What Does 2 Chronicles 11:2 Mean?
But the word of the LORD came to Shemaiah, the man of God, saying,
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
But the word of the LORD came to Shemaiah the man of God, saying,THE KEY
The word comes to a man whose name means “Yah has heard,” placing divine speech inside a relationship of hearing.
THE MEANING
The LORD’s word reaches a particular hearer; receiving is part of its path into the world. Shemaiah’s name means “Yah has heard,” holding divine hearing and human reception together.
THE ROOT
שְׁמַעְיָהוּ
Shema‘yahu
GROWS FROM
שמע
Hear, listen, and heed or respond.
Shemaiah joins the root שמע (shama, hear and respond) to Yah’s name: “Yah has heard.” The name and the event echo each other as the LORD’s word comes to this particular hearer.
ALSO GROWS
shema: Hear, listen, respond.
שְׁמַע
This form makes the hearing carried in Shemaiah’s name audible as an act of reception.
shemuah: A report or tidings, something heard.
שְׁמוּעָה
This branch connects hearing to a message received and carried onward.
דְּבַר
devar
GROWS FROM
דבר
Speak or utter; a word or matter.
Davar belongs to a word-family that names both speech and a matter or affair. The LORD’s word here is not detached information: it arrives to someone.
ALSO GROWS
dibber: He spoke.
דִּבֶּר
The verb and the word share the same root, keeping the spoken act close to the message that comes.
devarim: Words, matters, or affairs.
דְּבָרִים
This branch holds speech and matter together in one family, giving “word” the weight of something that enters a real situation.
THE PATTERN
Divine speech reaches a hearer as an address, and hearing is bound to its reception.
And the LORD came, and stood, and called as at other times, Samuel, Samuel. Then Samuel answered, Speak, for your servant hears and responds.I will hear and respond to what God the LORD will speak, for he will speak wholeness to his people and to his faithful ones, and let them not turn back to dullness.And a voice came to him, Rise, Peter; slaughter, and eat.THE THREAD
And the LORD came, and stood, and called as at other times, Samuel, Samuel. Then Samuel answered, Speak, for your servant hears and responds.Shemaiah’s name carries the root שמע (shama, hear and respond), and Samuel answers with a form of that same root: “heareth.” Both verses bind a word or call from the LORD to the hearing of a particular person.
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