What Does Deuteronomy 17:2 Mean in the King James?
If there be found among you, within any of thy gates which the LORD thy God giveth thee, man or woman, that hath wrought wickedness in the sight of the LORD thy God, in transgressing his covenant,
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 pictures transgression as crossing over the covenant, so conduct within the community’s gates remains in God’s sight.
THE MEANING
Wrongdoing within a shared community remains visible to God; being among one’s own people does not make it morally private. The verse names the act as evil and as crossing over the covenant that binds the community.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The verse undoes the belief that wrongdoing becomes morally invisible simply because it happens within one’s own community.
THE ROOT
לַעֲבֹר
laʿavōr
GROWS FROM
עבר
ʿ-b-r
to cross or pass over
The Hebrew verb comes from עבר (ʿ-b-r), meaning to cross or pass over. It pictures covenant-breaking as crossing beyond the bond, giving the word more movement than the English label “transgressing” may suggest.
ALSO GROWS
ʿāvar: to cross, pass over
עָבַר
This is the root verb behind “transgressing”; it makes the breach an act of crossing.
maʿavār: passage, crossing
מַעֲבָר
This related noun carries the same crossing into a passage or route, illuminating the verse’s image of going beyond the covenant bond.
ʿēver: the other side, beyond
עֵבֶר
This related form names what lies across or beyond, sharpening the sense of crossing over the covenant.
הָרָע
hā-rāʿ
GROWS FROM
רעע
r-ʿ-ʿ
to be bad or evil; to cause harm
“wickedness” in this verse is hā-rāʿ. The verse names the conduct as evil in God’s sight, not merely as a label imposed by the person doing it. The word’s range includes what is bad or harmful, so the verse presents the breach as conduct with moral weight.
ALSO GROWS
raʿ: bad, evil
רַע
This adjective names the conduct as evil in the verse’s description.
hēreaʿ: to do evil, cause harm
הֵרֵעַ
This related verb makes the connection between evil and harmful action explicit.
rōaʿ: evil, harm
רֹעַ
This noun form keeps the same root’s association with evil and harm.
THE PATTERN
A covenant breach is pictured as crossing the bond and becoming visible in the shared life of a people.
Israel hath sinned, and they have also transgressed my covenant which I commanded them: for they have even taken of the accursed thing, and have also stolen, and dissembled also, and they have put it even among their own stuff.But they like men have transgressed the covenant: there have they dealt treacherously against me.Not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day when I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt; because they continued not in my covenant, and I regarded them not, saith the Lord.THE THREAD
Israel hath sinned, and they have also transgressed my covenant which I commanded them: for they have even taken of the accursed thing, and have also stolen, and dissembled also, and they have put it even among their own stuff.Joshua uses the same Hebrew root, עבר (ʿ-b-r), meaning to cross or pass over, with “my covenant.” Its list of taking, stealing, and concealment makes concrete how the crossing named in Deuteronomy shows up in communal life.
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