What Does Ezekiel 27:6 Mean in the King James?
Of the oaks of Bashan have they made thine oars; the company of the Ashurites have made thy benches of ivory, brought out of the isles of Chittim.
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 word for “oars” belongs to a Hebrew root of roaming, so the ship’s means of motion carries the idea of ranging across distance within its name.
THE MEANING
A ship can appear as one powerful thing while its oars, benches, and materials come from different places: Bashan’s oaks become its oars, Ashurite makers shape its benches, and ivory comes from the isles of Chittim. Its movement and its splendor are assembled from land, skilled hands, and distant sources. What looks self-contained is held together by many origins.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The ship’s power and luxury are self-made. The verse shows them assembled from materials and labor beyond the ship itself.
THE ROOT
מִשְׁטוֹתַיִךְ
mishtotayikh
GROWS FROM
שׁוּט
shut
to roam, range, or go to and fro; in a nautical form, to row
“oars” in this verse is mishtotayikh. English gives the oar a purely mechanical name, while Hebrew places it in a word family of roaming and going to and fro. The ship’s means of travel thus carries the idea of ranging over distance within its name.
ALSO GROWS
māšōṭ: An oar, an instrument for rowing
מָשׁוֹט
This is the object named in the verse: the tool that sends the ship across the water.
shut: To range or move about
שׁוּט
Amos 8:12 uses this root for running to and fro across the land; the oar’s motion belongs to the same word family of ranging.
THE PATTERN
What appears as one powerful vessel or city is assembled from materials, skilled work, and goods gathered across distance.
Make thee an ark of gopher wood; rooms shalt thou make in the ark, and shalt pitch it within and without with pitch.For the king had at sea a navy of Tharshish with the navy of Hiram: once in three years came the navy of Tharshish, bringing gold, and silver, ivory, and apes, and peacocks.The merchandise of gold, and silver, and precious stones, and of pearls, and fine linen, and purple, and silk, and scarlet, and all thyine wood, and all manner vessels of ivory, and all manner vessels of most precious wood, and of brass, and iron, and marble,THE THREAD
And they shall wander from sea to sea, and from the north even to the east, they shall run to and fro to seek the word of the LORD, and shall not find it.The word translated “oars” is מִשְׁטוֹתַיִךְ (mishtotayikh), from שׁוּט (shut), a root for ranging or going to and fro. Amos uses the same root for those who “run to and fro”; here that ranging is built into a ship’s equipment, while Amos makes it a search across the land.
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