What Does Jeremiah 34:18 Mean?
And I will give the men who have crossed over my covenant, who did not make the words of the covenant stand that they cut before me, when they cut the calf in two and passed between its pieces.
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 I will give the men that have transgressed my covenant, which have not performed the words of the covenant which they had made before me, when they cut the calf in twain, and passed between the parts thereof,THE KEY
The verse uses the same verb for violating the covenant and passing between the calf’s severed halves, making the breach part of the oath’s own enactment.
THE MEANING
The verse holds broken words beside the visible sign of the oath: the men cross the covenant they enacted, and God gives them over to its consequence. The cut calf makes the promise’s weight visible even as its words go unperformed.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that breaking the words erases the oath’s weight and consequence.
THE ROOT
הָעֹבְרִים
ha'ovrim
GROWS FROM
עבר
ʿ-b-r
Cross over, pass through.
“crossed over my covenant” in this verse is ha'ovrim. The verse uses this root first for the men who transgress the covenant and again for their passage between the calf’s parts. The same crossing names both the breach and the oath’s enacted sign.
ALSO GROWS
ha'ovrim: Those who cross over or transgress.
הָעֹבְרִים
This is the verse’s word for the men who violate the covenant.
vayya'avru: And they passed over or through.
וַיַּעַבְרוּ
This names the men’s passage between the calf’s parts, repeating the root used for their transgression.
כָּרְתוּ
karatu
GROWS FROM
כרת
k-r-t
Cut, sever.
“cut” in this verse is karatu. The Hebrew uses the same verb for making the covenant and cutting the calf in two. The covenant’s words and the divided animal are joined by the act of cutting, giving the oath a visible form.
ALSO GROWS
karatu: They cut; in the covenant phrase, they made a covenant.
כָּרְתוּ
The same form describes the covenant they made and the calf they divided.
hikrit: He cut off or severed.
הִכְרִית
This branch keeps the root’s force of separation visible in the calf cut into parts.
THE PATTERN
A covenant’s words take visible form in an enacted sign that also carries the covenant’s consequence.
When the sun had gone down and it was dark, behold, a smoking oven and a torch of fire passed between these split pieces.And Moses took the blood, and sprinkled it on the people, and said, Behold the blood of the covenant, which the LORD has cut with you concerning all these words.Likewise also the cup after the meal, saying, This cup is the new covenant in my blood, poured out for you.THE THREAD
When the sun had gone down and it was dark, behold, a smoking oven and a torch of fire passed between these split pieces.Genesis uses the root עבר for the lamp’s passing between the divided pieces; Jeremiah uses it for both transgressing the covenant and passing between the calf’s halves. The repeated verb joins crossing the covenant boundary to the passage that enacts the oath.
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