What Does 2 Chronicles 6:36 Mean?
If they miss the mark against you, for there is no human who does not miss the mark, and you are angry with them, and give them to the enemy, so that they take them captive to the land of the enemy, far or near;
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
If they sin against thee, (for there is no man which sinneth not,) and thou be angry with them, and deliver them over before their enemies, and they carry them away captives unto a land far off or near;THE KEY
By placing “there is no man which sinneth not” inside the warning of exile, the verse makes captivity a human possibility no reader can dismiss as someone else’s fate.
THE MEANING
You are inside the human condition the verse names: no one moves through life without missing the mark. It holds the consequence plainly, God’s anger, being placed before enemies, and being carried captive to a land either near or far. Displacement remains a real vulnerability, not a condition reserved for strangers.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that captivity marks only an unusually wicked person; the verse places the vulnerability within the shared human condition it names.
THE ROOT
יַחֶטְאוּ
yachate'u
GROWS FROM
חטא
chata
To miss, fail, or go wrong, the seed behind sin as a missing.
“miss the mark” in this verse is yachate'u. The verse uses this root for both “they sin” and “sinneth not.” The parenthesis extends the same condition to every human being, tying the possible exile to a shared human vulnerability.
ALSO GROWS
chet: Sin; a missing.
חֵטְא
It names the condition that the verb “sin” expresses here.
chatta't: Sin; an offering for the missing.
חַטָּאת
The same root names both the failure and an offering associated with it.
וּנְתַתָּם
unetattam
GROWS FROM
נתן
natan
To give, set, or place.
The phrase translated “deliver them over” carries the root natan, “give” or “place.” The verse names a painful transfer: they are placed before their enemies, who then take them captive.
ALSO GROWS
natan: To give, set, or place.
נָתַן
This verb supplies the root sense of placing them before their enemies.
mattanah: A gift; something given.
מַתָּנָה
It shows the same root in the ordinary act of giving, sharpening the force of the transfer described here.
וְשָׁבוּם
veshavum
GROWS FROM
שבה
shavah
To take captive.
“take them captive” in this verse is veshavum. The verse names the enemies’ action directly: they take the people captive. The root also gives the word for a captor, linking the act of capture to the one who carries it out.
ALSO GROWS
shavah: To take captive.
שָׁבָה
This is the action described in the verse.
shoveh: A captor; one who takes captive.
שֹׁבֵה
It names the person who performs the action, making the captors explicit in the sentence.
THE PATTERN
No human stands outside the possibility of missing the mark, and its consequences can reach the life and land a person inhabits.
For there is no aligned human upon the earth who does good and does not miss the mark.For all have missed the mark, and fall short of the weight of God.And the LORD will scatter you among all the peoples, from one edge of the earth to the other, and there you will serve other gods, which neither you nor your fathers have known, wood and stone.THE THREAD
If my people, upon whom my name is called, bend themselves low, and pray, and seek my face, and turn back from their harmful ways, then I will hear from the heavens, and I will release their falling short, and heal their land.“Their sin” here, חַטָּאת (chatta’t, sin or missing), comes from the same חטא (chata, miss) root as “sin” in 6:36. The passage then names turning, release, and healing of the land, opening a path beyond the captivity described here.
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