What Does 2 Kings 13:3 Mean in the King James?

And the anger of the LORD was kindled against Israel, and he delivered them into the hand of Hazael king of Syria, and into the hand of Ben-hadad the son of Hazael, all their days.

2 Kings 13:3 · KJV

The analysis reads the King James wording.

King James Version The King James Version, first published in 1611. Selah Verse shows the standard text.

This verse in the Selah Decoded Version

THE KEY

Here, “delivered” grows from ⁨נָתַן⁩, “to give”: the people are placed into the king’s hand, where power becomes a grip.

THE MEANING

The verse holds the heat of the LORD’s anger beside the concrete reality of subjection: a people are placed in rulers’ hands, and the pressure lasts “all their days.” It gives prolonged powerlessness an unsparing name, being handed over, without calling subjection wholeness.

WHAT THIS UNDOES

This undoes the assumption that “deliver” always means rescue: here it names being given into hostile power.

THE ROOT

וַיִּתְּנֵם

vayyittenem

GROWS FROM

נתן

give, set, place

“delivered” in this verse is vayyittenem. The verb is literally from ⁨נתן⁩, “to give, set, place”: the verse pictures the people as placed into a ruler’s hand, the reach of his power. The same consonants appear in words for giving and for what is given, keeping the act and its result joined.

ALSO GROWS

netinah: giving; an act of giving

נְתִינָה

This noun shares the root consonants and makes the handover an act of giving, not an escape from the hand that holds them.

natun: given; placed

נָתוּן

This form shares the root consonants and describes the resulting state: the people are placed under another’s power.

THE PATTERN

Being handed over names the loss of freedom as a concrete transfer of power.

And the anger of the LORD was hot against Israel, and he delivered them into the hands of spoilers that spoiled them, and he sold them into the hands of their enemies round about, so that they could not any longer stand before their enemies.

Judges 2:14 · KJVThe same language of anger and giving into hostile hands makes subjection a direct transfer of power.

And he gave them into the hand of the heathen; and they that hated them ruled over them.

Psalm 106:41 · KJVBeing given into hostile hands is shown in the rule that follows.

Wherefore God also gave them up to uncleanness through the lusts of their own hearts, to dishonour their own bodies between themselves:

Romans 1:24 · KJVThe language shifts, but the pattern remains: being given over places people under a power that shapes what follows.

THE THREAD

I have forsaken mine house, I have left mine heritage; I have given the dearly beloved of my soul into the hand of her enemies.

Jeremiah 12:7 · KJV

Jeremiah uses the same ⁨נתן⁩ root when the LORD says he has given “the dearly beloved of my soul” into her enemies’ hand. The shared verb holds the transfer starkly while showing that being placed in hostile hands does not, by itself, erase the beloved one’s identity.

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