What Does 2 Chronicles 15:16 Mean?
And also Maachah, the mother of Asa the king, he turned her aside from being queen, because she had made an idol for Asherah. And Asa cut down her idol, and beat it to dust, and burned it at the brook Kidron.
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 also concerning Maachah the mother of Asa the king, he removed her from being queen, because she had made an idol in a grove: and Asa cut down her idol, and stamped it, and burnt it at the brook Kidron.THE KEY
The Hebrew verb for Asa cutting down the image is also the verb used for cutting a covenant.
THE MEANING
Here, status and devotion are stripped to their material facts: Maachah is removed from the queen’s office, and her image is cut down, pounded, and burned. The verse leaves neither family rank nor a sacred object beyond removal. The destruction ends at the brook Kidron, where the image is burned.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The belief that rank or sacred status makes a person’s authority or an object untouchable collapses here: Maachah loses her office, and her image is destroyed.
THE ROOT
וַיִּכְרֹת
wayyikrot
GROWS FROM
כרת
karat
To cut or cut off.
“cut down” in this verse is wayyikrot. The verb used for destroying the image is also used in the phrase for making a covenant. The same root holds severance and binding together, so this act of destruction resonates with the language of allegiance.
ALSO GROWS
karat berit: To establish a covenant, literally “cut a covenant.”
כָּרַת בְּרִית
The shared verb links Asa’s physical cutting of the image with the language used to describe a bond.
nikhrat: To be cut off or severed.
נִכְרַת
This branch shows the root’s other edge: what is cut can be separated and removed.
וַיִּכְתֹּת
wayyikketot
GROWS FROM
כתת
kathath
To beat, pound, or crush into pieces.
“stamped” in this verse is wayyikketot. The root describes physical pounding: elsewhere it describes olives beaten for oil, while here it names the image being beaten into pieces. The act is material and complete, not merely a change in what the image represents.
ALSO GROWS
katit: Beaten or pressed; used of olive oil made from beaten olives.
כָּתִית
The same root describes pounding material to extract something from it, while Asa directs that force toward breaking the image apart.
vekhattoti: A form of the verb meaning to beat or crush down; used in Psalm 89:23.
וְכַתּוֹתִי
This branch preserves the force of the action: the image is not simply set aside but physically beaten down.
THE PATTERN
Rival devotion is answered with concrete acts that dismantle the objects and practices carrying it.
But you shall tear down their altars, break their standing stones, and cut down their groves.But thus shall you do to them. You shall tear down their altars, shatter their standing stones, cut down their upright poles, and burn their hewn images in the fire.Many of those who had practiced the meddling arts also brought their scrolls together and burned them before all people; and they counted the price, and found it fifty thousand pieces of silver.THE THREAD
On that day the LORD cut a covenant with Abram, saying, To your seed I have given this land, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the river Euphrates.The Hebrew verb כרת (karat, “cut”) in this verse is also used for the covenant in Genesis 15:18, where the KJV says the LORD “made” a covenant. The shared root places the destruction of the image beside covenant language: in Hebrew, even the act of binding can be named as a cutting.
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