What Does 2 Kings 6:23 Mean?
And he prepared a great feast for them, and when they had eaten and drunk, he sent them away, and they went to their master. So the bands of Syria came no more into the land of Israel.
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 prepared great provision for them: and when they had eaten and drunk, he sent them away, and they went to their master. So the bands of Syria came no more into the land of Israel.THE KEY
The captives are fed and released, and their release, not their destruction, is followed by the end of the raids.
THE MEANING
The danger before you is real, yet the enemy can receive food and drink and leave alive. Here, release follows provision, and the raids cease; the threat is neither denied nor answered with slaughter.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that safety requires destroying every enemy: these captives are fed, released, and followed by an end to the raids.
THE ROOT
וַיְשַׁלְּחֵם
wayĕšallĕḥēm
GROWS FROM
שׁלח
To send out, send forth, or release.
“sent them away” in this verse is wayĕšallĕḥēm. The verb for sending them away carries the sense of letting them go. Here that release follows a great meal, and the verse links their departure with the raids stopping: provision and release mark a change in the encounter.
ALSO GROWS
shilluaḥ: Sending away; dismissal.
שִׁלּוּחַ
This branch makes the departure sound like a letting-go, not simply a change of location; the captives return to their master alive.
mishloach: Sending forth; dispatch or extension.
מִשְׁלוֹחַ
The root can also describe something extended outward, making the verse’s sending a movement out from the captor’s reach.
THE PATTERN
Provision given to an enemy can interrupt the cycle of retaliation.
If the one who hates you hungers, feed him bread; and if he thirsts, give him water to drink.So if your enemy hungers, feed him. If he thirsts, give him drink, for by doing this you will heap coals of fire upon his head.THE THREAD
And they rose early in the morning, and swore to one another, and Isaac sent them away, and they went away from him in wholeness.The verb translated “sent them away” comes from שׁלח (shalach), the same send-and-release root used here. The preceding verse describes Isaac’s feast; then this shared root marks the departure in peace, linking provision and release across both encounters.
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