What Does Exodus 27:2 Mean in the King James?

And thou shalt make the horns of it upon the four corners thereof: his horns shall be of the same: and thou shalt overlay it with brass.
Exodus 27:2 · 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.

This verse in the Selah Decoded Version

The altar’s horns rise from the altar itself: its strength is part of its own substance.

The verse gives the altar four projecting horns and says they come from the altar itself. Its strength belongs to its own structure, and bronze covers the whole.

WHAT THIS UNDOES

The altar’s strength must be attached from outside.

קַרְנֹתָיו

qarnotav

GROWS FROM

ק־ר־ן

q-r-n

To project or rise like a horn; the image extends to rays sent outward.

The root behind “horns” also appears in the word for shining rays. That shared image lets the altar’s horns suggest strength projecting outward from a source, and this verse says that source is the altar itself.

ALSO GROWS

qāran: To send out rays; to shine.

קָרַן

In Exodus 34:29, Moses’ face shines; the same root-image links the altar’s horns with light radiating from a source.

qeren: Horn; also an image of projecting strength, as in “the horn of my salvation” (Psalm 18:2).

קֶרֶן

This sense makes the altar’s horns more than decorative corners: they embody strength rising from the altar.

The altar’s horns serve as points of contact: blood is applied there, refuge is seized there, and a voice rises from them.

And thou shalt take of the blood of the bullock, and put it upon the horns of the altar with thy finger, and pour all the blood beside the bottom of the altar.
Exodus 29:12 · KJVBlood is placed on the horns, making them part of the altar’s active surface.
And Adonijah feared because of Solomon, and arose, and went, and caught hold on the horns of the altar.
1 Kings 1:50 · KJVAdonijah grips the horns as a place of refuge.
And the sixth angel sounded, and I heard a voice from the four horns of the golden altar which is before God,
Revelation 9:13 · KJVA voice comes from the four horns, extending their role as points where the altar’s presence is encountered.
And it came to pass, when Moses came down from mount Sinai with the two tables of testimony in Moses’ hand, when he came down from the mount, that Moses wist not that the skin of his face shone while he talked with him.
Exodus 34:29 · KJV

The Hebrew word translated “shone” comes from the same root-family as “horn.” The shared image opens the altar’s horns as something that projects outward from its source, like rays from Moses’ face.

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Exodus 27:2 KJV Meaning