What Does Psalm 81:16 Mean in the King James?
He should have fed them also with the finest of the wheat: and with honey out of the rock should I have satisfied thee.
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 rock is not merely beside the sweetness; it is where the sweetness comes from.
THE MEANING
The verse speaks to you in a condition: when you hear, nourishment reaches you as the richest wheat and honey from rock. What looks hard or barren does not set the limit of what can satisfy you; fullness comes from a source deeper than appearances.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The lie that a hard place can yield only hardship dissolves here: the verse places sweetness inside the rock itself.
THE ROOT
אַשְׂבִּיעֶךָ
asbiʿekha
GROWS FROM
שׂבע
ś-b-ʿ
To be filled or sated, to have one’s fill.
“satisfied” in this verse is asbiʿekha. The verb is causative: the speaker does not merely place food before you but brings you to fullness. Its word family names both the state of being full and fullness itself, so satisfaction here reaches beyond a taste of sweetness.
ALSO GROWS
saveaʿ: Full, sated, satisfied.
שָׂבֵעַ
This names the state the verse’s provision brings you into.
sovaʿ: Fullness, satiety, plenty.
שֹׂבַע
This shows that satisfaction belongs to a larger idea of abundance.
מִצּוּר
mitsur
GROWS FROM
צור
tsur
Rock, cliff, a hard mass.
The word identifies the very hard place as the source from which sweetness comes. The image holds both realities together: rock remains rock, yet it gives what you would not expect from its appearance.
ALSO GROWS
tsur: A rock or cliff.
צוּר
This is the singular form behind the verse’s image of honey coming from rock.
tsurim: Rocks or crags.
צֻרִים
The plural carries the same image into rocky places, where hardness does not rule out provision.
THE PATTERN
The provision that brings fullness comes from a source larger than the scarcity or hardness visible to you.
He made him ride on the high places of the earth, that he might eat the increase of the fields; and he made him to suck honey out of the rock, and oil out of the flinty rock;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 said unto them, I am the bread of life: he that cometh to me shall never hunger; and he that believeth on me shall never thirst.THE THREAD
He made him ride on the high places of the earth, that he might eat the increase of the fields; and he made him to suck honey out of the rock, and oil out of the flinty rock;Both verses join rock and honey, letting the same hard source yield sweetness. That shared image opens Psalm 81:16 further: what appears unable to nourish does not define what can satisfy you.
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