What Does 2 Chronicles 24:26 Mean?
And these are the ones who bound together against him, Zabad son of Shimeath, an Ammonite woman, and Jehozabad son of Shimrith, a Moabite woman.
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 these are they that conspired against him; Zabad the son of Shimeath an Ammonitess, and Jehozabad the son of Shimrith a Moabitess.THE KEY
A conspiracy is a bond turned against a person, and this verse makes that bond answer to names.
THE MEANING
A hidden agreement becomes concrete when people bind themselves to act against someone. The names here carry the language of bestowal and guarding, while the verse names a bond of opposition. The line holds those meanings beside what the people do.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that shared wrongdoing makes responsibility anonymous: the verse names each person within the bond.
THE ROOT
הַמִּתְקַשְּׁרִים
hammitqashrim
GROWS FROM
קשר
Q-Sh-R
To bind, tie, or join; the verb can also mean to conspire.
“bound together” in this verse is hammitqashrim. “Conspired” comes from a root with the physical sense of binding or tying together. The hidden image is people fastening themselves to a shared act, like a knot turned against someone.
ALSO GROWS
qashar: To tie or bind.
קָשַׁר
The same verb describes fastening something in place, so the plot carries the image of people binding themselves together.
qesher: A conspiracy or league.
קֶשֶׁר
This noun names the plot as a bond; the English word hides that image of people joined into one act.
יְהוֹזָבָד
Yehōzāḇāḏ
GROWS FROM
זבד
Z-B-D
To bestow or endow.
Jehozabad carries the sense “YHWH has bestowed.” The verse places this language of bestowal beside the conspiratorial bond, letting a name hold meaning beyond a label.
ALSO GROWS
Zabad: Bestowed; a gift.
זָבָד
The other conspirator’s name belongs to the same bestowal word family.
zebed: A gift or endowment.
זֶבֶד
This noun shows the concrete sense behind the names: something given or bestowed.
שִׁמְרִית
Shimrith
GROWS FROM
שמר
Sh-M-R
To keep, watch, or guard.
Shimrith carries the language of guarding. Set beside the verse’s word for conspiracy, the name creates a tension between keeping and binding together against someone.
ALSO GROWS
shomer: A keeper or guardian.
שֹׁמֵר
This form shares the name’s guarding root and makes its protective sense audible.
mishmeret: A watch, charge, or duty of keeping.
מִשְׁמֶרֶת
This branch extends guarding into an entrusted responsibility, a meaning that sits sharply beside the conspiracy named here.
THE PATTERN
Conspiracy binds people into a shared act directed against another person.
And Absalom sent for Ahithophel the Gilonite, David's counselor, from his city, even from Giloh, while he slaughtered sacrifices. And the bond took hold, for the people kept walking and growing with Absalom.And Hoshea son of Elah bound together against Pekah son of Remaliah, and struck him, and killed him, and reigned in his place, in the twentieth year of Jotham son of Uzziah.And consulted that they might seize Jesus by deceit, and kill him.THE THREAD
And Absalom sent for Ahithophel the Gilonite, David's counselor, from his city, even from Giloh, while he slaughtered sacrifices. And the bond took hold, for the people kept walking and growing with Absalom.Both verses draw on קשר (qashar, bind or tie): here as הַמִּתְקַשְּׁרִים (hammitqashrim, those conspiring), there as קֶשֶׁר (qesher, conspiracy). The thread opens the image further: the bond gains strength as people join it.
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