What Does Zechariah 14:16 Mean in the King James?
And it shall come to pass, that every one that is left of all the nations which came against Jerusalem shall even go up from year to year to worship the King, the LORD of hosts, and to keep the feast of tabernacles.
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 place the nations once attack becomes the place they return to each year, and its name carries wholeness.
THE MEANING
The verse places you before an annual return: even the nations that come against Jerusalem remain in the scene, going up to bow before the King and keep the Feast of Booths. Their opposition does not define their final relation to the city; the movement turns toward its name’s wholeness and the shelter carried by the feast.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
Coming against Jerusalem permanently fixes a people as its enemy and bars them from worship.
THE ROOT
לְהִשְׁתַּחֲוֹת
le-hishtachavot
GROWS FROM
שחה
to bow down, lower oneself
The Hebrew verb names the posture inside the English word “worship”: these nations bow low before the King. The root keeps the body’s act in view, making the gathering a shared posture rather than only an abstract religious category.
ALSO GROWS
shachah: to bow down
שָׁחָה
This basic form makes the bodily lowering explicit in the act translated “worship.”
hishtachavah: to bow oneself down, prostrate oneself
הִשְׁתַּחֲוָה
The form used here places the worshippers themselves in the act of bowing before the King.
הַסֻּכּוֹת
ha-sukkot
GROWS FROM
סכך
to cover, screen, shelter
“tabernacles” in this verse is ha-sukkot. The feast-name comes from sukkah, a booth or temporary shelter, from the root for covering. The annual gathering is therefore tied to dwelling under shelter as well as to a feast.
ALSO GROWS
sukkah: booth, temporary shelter
סֻכָּה
This is the singular form behind “tabernacles,” keeping shelter present in the feast’s name.
sokek: covering, sheltering
סֹכֵךְ
This form shows the root’s covering sense and deepens the shelter carried by Sukkot.
יְרוּשָׁלַ
Yerushalayim
GROWS FROM
שלם
to be whole, complete
“Jerusalem” in this verse is Yerushalayim. Yerushalayim carries the sound and root-family of shalom, wholeness, in this lens. The nations who came against it now go up toward that named wholeness; the destination itself is part of the reversal.
ALSO GROWS
shalom: wholeness, well-being
שָׁלוֹם
The city’s name carries this sense into the verse’s scene of return.
shalem: whole, complete
שָׁלֵם
This related form makes the root’s sense of completeness audible in the name.
THE PATTERN
God’s presence becomes a shared destination for peoples from every nation.
And it shall come to pass in the last days, that the mountain of the LORD’s house shall be established in the top of the mountains, and shall be exalted above the hills; and all nations shall flow unto it.All nations whom thou hast made shall come and worship before thee, O Lord; and shall glorify thy name.After this I beheld, and, lo, a great multitude, which no man could number, of all nations, and kindreds, and people, and tongues, stood before the throne, and before the Lamb, clothed with white robes, and palms in their hands;THE THREAD
And it shall come to pass, that from one new moon to another, and from one sabbath to another, shall all flesh come to worship before me, saith the LORD.The same bowing verb, from שחה (shachah, “to bow down”), appears in both verses. Zechariah makes that bowing an annual ascent of the nations, while Isaiah places all flesh in a recurring rhythm of approach.
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