What Does Deuteronomy 13:16 Mean?
And you shall gather all the spoil of it into the midst of its wide place, and shall burn the city with fire, and all its spoil whole, for the LORD your God; and it shall be a mound for the ages; it shall not be built again.
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 thou shalt gather all the spoil of it into the midst of the street thereof, and shalt burn with fire the city, and all the spoil thereof every whit, for the LORD thy God: and it shall be an heap for ever; it shall not be built again.THE KEY
The verse turns the city’s entire plunder into fuel and its place into a ruin expressly barred from rising again.
THE MEANING
The verse’s scene is uncompromising: the city’s plunder is gathered into its broad public square and burned for the LORD, while the city remains a heap for the ages and is not rebuilt. What remains is neither a usable prize nor a temporary ruin, but a place whose destruction the verse makes enduring.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the assumption that every ruin is only a pause before rebuilding: here, the city is explicitly barred from being built again.
THE ROOT
עוֹלָם
ʿolam
GROWS FROM
ע־ל־ם
ʿ-l-m
An age or span of ages; the related verb means to be hidden or concealed.
“for the ages” in this verse is ʿolam. עוֹלָם (ʿolam) names an age or ages, the word rendered “for ever” here. Its consonants also appear in עָלַם (ʿālam), “to be hidden,” evoking a span whose far horizon is out of sight without requiring the word to mean endless time.
ALSO GROWS
olamim: Ages or long spans of time
עוֹלָמִים
This plural form makes clear the word’s association with ages, the duration assigned to the heap.
neʿlam: Hidden or concealed
נֶעְלָם
This form shares the root consonants and echoes the unseen horizon carried by an age.
רְחֹבָהּ
rechovah
GROWS FROM
ר־ח־ב
r-ḥ-b
To be wide or broad; to open out.
“wide place” in this verse is rechovah. The word translated “street” is the city’s broad, open place, from the root רָחַב (rachav), “to be wide.” The plunder is gathered there before the fire, making the city’s open square the public stage of its destruction.
ALSO GROWS
rachav: To become wide or broad
רָחַב
The verb exposes the width beneath the word translated “street.”
merchav: A broad or open place
מֶרְחָב
This noun from the same root reinforces that the setting is an open space, not merely a road.
וְשָׂרַפְתָּ
wesarafta
GROWS FROM
ש־ר־ף
ś-r-p
To burn or consume by fire.
“burn” in this verse is wesarafta. The fire consumes both the city and its gathered plunder; it leaves no usable wealth to carry forward. The root also names burning itself and a “fiery serpent,” keeping the image of consuming heat concrete.
ALSO GROWS
serephah: A burning or conflagration
שְׂרֵפָה
This noun makes the consuming act of the verse explicit in another form of the root.
saraph: A fiery serpent
שָׂרָף
This branch carries the root’s burning force in the name of a fiery creature.
THE PATTERN
Scriptural judgment scenes can mark a city’s end by turning its place into a lasting sign that its former life does not resume.
And Joshua burned Ai, and made it a mound for the ages, a waste to this day.Therefore, look, the days are coming, says the LORD, when I will sound the war-shout against Rabbah of the children of Ammon. It shall become an emptied heap, and her daughters shall be burned with fire. Then Israel shall take hold of those who took hold of him, says the LORD.And a strong messenger lifts a stone like a great millstone, and throws it into the sea, saying, With a rush shall Babylon the great city be thrown down, and shall never be found again.THE THREAD
And Joshua burned Ai, and made it a mound for the ages, a waste to this day.Joshua 8:28 uses the same Hebrew phrase, תֵּל עוֹלָם (tel ʿolam), “a heap for the ages,” for Ai. That shared phrase makes the heap a recurring image of enduring ruin; Deuteronomy adds the explicit statement that the city is not built again.
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