What Does 2 Kings 15:35 Mean in the King James?
Howbeit the high places were not removed: the people sacrificed and burned incense still in the high places. He built the higher gate of the house of the LORD.
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
A new gate rises at the LORD’s house while the old high places keep receiving sacrifice: building upward does not mean turning away.
THE MEANING
A new sacred structure can take shape beside an old practice that still receives attention. The verse holds both in view: the LORD’s house gains an upper gate, while people continue to sacrifice and burn incense at the high places. Visible change and continued practice occupy the same moment.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
A visible improvement does not prove that what was already in place has been released.
THE ROOT
סָרוּ
saru
GROWS FROM
סור
sur
To turn aside, depart, or move away; by extension, to remove.
“removed” in this verse is saru. The Hebrew form means “turned aside” or “departed,” so removal carries the sense of a change in direction as well as clearing a site. The high places remain in use: the verse describes a practice that has not turned away.
ALSO GROWS
sur: To turn aside or depart.
סוּר
This root makes removal a movement away, not only the clearing of a physical place.
sar: Turned aside or departed.
סָר
Exodus 32:8 uses this same root for turning aside from the way, linking removal here with a change of direction.
עֶלְיוֹן
elyon
GROWS FROM
עלה
alah
To go up or ascend.
“higher” in this verse is elyon. The gate is described with language of ascent. That same root family names both an ascent and an offering that goes up in smoke, placing elevation and worship in the same field of imagery while the high-place worship continues.
ALSO GROWS
aliyah: Ascent or going up.
עֲלִיָּה
It shows that the gate’s “upper” position belongs to a wider family of ascent language.
olah: A burnt offering; literally, something that goes up.
עֹלָה
This root also names an offering by its upward movement, echoing the verse’s picture of worship continuing as the upper gate is built.
THE PATTERN
A visible religious improvement can stand beside a practice that remains untouched.
He removed the high places, and brake the images, and cut down the groves, and brake in pieces the brasen serpent that Moses had made: for unto those days the children of Israel did burn incense to it: and he called it Nehushtan.And when ye spread forth your hands, I will hide mine eyes from you: yea, when ye make many prayers, I will not hear: your hands are full of blood.Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye make clean the outside of the cup and of the platter, but within they are full of extortion and excess.THE THREAD
They have turned aside quickly out of the way which I commanded them: they have made them a molten calf, and have worshipped it, and have sacrificed thereunto, and said, These be thy gods, O Israel, which have brought thee up out of the land of Egypt.Exodus uses the root סור (sur, “turn aside” or “depart”) for turning aside from the way; 2 Kings uses it for the high places not being removed. The shared root makes removal a matter of direction as well as clearing a site, sharpening the contrast between the new gate and the worship that continues.
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