What Does Psalm 78:2 Mean?
I will open my mouth in a likeness, and pour out riddles of old.
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
I will open my mouth in a parable: I will utter dark sayings of old:THE KEY
A parable is a comparison that lets an old, hidden pattern rise into speech now.
THE MEANING
Truth reaches you through comparison: one thing makes another visible without flattening it into a plain explanation. The old riddle still speaks in the present, carrying a pattern you can perceive.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
This undoes the belief that truth is empty or inaccessible when it arrives as an image or riddle instead of a plain statement.
THE ROOT
מָשָׁל
māšāl
GROWS FROM
משל
m-sh-l
To compare or liken; a comparison-shaped saying.
The parable’s core is not simply obscurity; it sets one reality beside another. Through that likeness, a hidden pattern becomes visible and an old saying speaks into the present.
ALSO GROWS
nimshal: Be compared or likened
נִמְשַׁל
This verbal form makes the parable’s work clear: meaning emerges as one thing is seen alongside another.
meshalim: Proverbs or parables
מְשָׁלִים
The plural shows this is a way of speaking: many comparisons can carry patterns that a direct statement might leave unseen.
אֲבִיעָה
ʾabîʿāh
GROWS FROM
נבע
n-b-ʿ
To bubble or gush forth.
“pour out” in this verse is ʾabîʿāh. The Hebrew verb pictures the saying as something that wells up and flows out. The riddles of old are not inert fragments; they rise into speech now.
ALSO GROWS
nāvaʿ: Gush or bubble forth
נָבַע
This is the root’s basic image: the speaker’s words flow up from within.
mabbūaʿ: Spring or fountain
מַבּוּעַ
The spring makes the image concrete: utterance flows from a source, carrying what was held beneath the surface.
THE PATTERN
Scripture uses comparison and riddling speech to give hidden patterns a form that can be spoken and perceived.
To discern a proverb and its turned saying, the words of the wise and their enfolded riddles.Son of man, put forth a riddle, and speak a likeness to the house of Israel.So that what was spoken through the prophet might be filled, saying, I will open my mouth in parables; I will pour forth what has been hidden from the laying down of the world.THE THREAD
So that what was spoken through the prophet might be filled, saying, I will open my mouth in parables; I will pour forth what has been hidden from the laying down of the world.Matthew quotes this verse as the explanation for speaking in parables, then names the “dark sayings of old” as things kept secret from the foundation of the world. The link opens the parable as speech that lets a hidden pattern become visible.
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