What Does Exodus 37:20 Mean?
And on the lampstand were four cups shaped like almonds, its knobs, and its blossoms.
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 in the candlestick were four bowls made like almonds, his knops, and his flowers:THE KEY
The almond-shaped bowls make the lampstand’s light carry the language of watchfulness and flowering life.
THE MEANING
The lampstand’s bowls take the shape of almonds among its buds and flowers. The Hebrew word-link between almond and watching holds wakefulness and flowering together in the image of its light.
THE ROOT
מְשֻׁקָּדִים
meshukkadim
GROWS FROM
שקד
To watch or remain alert; the related noun shaqed means almond.
The word translated “made like almonds” comes from שקד, the same consonants in shaqed (almond) and shaqad (to watch). Jeremiah places the almond tree beside the LORD’s declaration that he is watching over his word, so the lampstand’s flowering form carries an echo of watchfulness within its light.
ALSO GROWS
shaqed: Almond or almond tree.
שָׁקֵד
The bowls are shaped like almonds, making this word’s image part of the lampstand’s form.
shoqed: Watching, keeping watch.
שֹׁקֵד
In Jeremiah 1:12, this form shares the root with “almond” in the preceding verse, joining the almond image to watchfulness.
THE PATTERN
Scripture uses the almond’s shape and name to link watchfulness with life visibly coming into bloom.
Three cups shaped like almonds on one stalk, with a knob and a blossom; and three cups shaped like almonds on the other stalk, with a knob and a blossom; so for the six stalks that come forth from the lampstand.And it came to pass that on the morrow Moses went into the tent of witness, and behold, the staff of Aaron for the house of Levi had burst forth, and brought out buds, and bloomed blossoms, and ripened almonds.And the word of the LORD came to me, saying, Jeremiah, what do you see? And I said, I see a rod of the watching almond.THE THREAD
And the LORD said to me, You have seen well, for I keep watch over my word to do it.The Hebrew repeats שקד: the almond in verse 11 is shaqed, and verse 12 uses shoqed, “watching,” rendered “hasten” in the KJV. That shared root gives the almond form here an echo of watchfulness that the English alone does not reveal.
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