What Does 1 Kings 22:42 Mean?
Jehoshaphat was thirty-five years old when he began to reign, and he reigned twenty-five years in Jerusalem. And his mother's name was Azubah, daughter of Shilhi.
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
Jehoshaphat was thirty and five years old when he began to reign; and he reigned twenty and five years in Jerusalem. And his mother’s name was Azubah the daughter of Shilhi.THE KEY
The royal record places Azubah, a name meaning “forsaken,” inside Jerusalem, whose name carries the sense of wholeness.
THE MEANING
This verse holds a reign with a measured span and locates it in Jerusalem. It also preserves the name Azubah, formed from the language of leaving and forsaking. Wholeness and the name of abandonment stand side by side in one living story, with neither erased.
THE ROOT
עֲזוּבָה
ʿĂzûḇāh
GROWS FROM
עזב
ʿ-z-b
To leave, abandon, or forsake.
The name Azubah carries the sense of one left behind. Its root also appears as an action, leaving or forsaking, so English transliteration conceals a word that already holds a whole relational condition.
ALSO GROWS
azav: To leave, abandon, or forsake.
עָזַב
The verb is the seed inside Azubah’s name, making the name itself a compressed form of being left.
azubah: Forsaken, abandoned; the feminine form used as a name here.
עֲזוּבָה
The name preserves the condition in a single word, even as the verse places it within a royal lineage.
יְרוּשָׁלַיִם
Yerushalayim
GROWS FROM
שלם
sh-l-m
To be complete, whole, or intact.
The name Jerusalem carries the language of shalom: wholeness. In this verse, the royal reign is located in that named wholeness, while the family line keeps the name Azubah visible beside it.
ALSO GROWS
shalom: Wholeness, completeness.
שָׁלוֹם
This branch opens the place-name toward the sense of wholeness held alongside Azubah’s name.
shalem: Complete, whole, intact.
שָׁלֵם
It carries the same root sense and deepens the contrast between a name of wholeness and a name of forsakenness.
יְהוֹשָׁפָט
Yəhôšāfāṭ
GROWS FROM
שפט
sh-p-ṭ
To judge or govern with judgment.
Jehoshaphat’s name compresses the claim “YHWH judges.” The royal name, the place-name of wholeness, and the maternal name meaning forsaken all remain in the same line, carrying more than a bare succession record.
ALSO GROWS
shaphat: To judge, govern, or render judgment.
שָׁפַט
This verb is the root carried in the king’s name.
mishpat: Judgment, justice, or a ruling.
מִשְׁפָּט
This branch shows the governing force inside the name Jehoshaphat.
THE PATTERN
Scripture names abandonment plainly, then shows that it need not be the final name or word over a life.
When my father and my mother let go of me, then the LORD gathers me in.You shall no more be called Left Behind, and your land shall no more be called Stunned; but you shall be called Hephzibah, my delight is in her, and your land Beulah, wedded; for the LORD delights in you, and your land shall be wed.Let your way of living be without the love of silver, and let what is at hand be enough, for he has said, I will never let go of you, nor leave you behind.THE THREAD
You shall no more be called Left Behind, and your land shall no more be called Stunned; but you shall be called Hephzibah, my delight is in her, and your land Beulah, wedded; for the LORD delights in you, and your land shall be wed.Azubah and “Forsaken” carry the same Hebrew root, עזב, meaning to leave or forsake. Isaiah opens the name into a direct renaming: the condition is named, but it does not remain the identity.
Read the SDV Bible.
Every verse has a Deep Dive in the app.
The iPhone Bible app with the Selah Decoded Version.
Does something in this reading look wrong? Tell us