What Does 2 Samuel 22:32 Mean in the King James?
For who is God, save the LORD? and who is a rock, save our God?
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 verse gives the same answer to two questions: the one God is also the one solid ground.
THE MEANING
The two questions meet in one answer: the one you name as God is also the ground that holds you. “Our God” makes that stability relational, not merely a title.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
You must choose between a God who is ultimate and a refuge that is dependable.
THE ROOT
צוּר
tsur
GROWS FROM
צ־ו־ר
ṣ-w-r
Rock or cliff: a hard, fixed outcrop.
English can make “a rock” sound like an image beside God’s name; the Hebrew parallelism gives “rock” as another answer to the same question of who holds you. The related forms make that stability personal and tangible: “my rock,” and the clefts of actual rocks.
ALSO GROWS
tsuri: The same noun with the first-person suffix: my rock.
צוּרִי
In 2 Samuel 22:3, the image becomes personal; the rock is a refuge the speaker can call “mine.”
tsurim: The plural form of the noun, used for rocks or crags.
צוּרִים
In Isaiah 2:21, people hide in the clefts of the rocks; here the rock image points to shelter that can be entered.
THE PATTERN
The one named as God is repeatedly pictured as dependable ground beneath danger.
He is the Rock, his work is perfect: for all his ways are judgment: a God of truth and without iniquity, just and right is he.He only is my rock and my salvation; he is my defence; I shall not be greatly moved.And did all drink the same spiritual drink: for they drank of that spiritual Rock that followed them: and that Rock was Christ.THE THREAD
The God of my rock; in him will I trust: he is my shield, and the horn of my salvation, my high tower, and my refuge, my saviour; thou savest me from violence.The same word צוּר (tsur, “rock”) appears here as “my rock,” while verse 32 asks who else can be a rock besides God. This earlier line gives the image a personal shape: the rock is also shield, high tower, refuge, and deliverer.
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