What Does Psalm 78:59 Mean?
God heard this, and overflowed, and pushed Israel far away.
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
When God heard this, he was wroth, and greatly abhorred Israel:THE KEY
Here, being heard by God does not mean being affirmed; God’s hearing ends in anger and rejection.
THE MEANING
God hears what is happening and answers it; here the answer is anger and rejection. Divine attention does not promise affirmation or gentle treatment: the verse holds hearing and judgment together.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The belief that being heard by God guarantees approval is undone here: God hears, and the response is rejection.
THE ROOT
וַיִּמְאַס
wayyim’as
GROWS FROM
מאס
ma’as
To reject, refuse, or regard as unacceptable; here it names the act of rejection.
“pushed away” in this verse is wayyim’as. The root holds more than revulsion: it names a refusal. The same seed appears when builders reject a stone, making the agent of rejection matter: here God is the one rejecting Israel.
ALSO GROWS
ma’asu: They rejected or refused.
מָאֲסוּ
Psalm 118:22 uses this form for builders rejecting a stone, showing the same root at work in a different act of rejection.
ma’us: Rejected, refused, or despised.
מָאוּס
This form describes one who bears rejection; here the verse makes God the one who rejects.
וַיִּשְׁמַע
wayyishmaʿ
GROWS FROM
שמע
shamaʿ
To hear or listen, with the sense of heeding or responding when the context calls for it.
English can make “heard” sound like sound simply arriving at the ear, but שמע (shamaʿ) can carry the movement toward heeding and response. The verse makes that movement explicit: God’s hearing is followed by an answer, and that answer is anger and rejection.
ALSO GROWS
shemaʿ: Hear; attend; in an imperative, hear and respond.
שְׁמַע
The familiar call to Israel to hear carries answerable attention; here God hears Israel and answers with judgment.
shemuʿah: A report, news, or what is heard.
שְׁמוּעָה
It names something received through hearing, content that can call forth a response.
THE PATTERN
Hearing in scripture is consequential: what is heard draws a response, whether deliverance or judgment.
The aligned cry out, and the LORD hears, and snatches them out of all their narrow places.And God heard and responded to their groaning, and God remembered his covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob.But be makers of the word, and not hearers only, miscounting yourselves.THE THREAD
The stone the builders push away becomes the head of the corner.Psalm 118:22 uses the same root, מאס (ma’as, reject), for the builders’ rejection of a stone. The shared word makes rejection audible across the Psalms, while the connected verse gives the stone a different outcome.
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