What Does Ezekiel 22:18 Mean in the King James?

Son of man, the house of Israel is to me become dross: all they are brass, and tin, and iron, and lead, in the midst of the furnace; they are even the dross of silver.

Ezekiel 22:18 · 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 KEY

The furnace does not certify the metals as silver; the verse names what is inside it as silver’s dross.

THE MEANING

The verse calls a whole people silver’s dross: the metals are in the furnace, yet the name given to them is residue, not refined silver. The heat exposes the difference between being inside the furnace and being purified.

WHAT THIS UNDOES

Being placed in a refining process does not prove that what is within is already pure.

THE ROOT

סִיגִים

sigim

GROWS FROM

ס־י־ג

s-y-g

Dross or slag: material separated from precious metal during refining.

The Hebrew word names the residue itself, and the verse applies that name to the metals gathered in the furnace. Silver is the standard in the image; the contents are called its dross, not its refined form.

ALSO GROWS

sig: Dross or slag; the singular form of the word.

סִיג

This form names the material that refining separates from silver.

sigim: Dross or slag; the plural form used in this verse.

סִיגִים

The same plural appears in Isaiah 1:22, linking the image of silver turned to dross with this naming of the people.

THE PATTERN

Fire exposes the difference between what appears valuable and what has been refined.

Take away the dross from the silver, and there shall come forth a vessel for the finer.

Proverbs 25:4 · KJVThe dross must be separated from the silver before the refined material can be shaped.

Thy silver is become dross, thy wine mixed with water:

Isaiah 1:22 · KJVSilver and wine remain the images of value, but each is named as compromised by what is mixed into it.

Every man’s work shall be made manifest: for the day shall declare it, because it shall be revealed by fire; and the fire shall try every man’s work of what sort it is.

1 Corinthians 3:13 · KJVFire makes the work’s true quality visible, just as the furnace image exposes what the metals are.

THE THREAD

Thy silver is become dross, thy wine mixed with water:

Isaiah 1:22 · KJV

Isaiah uses the same Hebrew word, ⁨סִיגִים⁩ (sigim, dross), for silver that has become residue. Ezekiel extends that image to the metals in the furnace, making the indictment a naming of what the mixture has become.

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