What Does 1 Kings 13:34 Mean in the King James?
And this thing became sin unto the house of Jeroboam, even to cut it off, and to destroy it from off the face of the earth.
The analysis reads the King James wording.
King James Version The King James Version, first published in 1611. Selah Verse shows the standard text.
THE KEY
The sharpest turn is that sin becomes something that belongs to an entire house, with severance as its stated end.
THE MEANING
A breach can take root in a household and reach beyond the act that begins it; this verse names that spread without softening its end. The same sentence moves from sin attached to the house to the house being cut off and destroyed.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The lie this undoes is that a destructive pattern stays private and has no reach beyond the original act.
THE ROOT
חַטָּאת
chatta't
GROWS FROM
חטא
chata
to miss, err, or fail to reach the mark
The word for sin grows from חטא (chata, to miss or err), carrying the sense of a deviation, not only a verdict. Here the miss is said to become attached to a whole house, and the next phrase gives that attachment an ending: severance.
ALSO GROWS
chata: to miss, err, or sin
חָטָא
The verb keeps the sense of an actual departure within the word translated as sin.
chet: a miss, offense, or sin
חֵטְא
The same root can name both the missing and the breach it creates, helping show how an act can become a condition.
וּלְהַכְרִיתוֹ
ulehakhritho
GROWS FROM
כרת
karat
to cut or sever
“cut it off” in this verse is ulehakhritho. The phrase uses the causative form of כרת (karat, to cut or sever): the house is not merely said to fade, but to be severed. This root also appears in covenant language and in a word for divorce, linking a physical cut with relational separation.
ALSO GROWS
karat: to cut; in כָּרַת בְּרִית (karat berit), to cut a covenant
כָּרַת
The same root can describe a binding relation, so its use here carries the force of severance.
keritut: severance; divorce
כְּרִיתוּת
This branch preserves the root’s sense of separation, showing the force behind “cut it off.”
THE PATTERN
A breach can become a settled condition, and its consequences can extend beyond the person or act where it begins.
Then when lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin: and sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death.Righteousness exalteth a nation: but sin is a reproach to any people.For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.THE THREAD
And this thing became a sin: for the people went to worship before the one, even unto Dan.The same Hebrew word חַטָּאת (chatta’t, sin or missing) appears in the phrase “this thing became a sin.” The wording attaches the miss first to the act, then to Jeroboam’s house, revealing the movement from act to consequence.
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