What Does 2 Kings 17:35 Mean?
With whom the LORD had made a covenant, and charged them, saying, You shall not fear other gods, nor bow down to them, nor serve them, nor slaughter to them.
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
With whom the LORD had made a covenant, and charged them, saying, Ye shall not fear other gods, nor bow yourselves to them, nor serve them, nor sacrifice to them:THE KEY
The covenant’s boundary runs through the whole of allegiance: fear, bowing, service, and sacrifice all belong to one object.
THE MEANING
Here, allegiance takes shape through fear, bodily posture, labor, and what is offered; these are parts of one orientation. The verse speaks wherever rival powers claim that same allegiance.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The lie this dissolves is that devotion is only inward: the verse includes posture, labor, and what is offered.
THE ROOT
וַיִּכְרֹת בְּרִית
vayyikrot berit
GROWS FROM
כרת
cut, sever
“made a covenant” in this verse is vayyikrot berit. The Hebrew says the LORD “cut a covenant.” That concrete verb makes the covenant’s boundary tangible: this allegiance is enacted, not merely held as an idea.
ALSO GROWS
hikhrit: cut off, sever
הִכְרִית
The same root carries the sense of cutting away, echoing the verse’s exclusion of rival claims.
keritut: severance
כְּרִיתוּת
This related word preserves the root’s language of separation and makes the covenant’s boundary easier to hear.
תַעַבְדוּם
ta'avdum
GROWS FROM
עבד
work, serve
The word translated “serve” belongs to the same family as ordinary work and the status of a servant. The prohibition reaches beyond ritual: it concerns what receives a person’s labor and obedience.
ALSO GROWS
ʿeved: servant, worker
עֶבֶד
This branch brings the relationship of service into view: the one served can claim the worker’s allegiance.
ʿavodah: work, service
עֲבוֹדָה
The shared root joins sacred service to labor, so the verse’s boundary reaches daily work as well as ceremony.
תִזְבְּחוּ
tizbechu
GROWS FROM
זבח
slaughter, sacrifice
“slaughter to them” in this verse is tizbechu. The Hebrew verb retains the concrete act of slaughter within “sacrifice.” Its root also appears in the word for altar, showing that the offering is a physical act directed toward a particular object of allegiance.
ALSO GROWS
zevach: sacrifice
זֶבַח
The noun names the offering made through the act expressed by the verse’s verb.
mizbeach: altar
מִזְבֵּחַ
The altar shares the root and makes the destination of sacrifice visible.
THE PATTERN
Allegiance becomes visible in whom a person fears, bows to, serves, and honors with offerings.
You shall have no other gods before my face.Now therefore stand in awe of the LORD, and serve him in wholeness and in truth. Turn aside the gods your fathers served beyond the river and in Egypt, and serve the LORD.Then Jesus said to him, Go away, Adversary, for it is written, You shall bow down to the LORD your God, and serve him alone.THE THREAD
Stand in awe of the LORD your God; him you serve, and to him you cling, and by his nature you swear.The Hebrew roots for “fear” (ירא, yare) and “serve” (עבד, avad) appear in both verses. Deuteronomy directs those acts toward the LORD; 2 Kings names them among the acts withheld from other gods.
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