What Does 2 Samuel 22:24 Mean in the King James?

I was also upright before him, and have kept myself from mine iniquity.

2 Samuel 22:24 · 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.

THE KEY

Here, uprightness is wholeness guarded even against what rises from within.

THE MEANING

Uprightness before God is a lived wholeness, expressed as the speaker keeps watch over his own crookedness. The verse leaves the inward threat in view: what can compromise that wholeness may rise from within the self.

WHAT THIS UNDOES

It undoes the belief that integrity means having no inner wrong to contend with; here, integrity includes guarding against one’s own crookedness.

THE ROOT

וָאֶשְׁתַּמְּרָה

va'eshtammerah

GROWS FROM

שׁמר

⁨שׁמר⁩ (shamar): to guard, watch, or keep.

“kept myself” in this verse is va'eshtammerah. The verb turns the guarding inward: the speaker watches over himself, naming a danger that can arise from within. ⁨שׁמר⁩ (shamar, to guard or watch) also names an entrusted charge, so the self becomes what is kept.

ALSO GROWS

shomer: keeper, watcher

שֹׁמֵר

The same root names the one who watches; here, the speaker takes the role of keeper over himself.

mishmeret: watch, charge, guard duty

מִשְׁמֶרֶת

This branch makes keeping an ongoing watch, and the verse presents integrity as that inward watch.

THE PATTERN

Integrity is lived by guarding what is entrusted, including one’s own inner life.

And the LORD God took the man, and put him into the garden of Eden to dress it and to keep it.

Genesis 2:15 · KJVThe garden is entrusted to human keeping, expressing care as both tending and guarding.

Keep thy heart with all diligence; for out of it are the issues of life.

Proverbs 4:23 · KJVThe heart is held as something entrusted, and its keeping matters because life flows from within it.

Little children, keep yourselves from idols. Amen.

1 John 5:21 · KJVThe verse echoes this passage’s inward watch, naming the self as something to guard.

THE THREAD

And the LORD God took the man, and put him into the garden of Eden to dress it and to keep it.

Genesis 2:15 · KJV

Both verses use ⁨שׁמר⁩ (shamar, to guard or keep): Genesis speaks of keeping the garden, while this verse speaks of keeping oneself from one’s own wrongdoing. The shared verb makes self-guarding a form of tending what has been entrusted.

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