Contents
Biblical Hebrew words are not just vocabulary to be remembered. To unlock Bible meaning, you must grasp Hebrew word stories. Each word tells one.
Words reveal Hebrew word stories. They unlock Bible meaning.
This takes us full circle back to Key 1. The King James translators (and other translators for other versions) ended up using multiple words in English to translate one Biblical Hebrew word. The result is that sometimes we end up with a jumble of foreign language words that don’t seem to make sense. In reality, they tell us Hebrew word stories.
Here’s a common word used in modern Hebrew for glue. In Biblical Hebrew, we find it about 55 times in the Old Testament. It carries Strong’s H1692 which is a primitive root, Key 6. Notice the presence of Key 1, multiple meanings, there are nine KJV translations. Key 2, with complementary, even contradictory meanings like cleave together and follow close. You can’t follow closely and at the same time be joined together. What’s going on here?
דָּבַק dâbaq daw-bak’; a primitive root; properly, to impinge, i.e. cling or adhere; figuratively, to catch by pursuit:
KJV – abide fast, cleave (fast together), follow close (hard after), be joined (together), keep (fast), overtake, pursue hard, stick, take.
Look at the KJV translations. Recognize the difference in these words. How do you make heads or tails out of them? One might well ask, how can one Hebrew word have such varied translations?
Yet somewhere, somehow, there’s a relationship between them. I call these associations Hebrew word stories. The 7th Key to master Biblical Hebrew. Yes, practically every word, and especially the roots, like this one, has a tale to tell. When we add in the derivatives, these Hebrew word stories unlock Bible meaning. There’s an exciting story behind dabak.
An important point to remember is you and I cannot imagine these word stories. With our KJV words, we must tell God’s story. That is true theology. The only way to do this is through corroborative texts! Verses using the same word in various contexts.
These word stories express the shape of each piece of our puzzle, the variegated contours of each word. Here’s a difficult-to-understand text with dabak. With the various KJV translations and the Bible contexts, we construct word stories. Let’s investigate the dabak piece of the puzzle.
33 Know you the ordinances of heaven? can you set the dominion thereof in the earth?
34 Can you lift up your voice to the clouds, that abundance of waters may cover you?
35 Can you send lightnings, that they may go, and say to you, Here we are?
36 Who has put wisdom in the inward parts? or who has given understanding to the heart?
37 Who can number the clouds in wisdom? or who can stay the bottles of heaven,
38 When the dust grows into hardness, and the clods cleave fast (H1692) together?
This is an amazing context in the book of Job, about the awesome happenings in the heavens. A very wise man puts Job in his place compared to God. Until this point, Job has talked about how great, knowledgeable, and wonderful he is. He’s given all the reasons he should NOT be suffering from the troubles Satan cast on him and his family (Job 1:8-12).
Finally, Elihu, this wise man, raises questions for which Job has no answers. In Job 38, he asks questions about heavenly phenomena like clouds, lightning, bottles of heaven, dust growing hard, and clods cleaving together. For the word stories of these passages about the Big Bang, please read Origin of the Universe. To illustrate Key 7, we shall tell the story of cleave together, dabak.
We are applying the concept to the formation of celestial bodies because of references to fusion and molten in other verses like Job 37:18. And also, because of the last part of Job 38:38, cleave fast together (H1692).
דָּבַק dâbaq daw-bak’; a primitive root; properly, to impinge, i.e. cling or adhere; figuratively, to catch by pursuit:
KJV – abide fast, cleave (fast together), follow close (hard after), be joined (together), keep (fast), overtake, pursue hard, stick, take.
Let’s change the order to reveal a progression of movement of the clods. Notice the concept of pursuing, follow hard after, overtaking, catching, sticking, adhering, and joining. Go over to Job 38:38 at UnlockBibleMeanin.com, click on Hebrew Concordance for H1692 and read the verses. Corroborative contexts are king. Do the exercise and meditate on the story H1692 tells us regarding Big Bang.
Word stories like H1692, reveal information about Big Bang
Once having caught up (another meaning of H1692), the specks join together: “And one wing of the other cherub was five cubits, reaching to the wall of the house: and the other wing was five cubits also, joining (H1692) to the wing of the other cherub” (2 Chronicles 3:12 KJV).
A well-known verse referring to marriage reveals how two become one, and we remember this message of joining: “Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave (H1692) unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh” (Gen. 2:24).
Three chapters further on in the book of Job 41:15-17, God refers to a particularly ferocious animal called Leviathan (possibly, from the description, some crocodile). His depiction of the scaly hide is impressive “His scales are his pride, shut up together as with a close seal. One is so near to another that no air can come between them. They are joined (H1692) one to another, they stick together, that they cannot be sundered.”
This word story is the same mechanism when atoms and molecules fuse to form larger bodies and more stable matter. It’s evidence that there are clumps of spatial matter caught and pulled by gravity to adhere into gaseous clusters. They stick together and cannot be sundered. What a fantastic description of atoms, molecules, and the formation of the elements in the periodic table.
All 7 Keys to unlock Bible meaning are present in dabak, insofar as abstracr (Key 3), figurative (Key 4), and nouns (key 5) are implied in the formation of the vastness of the bodies of the universe and the minuteness of the elements forming everything on Earth. Considering these word stories, this verse shows the formation of astral bodies. The Bible reveals what Science discovers.
Next week, we’ll look at the word story of Shabbat or the Sabbath. Everyone knows the day, but very few understand its role. Key 7, Hebrew word stories, reveals that meaning.
Dig Deeper into The Explanation
Join The Explanation Newsletter to stay informed of updates. and future events. No obligations, total privacy, unsubscribe anytime, if you want.
Online Study Courses to Unlock Bible meaning via Biblical Hebrew… with no fuss. Free video courses that put you in the driver’s seat to navigate the Bible as never before. Join now
The Explanation series of seven books. Free to read online or purchase these valuable commentaries on Genesis 1-3 from your favorite book outlet. E-book and paperback formats are available. Use this link to see the details of each book and buy from your favorite store.
Since you read all the way to here… you liked it. Please use the Social Network links just below to share this information from The Explanation, Biblical Hebrew Word Stories. Powerful Key 7 for Bible Meaning