What Does Psalm 50:7 Mean?
Hear and respond, O my people, and I will speak. O Israel, I will testify against you. I am God, even your God.
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
Hear, O my people, and I will speak; O Israel, and I will testify against thee: I am God, even thy God.THE KEY
The voice that testifies against you is the same voice that calls you “my people” and names itself your God.
THE MEANING
God addresses you as his people and bears witness against you without softening the claim. Belonging and exposure stand together: the testimony speaks within the relationship named by “thy God.”
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The lie is that belonging to God puts you beyond God’s scrutiny; here, belonging is the relationship in which the witness speaks.
THE ROOT
שִׁמְעָה
shimʿāh
GROWS FROM
שמע
To hear, listen, and respond.
“Hear and respond” in this verse is shimʿāh. Shema carries more than sound reaching the ear; it joins hearing with response. The verse begins by calling you into attentive reception before God speaks and testifies.
ALSO GROWS
shamaʿ: Hear or listen.
שָׁמַע
This verb shares the root’s sense of attentive hearing, making the opening a call to receive the words addressed to you.
shemuʿah: A report or news heard.
שְׁמוּעָה
A heard report is carried from a voice to a listener, echoing the movement from God’s speech to the people addressed.
וְאָעִידָה
veʾāʿîdāh
GROWS FROM
עוד
To bear witness; in this verb form, to testify or solemnly affirm.
“Testify” in this verse is veʾāʿîdāh. The testimony is spoken by the one who names himself as your God. The root’s witness-language holds the force of “against thee” inside the same direct address as “my people.”
ALSO GROWS
ʿēd: Witness.
עֵד
A witness gives testimony; this branch makes clear that the verse presents God as the one bearing witness.
ʿēdût: Testimony or witness.
עֵדוּת
The testimony is not an incidental remark: it is the witness God declares directly to the people he addresses.
THE PATTERN
God’s address joins belonging with hearing and witness within the same relationship.
Hear and respond, O Israel. The LORD our God is one LORD.Hear and respond, my people, and I will bear witness to you, Israel, if you would hear and respond to me.My sheep hear and respond to my voice, and I perceive them, and they follow me.THE THREAD
Hear and respond, my people, and I will bear witness to you, Israel, if you would hear and respond to me.Psalm 81:8 repeats the same pairing of hearing and testimony, using the roots שמע (shamaʿ, hear and respond) and עוד (ʿud, bear witness). The repeated address “my people” shows that the testimony speaks within the relationship, not outside it.
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