What Does 2 Chronicles 20:37 Mean?
Then Eliezer the son of Dodavah of Mareshah prophesied against Jehoshaphat, saying, Because you bound yourself with Ahaziah, the LORD has broken your deeds. And the ships were shattered, so that they were not able to go to Tarshish.
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
Then Eliezer the son of Dodavah of Mareshah prophesied against Jehoshaphat, saying, Because thou hast joined thyself with Ahaziah, the LORD hath broken thy works. And the ships were broken, that they were not able to go to Tarshish.THE KEY
The verse gives the works a breach and the ships a shattering, showing the alliance’s failure reaching both the venture’s purpose and the vessel meant to carry it.
THE MEANING
You can build a venture with real capacity and still bind it to an alliance that shapes where it leads. The judgment here is stark: the LORD breaks the work, and the ships are shattered before they reach Tarshish. Even the names frame the scene: יְהוֹשָׁפָט (Yehoshafat, “YHWH judges”) is joined to אֲחַזְיָהוּ (Ahazyahu, “YHWH has grasped”).
WHAT THIS UNDOES
A venture’s success can be separated from the alliances it is bound to.
THE ROOT
כְּהִתְחַבֶּרְךָ
kehitḥabberkha
GROWS FROM
חבר
ḥ-b-r
To join, bind, or associate.
“bound yourself” in this verse is kehitḥabberkha. English “joined” can sound like a single decision; חבר (ḥ-b-r, joining or binding) also gives words for a companion and a connection. The verse makes that bond the hinge between the alliance and the work’s rupture.
ALSO GROWS
ḥaver: Companion, associate.
חָבֵר
The root links joining with companionship: an alliance is a bond that shapes a shared direction.
ḥibbur: Joining, connection.
חִבּוּר
This branch makes the attachment itself visible, the work is connected to the company Jehoshaphat chooses.
פָּרַץ
parats
GROWS FROM
פרץ
p-r-ts
To break through, burst forth, or make a breach.
“has broken” in this verse is parats. The root carries the image of a breach: something gives way where the work had been joined and directed. Its sense can also be to burst forth or spread, so the word holds both force and disruption.
ALSO GROWS
perets: Breach, rupture.
פֶּרֶץ
The breach names how the venture’s work is interrupted at its structure.
ufaratzta: You will spread out, break forth.
וּפָרַצְתָּ
This form shows the root’s force of expansion, giving the breach in this verse a sense of a decisive break in the work’s course.
וַיִּשָּׁבְרוּ
vayyishavru
GROWS FROM
שבר
sh-b-r
To break or shatter.
Here the ships are shattered, not merely delayed. שבר (sh-b-r, breaking or shattering) is also the root of the “broken heart” in Psalm 34:18, extending the image from a vessel to inward fracture.
ALSO GROWS
shever: Fracture, ruin.
שֶׁבֶר
This noun gives the ships’ breaking the weight of damage and ruin.
shavur: Broken, shattered.
שָׁבוּר
This form describes the state the ships are left in after the alliance’s work is broken.
THE PATTERN
The company a person binds themself to can shape whether their work reaches its intended end.
The one who walks with the wise becomes wise; the one who grazes beside the dull is broken.Do not wander; bad company rots good habits.THE THREAD
The LORD is near to those whose heart is broken, and delivers those crushed in breath.The ships’ breaking uses שבר (shabar, break or shatter), the same root used for the “broken heart” here. The shared word stretches from a vessel’s physical fracture to inward fracture, and Psalm 34:18 places the LORD near the broken heart.
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