What Does Psalm 78:50 Mean in the King James?
He made a way to his anger; he spared not their soul from death, but gave their life over to the pestilence;
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 presents anger as a road opened to destruction, while “gave over” carries the force of shutting a life into the power of pestilence.
THE MEANING
You encounter divine anger here as a path opened to destruction: a living person is not spared from death, and life is handed over to pestilence. The verse’s force remains bodily and unsparing; its words leave no shelter from the stated outcome.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It dissolves the assumption that the anger named here is only an inward feeling: the verse names a living soul, death, and pestilence as concrete consequences.
THE ROOT
הִסְגִּיר
hisgir
GROWS FROM
סגר
s-g-r
To shut, close, or enclose; in this form, to hand over or surrender.
“surrendered” in this verse is hisgir. English “gave over” can sound like a transfer alone; סגר (s-g-r), “to shut in,” makes the transfer feel like confinement within the power that receives the life. Here the destination is explicit: pestilence.
ALSO GROWS
sagar: Shut; close.
סָגַר
The concrete action of closing gives “gave over” the added sense of a boundary closing around the one surrendered.
nisgar: Be shut in; become enclosed.
נִסְגַּר
This form shows the recipient’s side of the same action: a person is closed within the power receiving them.
נַפְשָׁם
nafsham
GROWS FROM
נפש
n-p-sh
The living self, person, or life; the related verb means to rest or be refreshed.
“soul” in this verse is nafsham. Nefesh names the living self or person, not an abstract layer detached from life. Here the verse says that this very living self is not withheld from death, then repeats the blow in the phrase “their life.”
ALSO GROWS
nephesh: Living soul; self, person.
נֶפֶשׁ
This is the word carried by “their soul”: the one not spared from death is the living person.
naphash: Rest; be refreshed.
נָפַשׁ
This verbal branch describes the living self at rest or refreshed, sharpening the loss named when this nefesh is not spared from death.
THE PATTERN
Judgment is pictured as a life being handed into the power of a destructive consequence.
So the LORD sent a pestilence upon Israel from the morning even to the time appointed: and there died of the people from Dan even to Beer-sheba seventy thousand men.Wherefore God also gave them up to uncleanness through the lusts of their own hearts, to dishonour their own bodies between themselves:THE THREAD
And hast not shut me up into the hand of the enemy: thou hast set my feet in a large room.Psalm 78:50 uses הִסְגִּיר (hisgir), “handed over,” from סגר (s-g-r), “to shut in”; Psalm 31:8 uses that same root in “shut me up into the hand of the enemy.” Then the psalm sets that enclosure against feet placed in “a large room,” turning the same root into a contrast between being enclosed by danger and being set in spaciousness.
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