What Does 2 Chronicles 26:12 Mean in the King James?
The whole number of the chief of the fathers of the mighty men of valour were two thousand and six hundred.
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 verse counts the leaders over the mighty men, showing valor as a shared, organized capacity rather than a lone hero’s trait.
THE MEANING
Strength takes visible form in 2,600 heads of ancestral households who stand over the mighty men they organize. The count holds power together with leadership and continuity; it is a community’s capacity made legible.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The verse loosens the belief that real strength belongs only to exceptional individuals: it records might through clan leadership and shared lineage.
THE ROOT
חַיִל
chayil
GROWS FROM
ח־י־ל
ḥ-y-l
Force, capacity, or resources.
The word translated “valour” can also name an army or host, resources, and a capable person. Its range gives the verse’s strength a sense of usable, organized capacity, not only individual courage.
ALSO GROWS
chayil: An organized force or company.
חַיִל
The same word can name a gathered force, linking individual valor with collective strength.
chayil: Possessions or resources a person or community can command.
חַיִל
Strength also carries the sense of capacity a community can marshal and sustain.
eshet chayil: A capable or valiant woman.
אֵשֶׁת חַיִל
The same word describes a woman’s capability, widening valor beyond the image of a male warrior.
THE PATTERN
Strength takes form through people whose distinct roles contribute to a shared whole.
Moreover thou shalt provide out of all the people able men, such as fear God, men of truth, hating covetousness; and place such over them, to be rulers of thousands, and rulers of hundreds, rulers of fifties, and rulers of tens:Two are better than one; because they have a good reward for their labour.For the body is not one member, but many.THE THREAD
Who can find a virtuous woman? for her price is far above rubies.The word translated “virtuous” there is חַיִל (chayil), the same word rendered “valour” here. The shared word describes capacity in both a company of mighty men and a woman, opening valor beyond the English picture of warriors alone.
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