What Does 2 Kings 3:3 Mean in the King James?
Nevertheless he cleaved unto the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, which made Israel to sin; he departed not therefrom.
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 Hebrew verb can describe clinging to the LORD or clinging to a missed way, so attachment itself is the hinge.
THE MEANING
A pattern of missing can become an attachment: it is held close until it shapes a shared path. The verse shows how refusing to release that pattern lets it keep causing others to miss, too.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
Familiarity does not make an inherited pattern harmless; what is kept in place can keep producing the missing in others.
THE ROOT
וַיִּדְבַּק
wayyidbaq
GROWS FROM
דבק
d-b-q
to cling, adhere, remain fastened
“cleaved” in this verse is wayyidbaq. The same Hebrew verb describes attachment to a spouse, to the LORD, and here to a pattern of missing. The words “he departed not” deepen the image: what stays fastened keeps shaping the life around it.
ALSO GROWS
wədāḇaq: cling to one’s wife
וְדָבַק
The same root can describe a bond that shapes a shared life, revealing the force of whatever a person clings to.
ūḇō tidbaq: cling to the LORD
וּבוֹ תִדְבָּק
The same root is used for attachment to God, making the object of the clinging decisive.
חַטֹּאות
ḥaṭṭōʾt
GROWS FROM
חטא
ḥ-ṭ-ʾ
to miss, err, fail to reach the mark
The Hebrew repeats this root in “which made Israel to sin”: the “sins” named as a pattern of missing become an action that causes others to miss, too. English separates the noun from the causative verb, hiding how the passage links a held pattern with its spread.
ALSO GROWS
yaḥăṭî: miss a target
יַחֲטִא
A physical miss shows the concrete image beneath the moral word: something goes wide of its mark.
heḥĕṭî: cause someone to miss
הֶחֱטִיא
This form from the same root turns the named missing into an effect carried into others.
THE PATTERN
What a person holds fast to shapes their allegiance and the influence they carry into others.
Thou shalt fear the LORD thy God; him shalt thou serve, and to him shalt thou cleave, and swear by his name.No man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon.Be not deceived: evil communications corrupt good manners.THE THREAD
Thou shalt fear the LORD thy God; him shalt thou serve, and to him shalt thou cleave, and swear by his name.The exact verb translated “cleaved” in 2 Kings 3:3 is used here for cleaving to the LORD. The root reveals attachment as a binding force: what it binds a person to shapes the path that follows.
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