What Does Psalm 78:65 Mean in the King James?

Then the Lord awaked as one out of sleep, and like a mighty man that shouteth by reason of wine.

Psalm 78:65 · 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 verse imagines divine force as a warrior waking into a wine-stirred shout, sudden, loud, and embodied.

THE MEANING

You encounter the LORD here in a startling image: he wakes from sleep and breaks into a warrior’s cry stirred by wine. The verse makes divine action feel abrupt, bodily, and loud.

WHAT THIS UNDOES

The LORD is asleep and will stay unresponsive; this verse turns apparent sleep into awakening and a cry of action.

THE ROOT

וַיִּקַץ

vayyiqats

GROWS FROM

קוּץ

qûts

Wake or rouse from sleep.

“awaked” in this verse is vayyiqats. The Hebrew verb presents waking as a sudden break from sleep. The same root can describe a plea for the LORD to awake and a person waking, so the image carries both urgency and movement out of stillness.

ALSO GROWS

haqitsah: Awake! (imperative)

הָקִיצָה

Psalm 44:23 uses this form as a plea to the LORD; here the same wake-root becomes an image of divine action.

heqitsoti: I awoke

הֱקִיצוֹתִי

Psalm 3:5 uses the root for waking from sleep, showing that the same word applies to ordinary human waking and the LORD’s awakening image.

מִתְרֹנֵן

mitronen

GROWS FROM

רנן

r-n-n

Ring out in a cry or song; shout aloud.

The Hebrew word belongs to a family used for both shouting and singing. English “shouteth” preserves the force of the sound, while the root also holds the possibility of a ringing song.

ALSO GROWS

yerannenu: They shout for joy

יְרַנֵּנוּ

Psalm 5:11 uses this form for a joyful cry, showing how the same vocal surge can carry celebration as well as force.

rinnah: A ringing cry or song

רִנָּה

Psalm 126:2 uses this noun for singing, revealing that the root crosses the English boundary between shout and song.

גִּבּוֹר

gibbor

GROWS FROM

גבר

g-b-r

Grow strong, be mighty, or prevail.

The word for “mighty man” grows from a root of strength and prevailing. The image is not only of a powerful figure, but of power rising into action.

ALSO GROWS

gavar: Grow strong or prevail

גָּבַר

The verb shows the force carried by “mighty man”: strength moving toward the upper hand.

gevurah: Might or strength

גְּבוּרָה

This noun from the same root makes the verse’s warrior image a picture of active power, not merely status.

THE PATTERN

The divine cry marks the moment power moves from stillness into action.

The LORD shall go forth as a mighty man, he shall stir up jealousy like a man of war: he shall cry, yea, roar; he shall prevail against his enemies.

Isaiah 42:13 · KJVThe LORD goes forth like a warrior, cries out, and prevails, joining the cry to forceful action.

For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first:

1 Thessalonians 4:16 · KJVThe Lord’s arrival is announced by a shout and trumpet, and the sound marks a movement that raises the dead.

THE THREAD

Awake, why sleepest thou, O Lord? arise, cast us not off for ever.

Psalm 44:23 · KJV

This plea uses the same Hebrew wake-root as Psalm 78:65. Beside it, the verse turns “awake” from a cry directed toward the LORD into the image of the LORD waking and shouting.

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