What Does Numbers 11:2 Mean?
And the people cried out to Moses, and when Moses prayed to the LORD, the fire sank down.
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
And the people cried unto Moses; and when Moses prayed unto the LORD, the fire was quenched.THE KEY
The Hebrew pictures the fire sinking, its descent following the people’s cry through Moses’ prayer to the LORD.
THE MEANING
When danger feels consuming, the verse shows a cry being carried through another person into prayer, followed by the fire subsiding. It keeps the threat real while showing that it does not have the final motion.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It unsettles the belief that a destructive force, once underway, cannot be met: here the people cry, Moses prays, and the fire subsides.
THE ROOT
וַתִּשְׁקַע
vattishqa
GROWS FROM
שקע
Sink, settle, subside.
“sank down” in this verse is vattishqa. The verb translated “quenched” pictures the fire sinking or subsiding. Its descent gives the ending a sense of the danger going down after Moses prays.
ALSO GROWS
shaqa: Sink or subside.
שָׁקַע
This verb form carries the same downward motion used to describe the fire’s end.
sheqi’ah: Sinking or setting, as of the sun.
שְׁקִיעָה
This noun preserves the image of something descending; here, it helps reveal the motion inside “the fire was quenched.”
וַיִּתְפַּלֵּל
vayyitpallel
GROWS FROM
פלל
Intercede or pray, especially in the hitpael form used here.
“prayed” in this verse is vayyitpallel. The verse places Moses’ prayer between the people’s cry and the fire’s subsiding. The plea moves through a person who carries it to the LORD.
ALSO GROWS
hitpallel: Pray or intercede.
הִתְפַּלֵּל
This is the verb form used for Moses’ prayer in the verse.
tefillah: Prayer.
תְּפִלָּה
This noun from the same word family names the kind of appeal that stands between the cry and the fire’s end.
וַיִּצְעַק
vayyits’aq
GROWS FROM
צעק
Cry out, call aloud in distress.
“cried out” in this verse is vayyits’aq. The people’s cry is a directed outcry, addressed to Moses. The same root appears in a word for a cry that the LORD hears, so this is more than an unnamed feeling: it is a plea with a recipient.
ALSO GROWS
tsa’aq: Cry out.
צָעַק
This verb names the people’s act of voicing their distress to Moses.
tze’aqah: Outcry or cry of distress.
צְעָקָה
This noun from the same root appears in Exodus 3:7 for the cry the LORD says he has heard.
THE PATTERN
A cry carried into prayer marks a turning point where danger can give way to relief.
And Moses softened the face of the LORD his God, and said, LORD, why does the burning of your anger flare against your people, whom you brought out of the land of Egypt with great strength and with a gripping hand?Then they cry out to the LORD in their narrowness, and he brings them out of their narrow places.Speak your stumbles into the open to one another, and pray over one another, that you may be made whole. The asking of an aligned one, working within, is very strong.THE THREAD
And the LORD said, I have surely seen the bending low of my people who are in Egypt, and have heard their cry because of their drivers. For I know their pains.Numbers uses the verb צעק (tsa’aq), and Exodus uses צַעֲקָה (tza’aqah), a noun from the same outcry root. Here the LORD says he hears that cry, opening Numbers’ scene of intercession onto a direct connection: the outcry reaches God.
Read the SDV Bible.
Every verse has a Deep Dive in the app.
The iPhone Bible app with the Selah Decoded Version.
Does something in this reading look wrong? Tell us