What Does Ezekiel 31:8 Mean in the King James?
The cedars in the garden of God could not hide him: the fir trees were not like his boughs, and the chesnut trees were not like his branches; nor any tree in the garden of God was like unto him in his beauty.
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 Hebrew repeats its verb for “resemble” to make the failure of comparison itself the measure of this beauty.
THE MEANING
You encounter a beauty that every other tree in the garden fails to match. The same Hebrew verb for “resemble” returns twice, making the limit of comparison part of what the verse lets you see.
THE ROOT
דָּמוּ
dāmû
GROWS FROM
דמה
dāmâ
To be like, resemble, or compare.
“were not like” in this verse is dāmû. This root can express both resemblance and the act of comparing. The verse uses it first for the fir trees failing to resemble his boughs, then for every tree failing to resemble him in beauty: the whole garden becomes a comparison that cannot produce an equal.
ALSO GROWS
dāmâ: To be like or resemble.
דָּמָה
This form makes the verse’s claim a question of likeness: the trees cannot provide a match.
dimmâ: To compare or liken.
דִּמָּה
This form names the act of comparison itself, which the verse repeats across the garden.
THE PATTERN
The unmatched becomes visible when the whole field of possible comparisons fails to produce an equal.
To whom then will ye liken God? or what likeness will ye compare unto him?And no man in heaven, nor in earth, neither under the earth, was able to open the book, neither to look thereon.THE THREAD
For who in the heaven can be compared unto the LORD? who among the sons of the mighty can be likened unto the LORD?Psalm 89 uses the same Hebrew root, דמה, to ask who can be likened to the LORD. In both verses, the failed act of resemblance makes singularity visible.
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