What Does Psalm 78:48 Mean?
He handed over their cattle to the hail, and their herds to the flaming bolts.
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
He gave up their cattle also to the hail, and their flocks to hot thunderbolts.THE KEY
The verb translated “gave up” also means “shut” or “hand over,” so the verse depicts the herds being delivered into the hail’s reach.
THE MEANING
Here, the verse makes judgment concrete: cattle meet hail, and flocks meet burning bolts. The damage reaches living animals and the livelihood held in them; the violence remains visible.
THE ROOT
וַיַּסְגֵּר
wayyasgēr
GROWS FROM
סגר
s-g-r
To shut or close; in the causative form, to shut in or hand over.
“handed over” in this verse is wayyasgēr. The Hebrew verb carries both closure and surrender into another’s power. Here the herds are handed into the hail’s reach, while the same root can describe a boundary that encloses and protects.
ALSO GROWS
sāgar: Shut, close
סָגַר
In Genesis 7:16, the LORD “shut him in,” using closure to enclose Noah.
hisgīr: Hand over, deliver up
הִסְגִּיר
Amos 1:6 uses this form for delivering captives to Edom, showing the root’s sense of surrendering someone into another’s power.
לָרְשָׁפִים
lāreshāfīm
GROWS FROM
רשף
r-sh-p
To burn or blaze; a flame or fiery bolt.
“flaming bolts” in this verse is lāreshāfīm. The Hebrew image carries the heat of flame and the force of a fiery bolt. The root makes the burning itself visible inside the KJV’s “hot thunderbolts.”
ALSO GROWS
reshef: Flame, burning heat
רֶשֶׁף
Deuteronomy 32:24 uses this word for burning heat, giving the verse’s bolts a distinctly fiery register.
benei reshef: Sons of flame; sparks
בְּנֵי רֶשֶׁף
Job 5:7 pictures these “sons of flame” flying upward, showing the same word-family in the image of sparks.
מִקְנֵיהֶם
miqnehem
GROWS FROM
קנה
q-n-h
To acquire, buy, or possess.
“flocks” in this verse is miqnehem. The Hebrew noun מִקְנֶה (miqneh) means livestock, yet it grows from a root of acquiring and possessing. The verse therefore names both living creatures and the material wealth bound up with them.
ALSO GROWS
qānāh: Acquire, buy
קָנָה
Genesis 47:20 uses this verb when Joseph buys Egypt’s land, making the economic dimension of the livestock audible.
qōneh: Possessor, owner
קֹנֵה
Genesis 14:19 calls God “possessor of heaven and earth,” showing how this root extends from acquired goods to possession on a cosmic scale.
THE PATTERN
Destruction through the created world reaches the material web of life: animals, fields, trees, and food.
And the hail struck throughout all the land of Egypt all that was in the field, both man and beast, and the hail struck all the grass of the field, and shattered every tree of the field.The field is ravaged, the ground mourns; for the grain is ravaged; the new wine withers, the oil wilts.The first messenger sounds, and there comes hail and fire mixed with blood, and they are thrown upon the earth; and the third part of the trees is burned down, and all green grass is burned down.THE THREAD
And those who came in, male and female of all flesh, came as God had commanded him, and the LORD shut him in.“Shut him in” comes from the same root, סגר (s-g-r), as “gave up” here. The root holds both enclosure and handover: in Genesis it closes around Noah, while here the herds are handed over to the destructive forces.
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