What Does Psalm 2:3 Mean?
Let us tear their bonds apart, and throw their cords off us.
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
Let us break their bands asunder, and cast away their cords from us.THE KEY
The revolt moves in two stages: first tearing the bonds loose, then flinging the cords away from the self.
THE MEANING
The voice in this verse names the LORD’s rule as restraint and answers with a shared vow to tear the bonds and hurl the cords away. Here, freedom is imagined as severance: whatever claims authority over the speakers must be removed from them.
THE ROOT
נְנַתְּקָה
nenatteqah
GROWS FROM
נתק
n-t-q
to tear apart or pull loose
“tear ... apart” in this verse is nenatteqah. English makes “break” sound like a general act of destruction, but נתק names the tearing apart of something fastened. The same root describes Samson snapping his bindings and God breaking prisoners’ bands; here, the speakers use that severing image for the LORD’s restraints.
ALSO GROWS
waynatteq: He tore the bindings loose.
וַיְנַתֵּק
The same verb describes Samson breaking free of the cords that hold him.
yenatteq: He breaks apart the bonds.
יְנַתֵּק
The same verb describes God breaking prisoners’ bands in Psalm 107:14.
מוֹסְרוֹתֵימוֹ
moseroteimo
GROWS FROM
אסר
ʾ-s-r
to bind or restrain
“bonds” in this verse is moseroteimo. The root also forms words for a bound person and for what is bound or forbidden, so these bands name a condition of restraint, not just cords. The speakers treat the LORD’s claim as captivity and declare that they will tear it away.
ALSO GROWS
asir: A prisoner or captive.
אָסִיר
The word names a person by the state of being bound.
asur: Bound, restricted, or forbidden.
אָסוּר
This form keeps the root’s sense of restraint in an adjective.
וְנַשְׁלִיכָה
venashlikhah
GROWS FROM
שלך
sh-l-k
to throw or cast
“throw ... off” in this verse is venashlikhah. This verb adds forceful expulsion to the earlier tearing: the cords are not merely loosened but thrown away from the speakers. The verse’s motion goes from breaking what binds to casting it out of reach.
ALSO GROWS
vayyashlekh: And he cast or threw.
וַיַּשְׁלֵךְ
This form describes Aaron casting down his staff.
vattashlekh: And she cast or put down.
וַתַּשְׁלֵךְ
This form describes Hagar casting the child under a shrub.
THE PATTERN
Resistance to a ruler becomes collective speech and action against the claim to reign.
And the LORD said to Samuel, Hear and respond to the voice of the people in all that they say to you; for they have not spurned you, but they have spurned me, that I should not reign over them.But his townsmen hated him, and sent a message after him, saying, "We will not have this man govern over us."The kings of the earth stood side by side, and the rulers gathered together against the LORD and against his Anointed One.THE THREAD
He brings them out of darkness and the valley of deepest darkness, and tears their bonds apart.Both verses use נתק (nataq, to tear apart) for breaking bands. Psalm 2 gives the word to speakers casting off rule as restraint; Psalm 107 uses it for God breaking bonds and bringing people out of darkness and death.
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