What Does 2 Chronicles 32:30 Mean in the King James?
This same Hezekiah also stopped the upper watercourse of Gihon, and brought it straight down to the west side of the city of David. And Hezekiah prospered in all his works.
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 calls it prospering when a source is redirected toward the city: success here is purposeful passage.
THE MEANING
A source can be closed at one outlet and still be directed toward where people dwell. Here, prosperity is joined to the work of channeling what flows. Hezekiah’s name carries the meaning “YHWH strengthens,” holding strength and careful direction together.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
A closed outlet does not necessarily mean the source is gone; the waters remain available to be directed toward the city.
THE ROOT
וַיַּצְלַח
wayyaṣlaḥ
GROWS FROM
צלח
ṣ-l-ḥ
To pass through, advance, or make progress.
The word translated “prospered” carries movement: getting through and making headway. The verse links that progress with a concrete work that directs water toward the city.
ALSO GROWS
ṣālaḥ: Pass through, advance, prosper.
צָלַח
This root makes prosperity sound like progress that gets through, not simply possession or comfort.
hiṣlîaḥ: Cause to succeed; bring to success.
הִצְלִיחַ
The causative form connects success with work that carries something through to its end.
גִּיחוֹן
Gîḥôn
GROWS FROM
גיח
g-y-ḥ
To gush forth or burst out.
Gihon’s name is commonly connected with this root of gushing forth. The name gives the watercourse a vivid quality: a force that bursts out is redirected toward the city.
ALSO GROWS
gîaḥ: Gush or burst forth.
גִּיחַ
This verbal form helps reveal the force carried in the name Gihon.
bəgîḥô: At its bursting forth.
בְּגִיחוֹ
Job uses this form for the sea bursting forth, echoing the image of a powerful source emerging.
יְחִזְקִיָּהוּ
Yəḥizqiyyāhû
GROWS FROM
חזק
ḥ-z-q
To be strong, strengthen, or make firm; the name carries “YHWH strengthens.”
Hezekiah’s name joins strength with the divine name. In this verse, that nature appears alongside the skilled work of directing water toward the city.
ALSO GROWS
ḥāzaq: Be strong, grow firm, or prevail.
חָזַק
The root names strength as a quality that holds or prevails.
ḥizzēq: Strengthen or make firm.
חִזֵּק
This form shows strength as an action that gives something firmness.
THE PATTERN
A living source becomes provision as its flow reaches and sustains the places where life gathers.
There is a river, the streams whereof shall make glad the city of God, the holy place of the tabernacles of the most High.And it shall come to pass, that every thing that liveth, which moveth, whithersoever the rivers shall come, shall live: and there shall be a very great multitude of fish, because these waters shall come thither: for they shall be healed; and every thing shall live whither the river cometh.He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water.THE THREAD
This book of the law shall not depart out of thy mouth; but thou shalt meditate therein day and night, that thou mayest observe to do according to all that is written therein: for then thou shalt make thy way prosperous, and then thou shalt have good success.The same root, צלח, appears in “prospered” here and “prosperous” in Joshua. In both, prosperity carries the sense of making headway: here, work directs water toward a city; there, a way advances.
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