What Does 2 Kings 4:21 Mean in the King James?
And she went up, and laid him on the bed of the man of God, and shut the door upon him, and went out.
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 Hebrew behind “laid” turns the act into a posture: she makes him lie down, placing his still body inside a room she then closes.
THE MEANING
You meet the moment when the child is dead: she lays him on the man of God’s bed, closes the door, and goes out. His stillness remains inside while his mother moves beyond the room; the verse leaves what follows unseen.
THE ROOT
וַתַּשְׁכִּבֵהוּ
vatashkivehu
GROWS FROM
שכב
shakav
To lie down; in this verb form, to cause someone to lie down.
“laid” in this verse is vatashkivehu. The verb makes her action more specific than simply placing him somewhere: she causes him to lie down. The same root forms מִשְׁכָּב (mishkav, “lying place” or “bed”), though this verse calls the bed מִטָּה (mittah, “bed”).
ALSO GROWS
shakav: To lie down, recline, or sleep.
שָׁכַב
This is the root verb behind the form translated “laid”; here she causes the child to lie down.
mishkav: A lying place; a bed.
מִשְׁכָּב
This noun names a place by the posture associated with the root, echoing the bed that receives the child in the verse.
וַתִּסְגֹּר
vattisgor
GROWS FROM
סגר
sagar
To shut, close, or enclose.
“shut” in this verse is vattisgor. The door’s closure is a deliberate action that encloses the child while his mother goes out. In another form, this root can mean handing someone over into custody, so its word family holds the edge between containment and confinement, though the verse says only that she shuts the door.
ALSO GROWS
sagur: Closed or shut.
סָגוּר
This form names the state the door enters as she closes it around the child.
hisgir: To hand over or deliver into custody.
הִסְגִּיר
This related form carries a sharper sense of enclosure, illuminating the boundary the verb creates without claiming that she hands the child over.
THE PATTERN
An unresolved crisis is held within a bounded space before its outcome appears.
And he said unto her, Give me thy son. And he took him out of her bosom, and carried him up into a loft, where he abode, and laid him upon his own bed.He went in therefore, and shut the door upon them twain, and prayed unto the LORD.Then the same day at evening, being the first day of the week, when the doors were shut where the disciples were assembled for fear of the Jews, came Jesus and stood in the midst, and saith unto them, Peace be unto you.THE THREAD
I will both lay me down in peace, and sleep: for thou, LORD, only makest me dwell in safety.Both verbs grow from שכב (shakav, “lie down”). Here the mother makes the child lie down; in the psalm, the speaker lies down in peace. The shared root reveals the bodily posture in this scene, while the psalm’s safety cannot be read back into the child’s situation.
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