What Does Ezekiel 21:13 Mean in the King James?
Because it is a trial, and what if the sword contemn even the rod? it shall be no more, saith the Lord 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 test reaches its breaking point when the sword despises even the rod: what force rejects can no longer hold its place.
THE MEANING
The verse names a test in which the sword scorns even the rod, and the rod does not remain. It speaks now to the breaking point where force has turned against the thing that could check it.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that the rod remains secure simply because it is meant to restrain: the sword can scorn it, and the verse says it is no more.
THE ROOT
בֹּחַן
boḥan
GROWS FROM
בחן
b-ḥ-n
To examine, test, or prove.
The word for “trial” carries the sense of examination: the test exposes what is actually able to hold its place. Here, the sword’s contempt for the rod becomes the point the test brings into view.
ALSO GROWS
bāḥan: To examine, test, or prove.
בָּחַן
This verb shows that the trial is an active testing that reveals what is there.
bāḥōn: An examiner or tester.
בָּחוֹן
This word casts the test as an examination that brings a thing’s condition into the open.
מֹאֶסֶת
mōʾeset
GROWS FROM
מאס
m-ʾ-s
To reject, refuse, or spurn.
“contemn” in this verse is mōʾeset. The sword’s contempt is expressed as rejection: it refuses the rod rather than merely insulting it. The root sharpens the scene into a refusal of the rod’s standing, with the consequence stated plainly: it is no more.
ALSO GROWS
māʾas: To reject, refuse, or spurn.
מָאַס
The verb names the refusal at the center of the sword’s relation to the rod.
māʾūs: Rejected or despised.
מָאוּס
This form shows the condition of what has been refused, echoing the rod’s threatened loss of standing.
THE PATTERN
Testing reveals what cannot hold its place when pressure turns against it.
Shall the axe boast itself against him that heweth therewith? or shall the saw magnify itself against him that shaketh it? as if the rod should shake itself against them that lift it up, or as if the staff should lift up itself, as if it were no wood.For thou, O God, hast proved us: thou hast tried us, as silver is tried.That the trial of your faith, being much more precious than of gold that perisheth, though it be tried with fire, might be found unto praise and honour and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ:THE THREAD
The fining pot is for silver, and the furnace for gold: but the LORD trieth the hearts.The Hebrew root בחן (b-ḥ-n), “to test,” appears in both Ezekiel’s “trial” and Proverbs’ “trieth.” Ezekiel applies the examination to the sword and rod; Proverbs turns it inward, to the heart.
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