What Does 2 Samuel 23:8 Mean in the King James?
These be the names of the mighty men whom David had: The Tachmonite that sat in the seat, chief among the captains; the same was Adino the Eznite: he lift up his spear against eight hundred, whom he slew at one time.
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 might is counted in the lives one man takes in a single encounter.
THE MEANING
You encounter strength here in its unsoftened form: one fighter kills eight hundred at once. “Mighty” is not an abstract honor; the verse measures it in lives taken. The count makes power’s human cost visible now.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
Might can sound like an admirable quality detached from consequence; here the verse binds it to the lives it destroys.
THE ROOT
גִּבֹּרִים
gibbōrîm
GROWS FROM
גבר
gābar
To be strong, prevail, or overcome.
“mighty men” in this verse is gibbōrîm. The Hebrew calls them גִּבֹּרִים (gibbōrîm, mighty or prevailing ones), from גבר (gābar, to be strong or prevail). The root names strength by its capacity to prevail, and this verse makes that capacity brutally concrete: eight hundred are killed in one encounter.
ALSO GROWS
gibbōr: A mighty or strong man; a warrior.
גִּבּוֹר
The singular form appears as “strong man” in Psalm 19:5, showing that this root can name vigorous capacity beyond a warrior’s title.
gevurah: Might, strength, or prowess.
גְּבוּרָה
This related word carries the same root into the idea of strength expressed in action, matching the verse’s measured display of power.
THE PATTERN
Scripture presents might as the capacity to prevail despite disparities in numbers, strength, or circumstance.
And he found a new jawbone of an ass, and put forth his hand, and took it, and slew a thousand men therewith.And Jonathan said to the young man that bare his armour, Come, and let us go over unto the garrison of these uncircumcised: it may be that the LORD will work for us: for there is no restraint to the LORD to save by many or by few.Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us.THE THREAD
Which is as a bridegroom coming out of his chamber, and rejoiceth as a strong man to run a race.The Hebrew behind “strong man” is גִּבּוֹר (gibbōr), from the same root גבר (gābar) as “mighty men” here. The shared root names prevailing strength in two sharply different scenes: one is a lethal encounter, the other a runner rejoicing in his course.
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