What Does Ezekiel 20:2 Mean?
Then the word of the LORD came to me, saying,
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
Then came the word of the LORD unto me, saying,THE KEY
God’s word arrives as an event that becomes speech inside the person it reaches.
THE MEANING
God’s word reaches you as an event: it becomes present to you and takes shape in speech. Arrival and utterance belong together here; the word is already turned toward being heard.
THE ROOT
דְּבַר
devar
GROWS FROM
דבר
d-b-r
speak; utter
The verse places “the word” beside “saying,” so the address arrives already moving toward voice. The shared root lets the word be heard as an address in motion, not just content held at a distance.
ALSO GROWS
dābār: word; matter; thing
דָּבָר
The word can name both what is spoken and the matter at hand, giving the divine address the weight of an event.
dibbēr: he spoke
דִּבֶּר
This speaking form shows the same root in action: the word reaches Ezekiel oriented toward being voiced.
וַיְהִי
wayhi
GROWS FROM
היה
h-y-h
be; become; happen
The Hebrew form וַיְהִי (wayhi, “and it was” or “and it happened”) opens the sentence before the English verb “came.” Arrival is cast as an occurrence: the word becomes present to Ezekiel, then speaks.
ALSO GROWS
hāyāh: to be; become; happen
הָיָה
The root links the word’s arrival with its becoming present.
yihyeh: he will be; it will be
יִהְיֶה
This future form carries the same root of being into what is yet to come.
THE PATTERN
God’s word arrives as an address to a person, opening into speech.
After these things the word of the LORD came to Abram in a vision, saying, Do not fear, Abram. I am your shield, and your very great wages.Then the word of the LORD came to me, saying,While Annas and Caiaphas were the chief priests, the word of God came upon John, the son of Zacharias, in the wilderness.THE THREAD
And he bent you low, and made you hunger, and fed you with manna, which you had never perceived, nor had your fathers, so that he might make you perceive that humankind does not live by bread alone, but by every word that goes out from the mouth of the LORD does humankind live.Deuteronomy uses the same Hebrew word, דָּבָר (dābār, “word”), and says life is sustained by what proceeds from the LORD’s mouth. Ezekiel’s verse shows that word arriving at a person; together they reveal speech as something that reaches and sustains.
Read the SDV Bible.
Every verse has a Deep Dive in the app.
The iPhone Bible app with the Selah Decoded Version.
Does something in this reading look wrong? Tell us