What Does 2 Samuel 2:25 Mean?
And the sons of Benjamin gathered behind Abner, and became one bundle, and stood on the head of the hill.
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 the children of Benjamin gathered themselves together after Abner, and became one troop, and stood on the top of an hill.THE KEY
The word translated “troop” means a bound bundle: the Benjaminites become one by being held together under Abner.
THE MEANING
People gathered behind one leader can become a single force, sharing a place to stand and a common direction. This unity has a hard edge: a people can become one for conflict as readily as for peace.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
Unity is not automatically peaceable; people can become one in order to stand for conflict.
THE ROOT
אֲגֻדָּה
ʾaguddāh
GROWS FROM
אגד
ʾ-g-d
to bind or tie together
“one bundle” in this verse is ʾaguddāh. English “troop” names the military unit, while the Hebrew word also carries the image of a band or bundle held together. The Benjaminites are described not merely as many followers but as one bound company behind Abner, standing together on one hill.
ALSO GROWS
ʾaguddāh: a band, bundle, or company
אֲגֻדָּה
This is the word used for the troop here; Exodus 12:22 uses it for a bunch of hyssop, a bundle gathered as one.
ʾaguddōt: bands or bonds
אֲגֻדּוֹת
Isaiah 58:6 uses this plural for bands of a yoke; the same binding can hold a group together or keep someone under a burden.
THE PATTERN
A people becomes a shared force when many are gathered into one body.
So all the men of Israel were gathered against the city, bound together as one man.And the LORD said, Look, they are one people, and they have all one lip; and this is what they begin to do. And now nothing they have devised to do will be walled off from them.That they all may be one; as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be one in us; that the world may lean its full weight on the fact that you sent me.THE THREAD
And you will take a bundle of hyssop, and immerse it in the blood that is in the basin; and you will strike the lintel and the two doorposts with the blood that is in the basin, and none of you will go out from the opening of his house until the morning.“Bunch” is אֲגֻדַּת (ʾaguddat, a bundle), the same word-family as אֲגֻדָּה (ʾaguddāh, a band or troop) in this verse. In Exodus, separate stems are held together as one bundle; here, people gather into one company behind Abner.
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