What Does Psalm 65:6 Mean?
Who by his strength sets the mountains firm, girded with might.
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
Which by his strength setteth fast the mountains; being girded with power:THE KEY
The mountains are set firm by strength, while their establisher is pictured as girded with might.
THE MEANING
The mountains stand fast through the strength of the one girded with might. Their solidity is not self-made; the verse places even mountain-scale permanence in a power that holds firm now.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The verse undoes the belief that what seems permanent secures itself.
THE ROOT
מֵכִין
mekhīn
GROWS FROM
כון
k-w-n
To be firm, establish, or prepare.
“sets firm” in this verse is mekhīn. The verse’s word for setting the mountains fast grows from the root of being made firm and prepared. The mountains’ stability is something established, not something they produce for themselves.
ALSO GROWS
nakhon: Firm, prepared, established.
נָכוֹן
This branch shows the settled condition that results when something is set fast.
konen: To establish or set up.
כּוֹנֵן
This verb branch makes explicit the act of giving something a firm place.
נֶאְזָר
ne’zar
GROWS FROM
אזר
ʾ-z-r
To gird, bind around, or equip.
The one who establishes the mountains is described as girded with might. The image presents strength as something held around the establisher, ready and secured.
ALSO GROWS
azar: To gird or equip.
אָזַר
The verb branch reveals the action behind the image of being girded.
ezor: A belt or girdle.
אֵזוֹר
This related noun makes the surrounding, fastening image of the verse tangible.
גְּבוּרָה
gevurah
GROWS FROM
גבר
g-b-r
To be strong, prevail, or overcome.
“girded with might” in this verse is gevurah. The might here belongs to the root of strength that prevails. The verse pairs that prevailing force with the act of making the mountains firm.
ALSO GROWS
gavar: To be strong or prevail.
גָּבַר
This verb branch shows the active force carried in the word for might.
gibbor: A mighty one or warrior.
גִּבּוֹר
This related word presents prevailing strength in a person, echoing the verse’s image of the one girded with might.
THE PATTERN
What appears fixed is sustained by active strength rather than by itself.
The LORD reigns, he is clothed in height; the LORD is clothed in strength, and he girds himself with it. The inhabited world is also set firm, and it will not totter.Your steadiness is from generation to generation; you steady the earth, and it stands.Who, being the radiance of his weight and the exact stamp of his foundation, carrying all things by the word of his power, when he had made the cleansing of shortcomings, sat down at the right hand of the Greatness on high.THE THREAD
The LORD reigns, he is clothed in height; the LORD is clothed in strength, and he girds himself with it. The inhabited world is also set firm, and it will not totter.Psalm 93:1 uses the same Hebrew roots for being girded and being established. It links the might surrounding the establisher with the firmness of what is established, opening the mountain image into a picture of the whole world.
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