What Does Ruth 1:21 Mean in the King James?
I went out full, and the LORD hath brought me home again empty: why then call ye me Naomi, seeing the LORD hath testified against me, and the Almighty hath afflicted me?
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 names emptiness as what happened to a formerly full life, not what that life always was.
THE MEANING
This verse gives the reader language for the moment when the life being lived feels at odds with the nature carried in their name. Naomi names the LORD as the one who has brought her back empty and afflicted her, and the text leaves that accusation intact. Her present emptiness does not erase the fullness she says came before it.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The belief that present loss proves you were never full is undone by the speaker’s own words: she names both the fullness she left with and the emptiness she bears now.
THE ROOT
נָעֳמִי
Naomi
GROWS FROM
נעם
na'am
To be pleasant or delightful; pleasantness.
Naomi’s name carries the nature of pleasantness and delight. Her question makes the distance between that name and the emptiness she speaks audible, without making either one unreal.
ALSO GROWS
no'am: Pleasantness, delight.
נֹעַם
This noun makes the nature compressed in Naomi’s name explicit.
na'im: Pleasant, delightful.
נָעִים
This related form describes the quality her name carries, which now seems painfully far from her circumstances.
רֵיקָם
reqam
GROWS FROM
ריק
riq
To be empty; empty or lacking contents.
רֵיקָם (reqam) describes an empty return, often empty-handed. Its root can name both the condition of emptiness and the act of emptying, giving the verse a concrete image of what is absent rather than a judgment about the speaker’s worth.
ALSO GROWS
req: Empty, void.
רֵיק
This form names the bare condition that stands opposite the fullness Naomi remembers.
heriq: To empty out, pour out.
הֵרִיק
This verbal form shows the root’s connection to emptying as an action, while the verse names the state in which Naomi returns.
מְלֵאָה
mele'ah
GROWS FROM
מלא
male
To be full or to fill.
“full” in this verse is mele'ah. The root lets fullness remain a real part of the account, not a feeling erased by what comes later. Naomi’s sentence holds fullness and emptiness together as successive truths of one life.
ALSO GROWS
male: Full, filled.
מָלֵא
This form names the condition Naomi says she had when she went out.
mille: To fill, make full.
מִלֵּא
This verb carries the movement into fullness, sharpening the contrast with the empty return.
THE PATTERN
Scripture lets loss be spoken plainly without making it the whole truth of a life.
And said, Naked came I out of my mother’s womb, and naked shall I return thither: the LORD gave, and the LORD hath taken away; blessed be the name of the LORD.As sorrowful, yet alway rejoicing; as poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, and yet possessing all things.They that sow in tears shall reap in joy.THE THREAD
And their nobles have sent their little ones to the waters: they came to the pits, and found no water; they returned with their vessels empty; they were ashamed and confounded, and covered their heads.Jeremiah uses רֵיקָם (reqam, empty) for vessels returned empty, the same word used for Naomi. In both verses, the emptiness is concrete: something returns carrying nothing, and that absence does not erase what was there before.
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