What Does Psalm 59:14 Mean?
And at evening, let them turn back, growling like dogs, and circle the city.
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
And at evening let them return; and let them make a noise like a dog, and go round about the city.THE KEY
The line repeats an earlier refrain, so its form itself enacts the threat’s return at evening.
THE MEANING
The threat returns with evening, growls like a dog, and circles the city. Its movement keeps the pressure surrounding the scene, while its noise announces its presence.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The belief that a threat is over once it withdraws is undone here: it returns at evening.
THE ROOT
יְשׁוּבוּ
yeshuvu
GROWS FROM
שׁוּב
shuv
To turn back or return.
“let them turn back” in this verse is yeshuvu. The root makes the threat’s return a movement that comes around again, not a single appearance. The repeated line gives that recurrence a shape in the psalm itself.
ALSO GROWS
shuvah: Return; turn back.
שׁוּבָה
This imperative branch carries the same turn-back movement named in the verse’s returning threat.
meshuvah: Backsliding; turning away.
מְשׁוּבָה
The root can describe movement that turns back or turns away, showing how a return can be part of an unresolved cycle.
יֶהֱמוּ
yehemu
GROWS FROM
הָמָה
hamah
To roar, murmur, or make a tumultuous sound.
“growling” in this verse is yehemu. The verb carries more than a generic noise: it suggests a roar or murmur, giving the dogs’ circling an audible, menacing presence. A related noun can name both a multitude and a tumult, joining surrounding presence with commotion.
ALSO GROWS
hamon: Multitude; tumult; din.
הָמוֹן
This branch links the root’s sound to a crowd or commotion filling the space around the city.
hemiyyah: Roaring; murmuring.
הֲמִיָּה
This sound-word echoes the growl in the verse and makes the circling threat audible.
THE PATTERN
Threat is pictured as a returning presence whose animal sound and circling motion make a place feel besieged.
They turn back at evening, growling like dogs, and circle the city.For dogs have circled me; an assembly of evildoers has surrounded me; they bore through my hands and my feet.THE THREAD
They turn back at evening, growling like dogs, and circle the city.Psalm 59:6 carries the same Hebrew roots for returning and roaring, with almost the same wording. The line returns twice in the psalm, mirroring the threat that returns at evening.
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