What Does Ezekiel 40:13 Mean?
Then he measured the gate from the roof of one chamber to the roof of another, twenty-five forearms wide, opening against opening.
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
He measured then the gate from the roof of one little chamber to the roof of another: the breadth was five and twenty cubits, door against door.THE KEY
The door is itself an opening, and its measure is completed by the opening it faces.
THE MEANING
You see the gate’s breadth measured from one chamber roof to another, with one opening facing another. Passage takes shape as a span of space, defined in relation to what stands across from it.
THE ROOT
רֹחַב
rōḥav
GROWS FROM
רחב
to be broad or spacious
The Hebrew word for breadth carries the sense of roominess as well as width. The measurement gives the passage a defined span of space.
ALSO GROWS
rāḥav: to become broad or spacious
רָחַב
The verb shares the root behind the gate’s breadth, linking its measured width with the quality of having room.
Reḥōvōt: broad places; room
רְחֹבוֹת
This is the name Rehoboth in Genesis 26:22, where the same root appears in the words “hath made room for us.”
פֶּתַח
petaḥ
GROWS FROM
פתח
to open; an opening
“opening against opening” in this verse is petaḥ. The word translated “door” also means an opening or entrance. The phrase “door against door” repeats that opening on the other side, making the passage a relation between two openings.
ALSO GROWS
pātaḥ: to open
פָּתַח
The verb makes the doorway’s nature visible: it is an opening through which passage can occur.
petaḥ: opening; doorway; entrance
פֶּתַח
In this verse, the same word names both the door and the opening it faces.
THE PATTERN
Openings become passages through measured space and relation to what they face.
Open to me the gates of alignment; I enter them, and I extend my hands to the LORD.I am the door. Through me, if anyone enters, he shall be delivered, and shall go in and out, and shall find pasture.THE THREAD
And he pulled up from there, and dug another well, and over that they did not strive. And he called the name of it Rehoboth, the wide places, and he said, For now the LORD has widened a place for us, and we shall bear fruit in the land.The Hebrew word for “breadth,” רֹחַב (rōḥav), shares its root with Rehoboth and “hath made room for us” here. The measured width of Ezekiel’s passage opens into the same root’s sense of room enough for fruitfulness.
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