What Does Zechariah 9:1 Mean in the King James?
The burden of the word of the LORD in the land of Hadrach, and Damascus shall be the rest thereof: when the eyes of man, as of all the tribes of Israel, shall be toward the LORD.
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 word is carried as a burden, finds its rest in Damascus, and draws human eyes toward the LORD.
THE MEANING
The LORD’s word carries weight into the places named here, and Damascus becomes its resting place. The human gaze, alongside Israel’s tribes, turns toward the LORD. Burden and rest stand together: what weighs upon a place can also become where attention gathers.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The LORD’s reach stops at Israel’s boundary; this verse places Damascus and humanity’s gaze in the same scene as Israel’s tribes.
THE ROOT
מַשָּׂא
massa
GROWS FROM
נשא
נשא (nasa): to lift, carry, or bear.
מַשָּׂא comes from נשא, “to lift or carry,” joining the weight of a burden with the weight of a word borne into a place. The verse lets that carried word settle in Damascus, so its burden is also a presence that arrives.
ALSO GROWS
nasa: to lift, carry, or bear
נָשָׂא
This verb is the root itself: the burden is what is carried.
massa: a load or burden; also a prophetic utterance
מַשָּׂא
This is the verse’s word for burden, holding physical weight and a weighty message together.
nasi: a prince or chief
נָשִׂיא
This noun from the same root evokes one lifted up or bearing standing among a people, extending the root’s sense of carrying and elevation.
מְנֻחָתוֹ
menuchato
GROWS FROM
נוח
נוח (nuach): to settle or rest.
The word translated “rest” comes from a root of settling. Damascus is named as the settling place of the carried word, bringing the movement of נשא, “carry,” to rest.
ALSO GROWS
nuach: to rest or settle
נוּחַ
This verb gives the root’s basic motion: coming to rest.
menuchah: rest or resting place
מְנוּחָה
This noun shares the root and clarifies the sense of Damascus as the word’s place of rest.
עֵין
ayin
GROWS FROM
עין
עין (ayin): eye; also a spring or source.
“eyes” in this verse is ayin. The Hebrew word עין can name both an eye and a spring. The verse’s gaze toward the LORD thus carries an additional image of a source opening toward him, while its parallel with Israel’s tribes widens the field of sight.
ALSO GROWS
ayin: eye
עַיִן
This is the word’s sense in the verse: the human eye directed toward the LORD.
ma‘yan: spring or fountain
מַעְיָן
This related word shares the עין consonants and carries the sense of a source, echoing the verse’s image of sight turned toward the LORD.
THE PATTERN
The LORD becomes the horizon toward which both individuals and peoples are directed.
A Song of degrees. Unto thee lift I up mine eyes, O thou that dwellest in the heavens.Look unto me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth: for I am God, and there is none else.That they should seek the Lord, if haply they might feel after him, and find him, though he be not far from every one of us:THE THREAD
The burden of Babylon, which Isaiah the son of Amoz did see.Isaiah uses the same Hebrew word מַשָּׂא (massa), from נשא, for a word carried with weight concerning Babylon. Zechariah likewise names Damascus as the resting place of the carried word, tying its weight to a place beyond Israel.
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