What Does 2 Chronicles 4:5 Mean?
And its thickness was a handbreadth, and its lip was wrought like the lip of a cup, with blossoms of lilies; it received and held three thousand baths.
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 the thickness of it was an handbreadth, and the brim of it like the work of the brim of a cup, with flowers of lilies; and it received and held three thousand baths.THE KEY
The basin’s “brim” is literally its “lip”, the same Hebrew word used for human lips and language, so even a vessel’s boundary is named as an opening.
THE MEANING
The verse gives this vessel an exact form: a wall one handbreadth thick, a lip shaped like a cup’s, lily-work, and room for three thousand baths. Its edge is carefully made, and its capacity is part of its design.
THE ROOT
וּשְׂפָתוֹ
u-sefato
GROWS FROM
שפה
s-f-h
lip; by extension, an edge or language
Hebrew calls the basin’s brim a “lip,” using the same word for the edge of a mouth and for language. One word holds together a vessel’s opening, the human mouth’s edge, and speech.
ALSO GROWS
saphah: lip
שָׂפָה
The basin’s brim is called a lip, just as the edge of a mouth is.
saphah: language
שָׂפָה
The same word can name language, linking a physical lip with the speech formed there.
sefat hayam: seashore, literally “lip of the sea”
שְׂפַת הַיָּם
The word also names the edge of a body of water, like the basin’s rim.
יָכִיל
yakhil
GROWS FROM
יכל
y-k-l
be able; have capacity
The Hebrew uses one capacity verb, yakhil, “can contain,” where the KJV says “received and held.” The measure is presented as what the basin is able to hold.
ALSO GROWS
yakhol: to be able
יָכֹל
The shared root frames holding as a matter of capacity.
yukhal: he or it can
יוּכַל
This form expresses ability, the same idea behind the basin’s stated capacity.
THE PATTERN
A vessel is defined by both the form of its opening and the amount it can hold.
And it came to pass, when the vessels were full, that she said to her son, Bring me yet another vessel. And he said to her, There is not one more vessel. And the oil stood.Jesus said to them, Fill the waterpots with water. And they filled them to the brim.If anyone therefore cleanses himself out of these, he will be a vessel for honor, set apart, good for the master's use, prepared for every good work.THE THREAD
The lips of the aligned shepherd many; but fools die for lack of heart.“Lips” here translates the same Hebrew word, שָׂפָה (saphah), used for the basin’s brim. In this verse, lips become a source that feeds many; the shared word connects the vessel’s opening with the mouth’s capacity to give.
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