What Does Psalm 85:4 Mean in the King James?

Turn us, O God of our salvation, and cause thine anger toward us to cease.

Psalm 85:4 · 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 God named by deliverance is asked to turn you back, so restoration begins as return rather than self-reinvention.

THE MEANING

You ask the God of your deliverance to turn you back toward wholeness. The prayer does not hide the anger directed toward you; it asks for that anger to cease.

WHAT THIS UNDOES

It undoes the belief that your return must begin through your own power: the prayer asks God to turn you.

THE ROOT

שׁוּבֵנוּ

shuvēnu

GROWS FROM

שׁוּב

shuv

Return; turn back.

“Turn” in this verse is shuvēnu. The prayer asks for a return, not the manufacture of a different self. This root can name both turning away and being brought back, so restoration reverses the drift.

ALSO GROWS

hēshîv: Bring back; restore.

הֵשִׁיב

This causative form shows the same root describing someone being turned or brought back.

meshūvāh: Backsliding; turning away.

מְשׁוּבָה

This branch names the movement that the prayer’s requested return reverses.

יִשְׁעֵנוּ

yishʿēnu

GROWS FROM

יָשַׁע

yasha

Deliver; bring into safety, out of constriction.

“Salvation” in this verse is yishʿēnu. “God of our deliverance” names the one the prayer trusts to act: the requested turning is bound to being brought out. Deliverance carries movement from constriction toward room to live.

ALSO GROWS

yasha: Deliver; rescue.

יָשַׁע

The verb names the action held inside “our salvation”: being brought out.

yeshuah: Deliverance; rescue.

יְשׁוּעָה

This noun names the deliverance that gives the prayer its address to God.

THE PATTERN

Restoration takes the form of a turning back that opens the way for deliverance and renewed presence.

Turn us again, O God, and cause thy face to shine; and we shall be saved.

Psalm 80:3 · KJVThe same plea for God to turn the people joins return with deliverance and the shining of God’s face.

I have surely heard Ephraim bemoaning himself thus; Thou hast chastised me, and I was chastised, as a bullock unaccustomed to the yoke: turn thou me, and I shall be turned; for thou art the LORD my God.

Jeremiah 31:18 · KJVThe turning is asked of God, and the speaker’s return follows from that turning.

Repent ye therefore, and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out, when the times of refreshing shall come from the presence of the Lord;

Acts 3:19 · KJVTurning is joined to what is blotted out and to refreshing from the Lord’s presence.

THE THREAD

Turn us again, O God, and cause thy face to shine; and we shall be saved.

Psalm 80:3 · KJV

Both prayers use ⁨שׁוּב⁩ (shuv, turn or return): God is asked to turn the people, and that turn is joined to deliverance. Psalm 85 names anger ceasing; Psalm 80 names God’s face shining, two dimensions of restoration opening from the same root.

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