What Does Leviticus 10:9 Mean?
Do not drink wine or strong drink, you or your sons with you, when you go into the tent of meeting, lest you die. It shall be a statute for the ages throughout your generations.
Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.
Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.
King James wording
King James Version
Do not drink wine nor strong drink, thou, nor thy sons with thee, when ye go into the tabernacle of the congregation, lest ye die: it shall be a statute for ever throughout your generations:THE KEY
The prohibition stands at the doorway, where the next verse calls for the discernment sacred service requires.
THE MEANING
The verse sets a living boundary at the threshold of sacred service: wine and strong drink cannot accompany entry into the tent of meeting, and death is the stated consequence. The next verse names the discernment this boundary guards: distinguishing what is set apart from what is common, and what is clean from what is unclean. The command is carried across generations.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The belief that sacred service remains clear when the person serving is impaired.
THE ROOT
שֵׁכָר
shekhar
GROWS FROM
שכר
sh-k-r
To become intoxicated; the root names the condition the drink induces.
“strong drink” in this verse is shekhar. The root joins the drink to the state of intoxication. The next verse names what must remain intact at the meeting-place: the ability to distinguish what is set apart from what is common.
ALSO GROWS
shakar: To become drunk or intoxicated.
שָׁכַר
The noun for the drink and the verb for becoming drunk share a root, joining the substance to the state it can bring.
shikkaron: Drunkenness or intoxication.
שִׁכָּרוֹן
This branch names the altered condition directly, clarifying what the boundary excludes from sacred service.
מוֹעֵד
mo'ed
GROWS FROM
יעד
y-ʿ-d
To appoint or designate; to arrange a meeting.
The phrase is אֹהֶל מוֹעֵד (ʾōhel mo’ed, tent of meeting), and its meeting-word comes from the root of appointing. The verse places its boundary at entry into an appointed encounter, where the work requires clear discernment.
ALSO GROWS
ya'ad: To appoint, designate, or arrange to meet.
יָעַד
The root points to a meeting set by appointment, giving the place of service a defined purpose.
mo'ed: An appointed time, meeting, or place of meeting.
מוֹעֵד
The verse’s destination is the tent of meeting; the boundary applies at the point of entering that encounter.
חֻקַּת
ḥuqqat
GROWS FROM
חקק
ḥ-q-q
To carve or inscribe, and thereby mark a fixed rule.
The word for statute grows from the language of inscribing. This boundary is presented as a marked rule carried forward through generations.
ALSO GROWS
ḥaqaq: To carve, engrave, or inscribe.
חָקַק
The root’s physical image of marking helps show the boundary as firmly set.
ḥoq: A decree, statute, or prescribed limit.
חֹק
This related word carries the sense of an established rule, fitting the verse’s emphasis on a boundary maintained across generations.
THE PATTERN
Those entrusted with sacred or civic responsibility need sobriety to distinguish clearly and judge fairly.
And that you may divide between the set-apart and the common, and between the unclean and the clean.Lest they drink and forget the statute, and twist the judgment of all who are bowed.Then the overseer must be one no hand can seize, a man of one wife, clear-headed, whole-minded, well-ordered, a lover of strangers, able to make others learn.THE THREAD
It is not for kings, Lemuel; it is not for kings to drink wine, nor for princes strong drink.This verse repeats יַיִן (yayin, wine) and שֵׁכָר (shekhar, strong drink). Its next verse links drinking with forgetting instruction and distorting judgment, extending the same boundary from priestly service to civic rule.
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