What Does 2 Chronicles 28:7 Mean in the King James?
And Zichri, a mighty man of Ephraim, slew Maaseiah the king’s son, and Azrikam the governor of the house, and Elkanah that was next to the king.
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
“Next to the king” means the king’s second in rank: the killing reaches inheritance, administration, and the throne’s deputy.
THE MEANING
The verse names three targets: the king’s son, the governor of the house, and the king’s second in rank. The violence reaches succession, administration, and the person nearest the throne in one stroke. Zichri is named as a man of strength, and the names keep each death particular.
THE ROOT
מִשְׁנֶה
mishneh
GROWS FROM
שׁנה
Repeat or do again; the root also gives the sense of second or double.
The Hebrew calls Elkanah the king’s mishneh, his second or deputy. “Next to” can sound like physical closeness in English, while the Hebrew points to rank within the royal order.
ALSO GROWS
mishneh: Second; deputy or one next in rank.
מִשְׁנֶה
This is the word used for Elkanah, making his place in the court explicit.
sheni: Second, as an ordinal.
שֵׁנִי
It shares the root’s sense of what comes second, clarifying the rank carried by “next to the king.”
גִּבּוֹר
gibbor
GROWS FROM
גבר
Be strong or prevail.
“mighty man” in this verse is gibbor. The verse identifies Zichri with a word rooted in strength and prevailing. The sentence then names how that force is used: he kills three people at the center of the kingdom’s order.
ALSO GROWS
gabar: Prevail or grow strong.
גָּבַר
It reveals the force contained in the description of Zichri as mighty.
gevurah: Strength or might.
גְּבוּרָה
This branch carries the same seed of strength, showing that “mighty” names capacity rather than the act itself.
זִכְרִי
Zikri
GROWS FROM
זכר
Remember or call to mind; the name can mean “my remembrance.”
Zichri’s name carries the root of remembrance. The verse preserves the killing through names: the killer and each of the three people killed remain distinct in the telling.
ALSO GROWS
zakar: Remember or recall.
זָכַר
This is the verb at the root of Zichri’s name.
zikaron: Remembrance or memorial.
זִכָּרוֹן
It shows how the same root can name an act of remembering as well as a person whose name carries remembrance.
THE PATTERN
A killing at the center of power or service reaches beyond one life into the order that person helps carry.
And the king said to Doeg, Turn thou, and fall upon the priests. And Doeg the Edomite turned, and he fell upon the priests, and slew on that day fourscore and five persons that did wear a linen ephod.For when they came into the house, he lay on his bed in his bedchamber, and they smote him, and slew him, and beheaded him, and took his head, and gat them away through the plain all night.Now about that time Herod the king stretched forth his hands to vex certain of the church. And he killed James the brother of John with the sword.THE THREAD
For Pekah the son of Remaliah slew in Judah an hundred and twenty thousand in one day, which were all valiant men; because they had forsaken the LORD God of their fathers.The verb translated “slew” shares the Hebrew root הרג (harag), meaning to kill or slay, with the killing in this verse. The same root moves from a count of 120,000 dead to three named people at the center of rule.
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