What Does Psalm 78:18 Mean?
And they tested God in their heart by asking food for their living soul.
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 they tempted God in their heart by asking meat for their lust.THE KEY
What the KJV calls “lust” is their nephesh, the living self, so appetite itself becomes the place where God is put to proof.
THE MEANING
The verse speaks of an inner test: the heart asks for food, yet makes God’s care answer to appetite. “Lust” here names their nephesh, the living self, with appetite among its branches. The request is for food, and its satisfaction becomes the proof they demand from God.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
A request becomes a test only when it is spoken as a direct challenge; this verse shows that the heart can make it one from within.
THE ROOT
נָסָה
nāsâ
GROWS FROM
נסה
To test, try, or put to proof.
“tested” in this verse is nāsâ. The verb carries the sense of trying God or putting God to proof. The request for food is part of that test: the heart makes God’s response answer for whether he will provide.
ALSO GROWS
vayənassu: They tested.
וַיְנַסּוּ
This is the verb used in the verse, naming the asking as a test of God.
Massah: Testing.
מַסָּה
The place name recalls a test of God over the people’s demand for water (Exodus 17:7).
nissah: He tested.
נִסָּה
The same root describes God testing Abraham (Genesis 22:1), showing the verb’s sense of putting someone to proof.
נֶפֶשׁ
nephesh
GROWS FROM
נפשׁ
The living self or person, including that person’s appetite.
“living soul” in this verse is nephesh. The Hebrew phrase is “for their nephesh”: the appetite belongs to the living self. The verse holds the hunger and the inward test together, their living selves make the provision they seek a proof of God’s care.
ALSO GROWS
nephesh: Living soul or person.
נֶפֶשׁ
This established sense keeps the verse’s appetite connected to the whole living person, rather than making it a separate force.
nephesh: Appetite.
נֶפֶשׁ
Proverbs 23:2 uses nephesh in the phrase “a man given to appetite,” showing how this word for the living self can also name its desire for food.
THE PATTERN
When the heart makes God’s care answer to a demand for proof, asking becomes a test.
Therefore the people strove with Moses, and said, Give us waters that we may drink. And Moses said to them, Why do you strive with me? Why do you test the LORD?You shall not test the LORD your God, as you tested him at Massah, the testing place.Jesus said to him, Again it is written, You shall not test the LORD your God.THE THREAD
You shall not test the LORD your God, as you tested him at Massah, the testing place.The Hebrew verb for “tempt” here shares the root נסה with Psalm 78:18: both describe putting the LORD to proof. Deuteronomy’s reference to Massah opens the verse further by connecting the test over food with the earlier demand for water.
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