What Does Exodus 39:19 Mean?

And they made two rings of gold, and set them on the two ends of the breastplate, upon its lip, which was on the side of the ephod, inward.

Exodus 39:19 · SDV

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.

This verse in the King James

King James wording

King James Version

And they made two rings of gold, and put them on the two ends of the breastplate, upon the border of it, which was on the side of the ephod inward.

THE KEY

The breastplate’s “border” is its “lip”, the same Hebrew word that names both a mouth’s edge and a language.

THE MEANING

What is worn close is held by points of fastening, not closeness alone. The breastplate’s two edges meet the ephod behind it through paired rings. Its boundary is also where it connects to what carries it.

THE ROOT

שְׂפָתוֹ

sephato

GROWS FROM

שפה

Lip; by extension, edge or boundary; also language.

The word translated “border” is ⁨שָׂפָה⁩ (safah, lip or edge), which also means language. The rings sit at this lip, the boundary where the breastplate meets the garment behind it.

ALSO GROWS

safah: Lip

שָׂפָה

The verse names the breastplate’s edge with the word for the edge of a mouth.

safah: Language

שָׂפָה

The same word names shared speech, linking an object’s boundary with a place where expression passes outward.

THE PATTERN

A thing is sustained when it remains joined to the structure that bears it.

And Aaron will carry the names of the children of Israel on the breastpiece of ruling, upon his heart, when he goes into the set-apart place, for a remembrance before the LORD continually.

Exodus 28:29 · SDVThe breastplate carries the names close to the heart while remaining part of what the wearer bears.

Remain in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it stays in the vine, so neither can you unless you remain in me.

John 15:4 · SDVA branch bears fruit through its continuing connection to the vine that supports it.

from whom the whole body, joined together and knit by every joint that supplies, according to the working in the measure of each part, makes the growth of the body for the building up of itself in love.

Ephesians 4:16 · SDVThe body grows as its parts remain joined and each connection supplies what the whole needs.

THE THREAD

And the whole earth had one lip, and one set of words.

Genesis 11:1 · SDV

The Hebrew word rendered “border” here is the same word rendered “language” in Genesis 11:1. There, one lip means shared speech; here, the breastplate’s lip is where its rings meet the garment behind it.

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