price.And Jesus took the loaves; and when he had given thanks, he distributed to the disciples, and the disciples to them that were set down; and likewise of the fishes as much as they would.THE THREAD
Behold, I will stand before thee there upon the rock in Horeb; and thou shalt smite the rock, and there shall come water out of it, that the people may drink. And Moses did so in the sight of the elders of Israel.The word צוּר (tsur, rock) recurs here: water comes from the hard place so the people may drink. That shared root sharpens the question in this verse: water has already broken out from the rock, yet food remains framed as beyond reach.
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