What Does Proverbs 15:11 Mean?
Sheol and perishing are before the LORD, how much more the hearts of the children of humankind.
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
Hell and destruction are before the LORD: how much more then the hearts of the children of men?THE KEY
Even the realm of ruin is before the LORD’s face, so the human heart is not too deep or hidden to be seen.
THE MEANING
Sheol and Abaddon, the realm of the dead and the field of ruin, are already before the LORD. How much more, then, is your heart within that seeing: no depth of your inner life falls beyond it.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The belief that the most hidden or ruined places lie outside God’s sight dissolves: the verse places even Sheol and Abaddon before him, then brings the human heart closer still.
THE ROOT
לִפְנֵי
lifnei
GROWS FROM
פנה
panah
Turn, face toward; the related noun means face or presence.
The Hebrew לִפְנֵי יְהוָה (lifnei YHWH, “before the LORD”) pictures Sheol and Abaddon within the LORD’s presence. The “how much more” then turns from the deepest imagined place to the human heart: if even that is before him, the heart is no exception.
ALSO GROWS
panim: Face, presence, front
פָּנִים
The word translated “before” carries the image of being at someone’s face or in their presence.
lifnei: Before, in the presence of
לִפְנֵי
This is the form used in the verse: even Sheol and Abaddon stand within the LORD’s presence.
אֲבַדּוֹן
Abaddon
GROWS FROM
אבד
abad
Perish, be lost; lose the way.
Abaddon grows from אבד (abad, “perish, be lost”), the same seed as words for perishing and loss. What English renders as “destruction” carries that root sense of loss, and the verse places even this domain before the LORD.
ALSO GROWS
abad: Perish, be lost
אָבַד
The verb exposes the seed inside Abaddon: destruction is bound to perishing and loss.
avedah: Loss, lost thing
אֲבֵדָה
This branch shows the same root naming loss itself; even loss lies before the LORD.
THE PATTERN
No depth or inward place lies beyond the LORD’s sight; what is hidden is already open before him.
The eyes of the LORD are in every place, watching the harm and the good.If I climb into the heavens, you are there; if I spread my bed in Sheol, behold, you are there.And no creation is hidden before him, but all things are naked and bared at the throat to the eyes of him to whom our account belongs.THE THREAD
If I climb into the heavens, you are there; if I spread my bed in Sheol, behold, you are there.The Hebrew word שְׁאוֹל (Sheol, the realm of the dead) is the word translated “hell” in Psalm 139:8. Proverbs says even Sheol is before the LORD; the psalm makes that nearness personal, placing the speaker there within God’s presence.
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