What Does 2 Chronicles 32:1 Mean in the King James?
After these things, and the establishment thereof, Sennacherib king of Assyria came, and entered into Judah, and encamped against the fenced cities, and thought to win them for himself.
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 word rendered “win” means “break them open,” so the verse describes conquest as a breach aimed at possession.
THE MEANING
You can stand amid what is established and still face a force gathering against its boundaries. The verse names the threat plainly: a king camps against fortified cities, intending to break in and take them for himself.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The belief that being established or well-defended makes you untouchable. The verse holds firmness and vulnerability together: fortified cities can still be targeted for a breach.
THE ROOT
לְבִקְעָם
ləviqʿām
GROWS FROM
בקע
b-q-ʿ
Split, cleave, break open.
The verb behind “win” means to break the cities open, so the king’s intention is a breach ending in possession. The same root describes waters divided into a passage of escape; the root names the opening, while the scene shows whether it serves seizure or passage.
ALSO GROWS
nibqeʿu: Were split open; broke out.
נִבְקְעוּ
The same form describes the deep broken open in Genesis 7:11 and waters breaking out in Isaiah 35:6, showing that an opening can release destructive force or life-giving water.
wayyibbaqʿu: And the waters were divided.
וַיִּבָּקְעוּ
At the sea in Exodus 14:21, this root describes a way opening through the waters, a breach that becomes a passage out.
הָאֱמֶת
ha’emet
GROWS FROM
אמן
ʾ-m-n
Be firm, steady, reliable; hence firmness or truth.
The KJV’s “establishment” carries the seed of firmness: אֱמֶת (emet), meaning truth or firmness, belongs to the root אמן (aman), to be firm or steady. Its branches include אֱמוּנָה (emunah), trust that leans its full weight, and אָמֵן (amen), “firm” or “so be it”; the verse holds that firmness alongside an advancing siege.
ALSO GROWS
emunah: Trust; firmness that can be relied on.
אֱמוּנָה
Trust and establishment share the seed of firmness, bringing steadiness into the verse’s opening phrase.
amen: Firm, steady; so be it.
אָמֵן
The familiar word carries the same affirmation of firmness that sits beside the approaching threat.
THE PATTERN
A broken boundary changes what can pass through it: a breach can admit an invader, release judgment, or let restoration break out.
In the six hundredth year of Noah’s life, in the second month, the seventeenth day of the month, the same day were all the fountains of the great deep broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened.But know this, that if the goodman of the house had known in what watch the thief would come, he would have watched, and would not have suffered his house to be broken up.Then shall the lame man leap as an hart, and the tongue of the dumb sing: for in the wilderness shall waters break out, and streams in the desert.THE THREAD
And Moses stretched out his hand over the sea; and the LORD caused the sea to go back by a strong east wind all that night, and made the sea dry land, and the waters were divided.The verb behind “win” comes from בקע (baqaʿ), the same root used when the waters divide at the sea. Here a breach is aimed at possessing fortified cities; there, the split opens a way through danger. The root names an opening, while the scene reveals whether it serves seizure or passage.
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