What Does Psalm 149:7 Mean?
To do vengeance upon the nations, and correction upon the peoples.
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
To execute vengeance upon the heathen, and punishments upon the people;THE KEY
The Hebrew word behind “punishments” also names “rebuke,” so the verse’s severe judgment carries the force of direct confrontation.
THE MEANING
The verse names vengeance against the nations and punishments against the peoples. Both clauses make its judgment collective in scale and severe in force.
THE ROOT
תּוֹכֵחֹת
tokhechot
GROWS FROM
יכח
y-kh-ch
To prove, decide, or reprove.
“correction” in this verse is tokhechot. The KJV’s “punishments” carries a hard penal edge, while this Hebrew word comes from the same root as “rebuke” and “reprove.” That shared root does not soften the verse: the reproof here is directed against peoples as judgment.
ALSO GROWS
tokhechah: Rebuke, reproof.
תּוֹכֵחָה
This related noun shows that the root behind “punishments” also names direct correction.
hokhiach: To rebuke, reprove, or reason with.
הוֹכִיחַ
This verb is used for rebuking a neighbor in Leviticus 19:17, revealing the same root in a direct confrontation between people.
נְקָמָה
neqamah
GROWS FROM
נקם
n-q-m
To avenge; to exact retribution.
This root names the answering act of vengeance, not simply the heat of anger. Here it stands beside the rebuke-word, joining forceful requital with direct confrontation of peoples.
ALSO GROWS
naqam: To avenge, take vengeance.
נָקַם
The verb shows the action contained in the noun “vengeance” in this verse.
noqem: Avenger; one who takes vengeance.
נֹקֵם
This form names the one who carries out the act, making the root’s link between vengeance and its agent visible.
THE PATTERN
Scripture frames vengeance as a matter of the LORD’s reckoning rather than private repayment.
To me belongs vengeance, and repayment. At its appointed time their foot slips, for the day of their ruin is near, and what is readied comes hurrying upon them.Beloved, do not avenge yourselves, but give room to wrath. For it is written, Vengeance is mine; I will give back, says the LORD.For we know the one who said, Mine is the vengeance; I will give back, says the LORD. And again, the LORD shall judge his people.THE THREAD
You shall not hate your brother in your heart; you shall surely set your neighbor straight, and not carry falling short upon him.The Hebrew word translated “punishments” in Psalm 149:7 comes from יכח, the same root behind “rebuke” here. The scale differs, one neighbor in Leviticus, whole peoples in the psalm, but the shared root reveals judgment that confronts wrong directly.
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