What Does 2 Chronicles 3:13 Mean?
The wings of these cherubim spread twenty forearms; and they stood on their feet, and their faces were inward.
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
The wings of these cherubims spread themselves forth twenty cubits: and they stood on their feet, and their faces were inward.THE KEY
The cherubim’s wings span the full twenty cubits, but their feet stay planted and their faces point toward the house, their reach is directed, not escape.
THE MEANING
The wings fill the span while the figures remain standing, facing toward the house. The verse holds great reach together with stillness and inward orientation: what extends across the space remains turned toward the dwelling.
THE ROOT
כַּנְפֵי
kanfei
GROWS FROM
כנף
Wing; also the outer edge or extremity of something.
The word for wings also names edges and extremities, so the image carries more than the idea of flight: it is about reach across the room. The full span makes the cherubim’s wings a covering-like boundary around the house.
ALSO GROWS
kanaf: A wing, the part that extends outward.
כָּנָף
This is the singular form behind the verse’s wings, foregrounding their extended reach.
kanfot: Outer edges or corners, as in “the four corners of the earth.”
כַּנְפוֹת
The same word family can name a far edge, widening the image from flight to the reach of a covering across the space.
פְּרֻשִׂים
perusim
GROWS FROM
פרשׂ
To spread out or stretch across a space.
The wings are described as spread across a measured twenty cubits. Beside the figures standing on their feet, the word presents extension over a place, not movement away from it.
ALSO GROWS
perusim: Extended across an area; the form used for the wings here.
פְּרֻשִׂים
It makes the wings’ breadth the focus of the verse.
paras: To extend outward, as when hands are stretched out.
פָּרַשׂ
The same root can describe a deliberate reach, which echoes the cherubim’s full, fixed span.
פְּנֵיהֶם
penehem
GROWS FROM
פנה
To turn, face, or direct toward.
The Hebrew says their faces are לַבָּיִת (la-bayit, toward the house); “inward” condenses that direction. Their posture is not only still but oriented toward the dwelling.
ALSO GROWS
panim: The face, or the presence turned toward another.
פָּנִים
The faces give the figures a clear orientation within the space.
panah: To turn or direct oneself toward something.
פָּנָה
This root brings out the direction held by “their faces were inward.”
THE PATTERN
A wing’s full reach is directed toward the place it covers.
The wings of these cherubim spread twenty forearms; and they stood on their feet, and their faces were inward.And the cherubim spread their wings upward, shading the covering with their wings, each face turned toward its brother; toward the covering the faces of the cherubim look.O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you, how often I wanted to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you would not!THE THREAD
And the cherubim spread their wings upward, shading the covering with their wings, each face turned toward its brother; toward the covering the faces of the cherubim look.Exodus uses the same roots for כָּנָף (kanaf, wing) and פָּרַשׂ (paras, spread out), then names what the wings cover: the mercy seat. Its faces point toward that place, making reach and orientation part of one image.
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