What Does 2 Kings 12:7 Mean?
Then King Jehoash called for Jehoiada the priest and the other priests, and said to them, Why are you not strengthening the broken places of the house? Now then, do not take silver from those who recognize you, but set it toward the broken places of the house.
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 king Jehoash called for Jehoiada the priest, and the other priests, and said unto them, Why repair ye not the breaches of the house? now therefore receive no more money of your acquaintance, but deliver it for the breaches of the house.THE KEY
The verse does not ask why the house is not honored; it asks why its breaches are not being strengthened, then directs the money straight to them.
THE MEANING
The damage is named plainly: the house has breaches, and the priests are not strengthening them. Its money is redirected toward those damaged places, making care visible in where the resources go. The verse speaks now wherever something called cared-for still has breaks left unattended.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
Reverence for a house is not the same as maintaining it; an unrepaired breach remains.
THE ROOT
תְחַזְּקוּ
teḥazzeqū
GROWS FROM
חזק
Be strong, grow firm, strengthen, or hold fast.
The verb translated “repair” carries the sense of strengthening. The verse frames the work as making the house firm where it has broken open.
ALSO GROWS
ḥāzāq: Strong, firm.
חָזָק
The related adjective makes clear that repair aims at firmness, not just appearance.
ḥizzēq: Strengthen, make firm.
חִזֵּק
This related verb gives the action behind the question: the breaches need strengthening.
בֶּדֶק
bedeq
GROWS FROM
בדק
Examine, inspect, or test.
“broken places” in this verse is bedeq. The noun בֶּדֶק names a breach or damaged place needing repair, while its Hebrew word family carries the sense of inspection. English gives the gap a static name; the Hebrew also draws attention to the need to examine what is damaged.
ALSO GROWS
bādaq: Examine, inspect.
בָּדַק
This verb in the same word family brings attention to looking closely at what has failed.
bedeq: A breach, or the repair of a breach.
בֶּדֶק
The noun names both the damaged place at issue and the work directed toward it.
תִּתְּנֵם
tittenēm
GROWS FROM
נתן
Give, set, or place.
“set it toward” in this verse is tittenēm. The verb is built on the root for giving or setting something in place. Its destination is explicit: the money is given for the breaches, so the transfer is tied to repair.
ALSO GROWS
nātan: Give, set, place.
נָתַן
This is the root verb beneath the instruction to direct the money to the damaged places.
mattānāh: Gift.
מַתָּנָה
This related noun shows another form of giving from the same root.
THE PATTERN
Repair becomes real when work and provision reach the places where a structure is broken.
Those who come from you shall build the dry ruins of the ages. You shall raise up the foundations of generation to generation, and you shall be called the mender of the breach, the one who turns the paths back to dwell in.So we built the wall, and all the wall was tied together to half of it, for the people had heart to work.from whom the whole body, joined together and knit by every joint that supplies, according to the working in the measure of each part, makes the growth of the body for the building up of itself in love.THE THREAD
And let them give it into the hand of the doers of the work who are set over the house of the LORD, and let them place it with the doers of the work who are in the house of the LORD, to strengthen the broken places of the house,The Hebrew word בֶּדֶק (bedeq), rendered “breaches,” appears here too, tying the damaged place to the work of repair. The verse directs the money to the workers so that the house’s breaches can be strengthened.
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