What Does Psalm 63:11 Mean?
But the king rejoices in God; everyone who swears by him boasts in him, and the mouth of those who speak falsely is shut.
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
But the king shall rejoice in God; every one that sweareth by him shall glory: but the mouth of them that speak lies shall be stopped.THE KEY
Glory here is a voice turned toward God, while the mouth speaking lies reaches its own closure.
THE MEANING
Your worth is not self-authored: the king rejoices in God, and everyone who swears by him finds their boast there. The verse also gives false speech a hard limit: the mouth that voices lies is stopped. It places praise and falsehood on different trajectories.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that a lie can preserve its voice and secure the final account; here, that mouth is stopped.
THE ROOT
יִתְהַלֵּל
yithallel
GROWS FROM
הלל
Praise; boast or glory.
“boasts in him” in this verse is yithallel. The Hebrew verb holds boasting and praise in the same root. Here, glory is voiced in God: the one who swears by him locates the boast in him.
ALSO GROWS
halal: Praise or boast.
הָלַל
This is the root’s central action, showing that glory can be spoken praise.
tehillah: Praise; a song of praise.
תְּהִלָּה
This noun from the same root makes the connection between glory and voiced praise explicit.
יִסָּכֵר
yissaker
GROWS FROM
סכר
Shut or close.
“is shut” in this verse is yissaker. The verse says the lying mouth is closed, not merely answered. Its sound echoes שָׁקֶר (sheqer, “lie”), though “lie” and “be shut” come from distinct roots.
ALSO GROWS
sākar: To shut or close.
סָכַר
This root meaning gives “stopped” the concrete sense of a mouth being closed.
vayissakru: They were shut or stopped.
וַיִּסָּכְרוּ
The same root describes the waters’ openings being stopped in Genesis 8:2, another image of an open flow coming to a close.
שָׁקֶר
sheqer
GROWS FROM
שקר
Falsehood; dealing falsely.
“speak falsely” in this verse is sheqer. The word for “lies” sounds near the word translated “stopped,” joining the false speech to its closure. The roots differ, but the verse’s sound lets the two actions answer one another.
ALSO GROWS
sheqer: A lie or falsehood.
שֶׁקֶר
This is the false speech named directly in the verse.
shāqar: To lie or deal falsely.
שָׁקַר
The related verb shows that sheqer is not only a false statement but a way of speaking and acting falsely.
THE PATTERN
The boast that is grounded in God becomes praise directed toward its source.
My living soul makes its boast in the LORD; the bowed ones hear it and are glad.So that, just as it is written, "The one who boasts, let him boast in the LORD."THE THREAD
My living soul makes its boast in the LORD; the bowed ones hear it and are glad.The Hebrew verb rendered “boast” here comes from the same הלל (H-L-L) root as “shall glory” in Psalm 63:11. The shared root shows glory as a voiced boast directed toward God.
Read the SDV Bible.
Every verse has a Deep Dive in the app.
The iPhone Bible app with the Selah Decoded Version.
Does something in this reading look wrong? Tell us