What Does Psalm 102:5 Mean?
From the voice of my groaning my bones cling to my flesh.
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
By reason of the voice of my groaning my bones cleave to my skin.THE KEY
Suffering is pictured as a bond: the bones do not merely show through the skin; they cling to it.
THE MEANING
Here, your groaning has a voice, and anguish reaches the body’s frame: bone clings to skin. The verse holds bodily depletion in plain sight rather than dissolving it into an abstract feeling.
THE ROOT
דָּבְקָה
dāveqāh
GROWS FROM
דבק
d-b-q
To cling, cleave, or adhere.
“cling” in this verse is dāveqāh. The same Hebrew verb describes bones clinging to skin and a person cleaving to a spouse or holding fast to God. Its core is attachment that holds; here, that binding names suffering made physical.
ALSO GROWS
wə-dāvaq: The verb describes a man cleaving to his wife.
וְדָבַק
Genesis 2:24 uses the same root for a bond that joins two people into one flesh.
tidbaq: The verb describes holding fast to the LORD.
תִּדְבָּק
Deuteronomy 10:20 uses the same root for steadfast attachment, showing how one word can name both closeness and bodily distress.
THE PATTERN
The verb דבק names attachment that binds a person to a beloved, to God, or even the bones to the skin in suffering.
Therefore a man leaves his father and his mother, and clings to his wife, and they become one flesh.Stand in awe of the LORD your God; him you serve, and to him you cling, and by his nature you swear.My bone clings to my skin and to my flesh, and I slip free with the skin of my teeth.THE THREAD
Therefore a man leaves his father and his mother, and clings to his wife, and they become one flesh.The verb for bones clinging to skin is the same verb that describes a man cleaving to his wife, where the two become one flesh. The shared root carries attachment across bodily union and bodily suffering.
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