What Does 2 Samuel 2:29 Mean in the King James?
And Abner and his men walked all that night through the plain, and passed over Jordan, and went through all Bithron, and they came to Mahanaim.
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 place they reach is called Mahanaim, “two camps”, so the verse’s final word makes arrival a place of doubled encampment.
THE MEANING
Your passage can hold several boundaries in sequence: a whole night on foot, a river crossing, a cleft stretch of country, and arrival. Each part remains named; reaching the destination does not erase the terrain crossed.
THE ROOT
מַחֲנָיִם
Machanayim
GROWS FROM
חנה
To encamp, to pitch a camp.
Mahanaim is the dual form of machaneh, “camp”: literally, “two camps.” In English it appears only as a destination name, but the arrival already contains two encampments in its wording.
ALSO GROWS
chanah: To encamp, to pitch a camp.
חָנָה
This is the verb behind the camp noun in the destination’s name.
machaneh: Camp, encampment, or host.
מַחֲנֶה
Mahanaim is the dual form of this word: two camps.
בִּתְרוֹן
Bithron
GROWS FROM
בתר
To cut or divide.
Bithron is commonly understood from this cut-and-divide word family, with the sense of a cleft or divided region. So “through all Bithron” names the cut-through character of the ground they traverse.
ALSO GROWS
batar: To cut in pieces or divide.
בָּתַר
This verb gives the place-name its sense of cleft or divided ground.
bether: A cut piece or portion.
בֶּתֶר
This noun shows the same root’s movement from cutting to the piece that is cut.
יַרְדֵּן
Yarden
GROWS FROM
ירד
To descend, to go down.
Jordan is linked to yarad, “to descend,” so the river’s name carries its downward flow inside the crossing. The KJV leaves Jordan as a proper name, while the Hebrew keeps that motion audible.
ALSO GROWS
yarad: To go down or descend.
יָרַד
This verb is the root linked to the river’s name.
horid: To bring or cause to descend.
הוֹרִיד
This causative branch keeps the root’s downward movement while showing that something can be made to descend.
THE PATTERN
Scripture portrays a crossing as passage through actual terrain, naming the difficult stretch as part of the way to arrival.
And the children of Israel went into the midst of the sea upon the dry ground: and the waters were a wall unto them on their right hand, and on their left.Thou hast caused men to ride over our heads; we went through fire and through water: but thou broughtest us out into a wealthy place.Confirming the souls of the disciples, and exhorting them to continue in the faith, and that we must through much tribulation enter into the kingdom of God.THE THREAD
And when Jacob saw them, he said, This is God’s host: and he called the name of that place Mahanaim.Mahanaim is the same place-name here, formed from machaneh (“camp”) in its dual form, “two camps.” Genesis says Jacob gives it that name after seeing God’s host; the echo lets Abner’s arrival retain the destination’s doubled sense without assigning a motive to his retreat.
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