What Does 2 Kings 16:14 Mean?
And the bronze altar, which was before the LORD, he also brought from the face of the house, from between the altar and the house of the LORD, and set it on the north side of his altar.
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 he brought also the brasen altar, which was before the LORD, from the forefront of the house, from between the altar and the house of the LORD, and put it on the north side of the altar.THE KEY
The altar remains in the house, but the king moves it from the place “before the LORD”, the change is in its position, not its survival.
THE MEANING
You can see that a sacred object may remain in the house while its place before the LORD changes. The altar is removed from the front and set beside another altar; its continued presence does not restore its former position.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
If the altar remains in the temple, it still occupies its proper place before the LORD.
THE ROOT
הֵסִיר
hēsîr remove or
GROWS FROM
סור
sûr: to turn aside or depart; in this form, to cause to turn aside or remove.
“brought ... from” in this verse is hēsîr remove or. The root holds turning aside and removal together. Here the altar remains in the temple, but what defined its position, being before the LORD, is turned aside.
ALSO GROWS
sûr: turn aside; depart
סוּר
This root’s sense of turning aside illuminates the altar’s movement from its former place.
hēsîr: remove; take away
הֵסִיר
This is the form used here: the altar is taken from one position, though it is not destroyed.
וַיַּנַּח
wayyannaḥ and he
GROWS FROM
נוח
nûaḥ: to rest or settle; in this form, to cause something to rest or settle.
“put it” in this verse is wayyannaḥ and he. The movement ends with a settling: the altar is removed from one position, then set down in another. Its new placement makes the displacement visible.
ALSO GROWS
nûaḥ: rest; settle
נוּחַ
The root brings the idea of settling into the act of placing the altar.
menûḥāh: rest; resting place
מְנוּחָה
This related word makes the destination matter: where something is set down shapes its place.
THE PATTERN
When people rearrange worship around their own designs, sacred space can retain its forms while its orientation or function changes.
And he made a house of high places, and made priests from the edges of the people, who were not of the sons of Levi.And he brought me into the inner court of the house of the LORD, and behold, at the opening of the temple of the LORD, between the porch and the altar, were about twenty-five men, with their backs toward the temple of the LORD and their faces toward the sunrise, and they bowed down to the sun toward the sunrise.And Jesus went into the temple of God, and threw out all who sold and bought in the temple, and turned over the tables of the moneychangers, and the seats of those who sold doves.THE THREAD
Then Jacob said to his household, and to all who were with him, Turn aside the foreign gods that are among you, and cleanse yourselves, and change your garments.“Put away” uses the same Hebrew root, סור (sûr), to turn aside or remove, as the altar’s removal here. The root names the act itself; what is being removed and where it is moved determines whether the act clears a space or displaces what stood there.
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