What Does 2 Kings 25:13 Mean in the King James?
And the pillars of brass that were in the house of the LORD, and the bases, and the brasen sea that was in the house of the LORD, did the Chaldees break in pieces, and carried the brass of them to Babylon.
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 temple’s pillars are named for standing, yet they become broken cargo bound for Babel, whose name the Bible echoes with confusion.
THE MEANING
The verse speaks now of violence stripping a sacred place of its supports and turning its furnishings into cargo. It names the house of the LORD while naming the smashing without euphemism. What seems fixed can be fractured and carried away.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The verse undoes the belief that what is sacred must remain physically intact: the temple is named, and its furnishings are still smashed and carried away.
THE ROOT
שִׁבְּרוּ
shibbĕrû
GROWS FROM
שבר
sh-b-r
to break, shatter, or crush
“break in pieces” in this verse is shibbĕrû. The verb depicts more than removal: the objects are ruptured into pieces. The same word family names both the act of breaking and the resulting fracture or ruin.
ALSO GROWS
shāvar: to break or smash
שָׁבַר
This is the verb form of the root, naming the force done to the temple objects.
shever: breakage, fracture, or ruin
שֶׁבֶר
This noun names the damage left behind by the breaking described here.
עַמּוּדֵי
ʿammûdê
GROWS FROM
עמד
ʿ-m-d
to stand, remain, or take a stand
“pillars” in this verse is ʿammûdê. The pillar’s name belongs to the root for standing: the object is named by the posture it holds. The verse places the things named for standing directly beside their collapse.
ALSO GROWS
ʿāmad: to stand or remain
עָמַד
This is the action at the heart of the name for a pillar.
maʿămād: a standing place or position
מַעֲמָד
It extends the root from standing itself to the place or position one occupies.
וַיִּשְׂאוּ
wayyiśʾû
GROWS FROM
נשא
n-s-ʾ
to lift, carry, or bear
“carried” in this verse is wayyiśʾû. The brass is borne away as cargo, and its destination adds a name-echo: Genesis 11:9 links Babel (בָּבֶל, Bāvel) by wordplay with בלל (bālal, to mix or confuse). This is the Bible’s sound-play around the name, not a claim that Babel derives from that root.
ALSO GROWS
nāśāʾ: to lift, carry, or bear
נָשָׂא
This is the root verb used for taking the brass away.
maśśāʾ: a burden or load
מַשָּׂא
The related noun makes visible what the temple’s brass becomes in the sentence: a load to be carried.
THE PATTERN
Forms that seem permanent can be dismantled until their pieces no longer hold their former shape.
And he shall break it as the breaking of the potters’ vessel that is broken in pieces; he shall not spare: so that there shall not be found in the bursting of it a sherd to take fire from the hearth, or to take water withal out of the pit.And Jesus said unto them, See ye not all these things? verily I say unto you, There shall not be left here one stone upon another, that shall not be thrown down.THE THREAD
And shalt say unto them, Thus saith the LORD of hosts; Even so will I break this people and this city, as one breaketh a potter’s vessel, that cannot be made whole again: and they shall bury them in Tophet, till there be no place to bury.Jeremiah uses the same root, שבר (sh-b-r), for breaking a vessel and then applies that force to a people and a city. The shared root opens the physical fracture of the bronze into a wider image of ruin.
Read the SDV Bible.
Every verse has a Deep Dive in the app.
The iPhone Bible app with the Selah Decoded Version.
Does something in this reading look wrong? Tell us