What Does 2 Kings 16:4 Mean in the King James?

And he sacrificed and burnt incense in the high places, and on the hills, and under every green tree.

2 Kings 16:4 · 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.

THE KEY

The same offering reaches the heights, the hills, and the shade, making the whole landscape a setting for worship.

THE MEANING

The verse shows a pattern that remains legible now: an offering can spread through repeated places and acts. Here, sacrifice and incense appear across the heights, the hills, and under every green tree, so the whole landscape becomes their setting.

THE ROOT

וַיִּזְבַּח

wayyizbaḥ

GROWS FROM

זבח

To slaughter for an offering; to sacrifice.

The verb behind “sacrificed” and ⁨מִזְבֵּחַ⁩ (mizbēaḥ, altar) belong to one word family. English gives the act and the altar separate words, while Hebrew keeps them related; here, the many locations become repeated settings for the same sacrificial act.

ALSO GROWS

zevaḥ: Sacrifice; sacrificial offering.

זֶבַח

It names the offering made in the verse, carrying the same root as the act of sacrificing.

mizbēaḥ: Altar; place of sacrifice.

מִזְבֵּחַ

Its shared root links the act of offering to the place that receives the offering.

THE PATTERN

Sacrificial acts take shape through the places where they are performed and the life that is offered.

Ye shall utterly destroy all the places, wherein the nations which ye shall possess served their gods, upon the high mountains, and upon the hills, and under every green tree:

Deuteronomy 12:2 · KJVThe verse names the same spread of worship sites, mountains, hills, and green trees, across the landscape.

For they also built them high places, and images, and groves, on every high hill, and under every green tree.

1 Kings 14:23 · KJVIt repeats the pattern of high places and tree shade as settings for worship.

I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service.

Romans 12:1 · KJVThe sacrificial pattern appears through the life presented, with the body named as the offering.

THE THREAD

For I desired mercy, and not sacrifice; and the knowledge of God more than burnt offerings.

Hosea 6:6 · KJV

The word translated “sacrificed” here and “sacrifice” in Hosea share the same Hebrew root. Hosea places that offering beside faithful love and knowing God, opening a question about what the ritual can, and cannot, stand in for.

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