What Does 2 Chronicles 13:6 Mean?
Yet Jeroboam son of Nebat, servant of Solomon son of David, has risen up and rebelled against his lord.
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
Yet Jeroboam the son of Nebat, the servant of Solomon the son of David, is risen up, and hath rebelled against his lord.THE KEY
Rebellion here rises from inside service: the one called servant becomes the one who stands against his lord.
THE MEANING
This verse exposes a fracture that can happen inside a bond of service: a person can occupy the servant’s place and still rise against the one called lord. The bond is named, and so is the breach; neither erases the other.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The false belief is that a role of service guarantees loyalty to the one being served.
THE ROOT
מָרַד
marad
GROWS FROM
מרד
To rebel or break away from recognized authority.
“rebelled” in this verse is marad. The Hebrew verb names a rupture against the relationship already in place. Here, that rupture is directed against the very lord whose servant Jeroboam is called.
ALSO GROWS
mered: Rebellion or revolt.
מֶרֶד
The noun makes clear that the break is a distinct act of resistance, not merely a change in position.
mored: One who rebels.
מֹרֵד
This branch names the person by the resistance they enact, echoing the verse’s sharp turn from servant to rebel.
עֶבֶד
eved
GROWS FROM
עבד
To work or serve.
“servant of Solomon” in this verse is eved. The root ties the servant to service as an enacted relationship, not just a title. Set beside marad, the verse places service and resistance in one person without letting either word cancel the other.
ALSO GROWS
avad: To serve or work.
עָבַד
The verb shows the active relationship carried by the title servant.
avodah: Service, labor, or work.
עֲבֹדָה
This branch opens the servant’s role into the larger field of work and service that the rebellion breaks against.
וַיָּקָם
vayyaqam
GROWS FROM
קום
To rise, stand, or become established.
“risen up” in this verse is vayyaqam. Before the verse names the rebellion, it says Jeroboam rises. The movement of standing up gives the rupture a visible shape: resistance takes a position against the authority already named.
ALSO GROWS
qum: To rise or stand.
קוּם
This is the verb’s basic movement, which the verse places immediately before rebellion.
maqom: A place or standing place.
מָקוֹם
This related word suggests a place where one stands, sharpening the verse’s image of taking a stand against one’s lord.
THE PATTERN
Rebellion is a rupture within a recognized bond of authority, capable of widening from one person to a whole people.
Only, do not rebel against the LORD, and do not fear the people of the land, for they are our bread. Their shadow has turned aside from over them, and the LORD is with us. Do not fear them.So Israel broke away from the house of David to this day.But they were contrary, and rebelled against you, and threw your instruction behind their backs, and killed your prophets, who testified against them to turn them back to you, and they wrought great spurnings.THE THREAD
So Israel broke away from the house of David to this day.The same Hebrew root, מרד (marad, rebel), names the breach in both verses. The shared root lets the reader see that rupture widen from one servant’s resistance to a people’s break from the house of David.
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