What Does Numbers 13:8 Mean?
Of the tribe of Ephraim, Oshea the son of Nun.
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
Of the tribe of Ephraim, Oshea the son of Nun.THE KEY
Before the land is surveyed, the text places a name meaning deliverance among those sent to see it.
THE MEANING
This verse lets a name carry more than identification: Oshea means deliverance, and he stands among those sent to look at the land. Ephraim’s name carries fruitfulness, placing fruitfulness and deliverance together in one line.
THE ROOT
הוֹשֵׁעַ
Hōshēaʿ
GROWS FROM
ישע
y-š-ʿ
To deliver, bring out of constraint into spaciousness.
Oshea’s name grows from the root of deliverance. The verse names him this way before the scouting report is spoken, placing deliverance within the scene from the start.
ALSO GROWS
Yasha: Deliver, bring out.
יָשַׁע
This verb shares Oshea’s root and shows that the name carries the action of deliverance.
Yeshuah: Deliverance.
יְשׁוּעָה
This noun makes explicit the meaning carried in Oshea’s name.
Yehoshua: The LORD delivers.
יְהוֹשֻׁעַ
Moses later gives Oshea this name, retaining the deliverance root while naming the LORD as its source.
אֶפְרַיִם
Efrayim
GROWS FROM
פרה
p-r-h
To be fruitful, bear fruit.
Ephraim’s name carries fruitfulness; Genesis explains it with the words, “God hath caused me to be fruitful.” Beside Oshea, the name places fruitfulness and deliverance together in the verse.
ALSO GROWS
Parah: To bear fruit, be fruitful.
פָּרָה
This verb shares the root associated with Ephraim and makes the name’s fruitfulness visible.
Peri: Fruit, produce.
פְּרִי
This related word shows the root’s movement from fruit-bearing to its resulting fruit.
THE PATTERN
Scripture uses names to disclose the nature or work carried by a person.
And he called the name of the second the Fruitful, Ephraim, for God has made me bear fruit in the land of my bending low.These are the names of the men whom Moses sent to scout out the land. And Moses called Oshea the son of Nun, Jehoshua, the LORD's deliverance.And she will bring forth a son, and you will call his name Jesus, the LORD's deliverance, for he will deliver his people from their missing.THE THREAD
These are the names of the men whom Moses sent to scout out the land. And Moses called Oshea the son of Nun, Jehoshua, the LORD's deliverance.The verse gives the same man a new name built on the same deliverance root: Oshea becomes Jehoshua. The change reveals what the first name already held and names the LORD as the source of deliverance.
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