What Does 2 Chronicles 15:14 Mean?
And they swore to the LORD with a great voice, and with shouting, and with trumpets, and with horns.
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
And they sware unto the LORD with a loud voice, and with shouting, and with trumpets, and with cornets.THE KEY
This oath turns allegiance from an inward resolve into a public sound carried by the whole assembly.
THE MEANING
A vow to the LORD is more than a private intention: it is spoken aloud and shared. The oath, shouts, trumpets, and cornets make commitment audible, holding solemn promise and celebration together.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The belief that genuine allegiance must remain private and silent dissolves here: the oath is voiced by the assembly.
THE ROOT
וַיִּשָּׁבְעוּ
vayyishavʿu
GROWS FROM
שבע
š-b-ʿ
To swear or bind oneself by an oath; the same consonants also form the Hebrew word for seven.
“sware” in this verse is vayyishavʿu. The oath verb shares its consonants with שֶׁבַע (sheva, “seven”), an echo traditionally linked with an oath’s completeness, though their historical relation is uncertain. The verse makes that binding pledge a whole-assembly act, sounded aloud rather than held as private resolve.
ALSO GROWS
shevuʿah: oath
שְׁבוּעָה
This noun from the same root names the binding commitment enacted by the assembly.
sheva: seven
שֶׁבַע
The shared consonants make “seven” an echo within the oath word, traditionally associated with completeness.
תְּרוּעָה
teruʿah
GROWS FROM
רוע
r-w-ʿ
To raise a cry or shout; the root also carries the sense of an alarm or signal.
“shouting” in this verse is teruʿah. This root holds shouted acclaim and alarm signal together, so the oath becomes a proclamation that gathers a people. With trumpets and cornets sounding beside it, the shout carries the pledge beyond its words.
ALSO GROWS
ruaʿ: to shout or raise a cry
רוּעַ
This verb names the action behind the assembly’s shouted response.
teruʿah: a shout, acclamation, or alarm signal
תְּרוּעָה
This is the word used for “shouting”; its signal sense resonates with the horns sounding beside it.
THE PATTERN
An oath gives allegiance binding form by declaring what will be upheld.
And Moses came and recounted to the people all the words of the LORD, and all the judgments, and all the people answered with one voice, and said, All the words which the LORD has said we will do.They took hold of their brothers, their mighty ones, and entered into a curse and into an oath, to walk in the instruction of God, which was given by the hand of Moses, the servant of God, and to guard and do all the commands of the LORD our Lord, and his judgments and his statutes;For humankind swears by the greater, and an oath for steadying is for them the boundary of every word set against.THE THREAD
I swear, and I make it stand, to guard the judgments of your alignment.The psalm uses the same oath root and joins swearing directly to doing: “I will perform it.” That connection opens this verse further: the assembly’s loud pledge points toward allegiance enacted, not exhausted by the sound.
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