What Does 2 Kings 3:19 Mean in the King James?

And ye shall smite every fenced city, and every choice city, and shall fell every good tree, and stop all wells of water, and mar every good piece of land with stones.

2 Kings 3:19 · 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

The violence keeps going after the walls are breached: it reaches the trees, the water, and the ground that could sustain life afterward.

THE MEANING

You are shown a campaign that strikes fortified cities, fells fruitful trees, seals wells, and makes good land harder to use. The destruction reaches beyond the battle into the conditions that allow life to return.

WHAT THIS UNDOES

The belief that defeating a city ends the harm is undone here: the command reaches into the trees, water, and soil that sustain life afterward.

THE ROOT

תַּכְאִיבוּ

takʾivu

GROWS FROM

כאב

To hurt or feel pain; in this causative form, to cause pain.

The Hebrew behind “mar” describes causing pain to the good plot of land, not merely scuffing its surface. The same root names human sorrows, linking damage to the land with suffering that is felt and known.

ALSO GROWS

makʾov: Pain or sorrow.

מַכְאֹב

In Exodus 3:7, this root appears in “their sorrows”; the shared root connects the land’s ruin here with human suffering there.

makʾovot: Pains or sorrows.

מַכְאֹבוֹת

Isaiah 53:3 uses this form for sorrows; it shows the same root naming pain carried within a person as well as pain inflicted on the land.

THE PATTERN

When destruction seeks to be complete, it reaches beyond people to the sources that sustain life.

And they encamped against them, and destroyed the increase of the earth, till thou come unto Gaza, and left no sustenance for Israel, neither sheep, nor ox, nor ass.

Judges 6:4 · KJVThe assault reaches the land’s produce and leaves no sustenance, extending the harm beyond the immediate attack.

Your country is desolate, your cities are burned with fire: your land, strangers devour it in your presence, and it is desolate, as overthrown by strangers.

Isaiah 1:7 · KJVThe verse places ruined cities beside a devoured land, showing destruction consuming both dwellings and the ground around them.

The first angel sounded, and there followed hail and fire mingled with blood, and they were cast upon the earth: and the third part of trees was burnt up, and all green grass was burnt up.

Revelation 8:7 · KJVThe devastation reaches trees and grass, striking the living world along with the earth itself.

THE THREAD

And the LORD said, I have surely seen the affliction of my people which are in Egypt, and have heard their cry by reason of their taskmasters; for I know their sorrows;

Exodus 3:7 · KJV

The shared root ⁨כ־א־ב⁩ (kaʾav, pain) appears in “mar” here and “sorrows” in Exodus. One verse describes pain inflicted on good land; the other names the pain of people that the LORD sees and knows.

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