What Does Ezekiel 48:20 Mean in the King James?
All the oblation shall be five and twenty thousand by five and twenty thousand: ye shall offer the holy oblation foursquare, with the possession of the city.
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 “oblation” is a portion raised up, yet its exact square gathers the city’s holding into the same sacred order.
THE MEANING
The holy portion and the city’s possession occupy one measured landscape. What is set apart has a specific place within the shared life of a people.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The sacred must exist outside the shared world of dwellings and land; here, the city’s holding belongs within the same measured allotment.
THE ROOT
תְּרוּמָה
terumah
GROWS FROM
רום
rum
Rise, be high; raise up.
“oblation” in this verse is terumah. The noun תְּרוּמָה (terumah, raised contribution) and the verb תָּרִימוּ (tarimu, you shall raise) share the same root. The portion is raised up by exact measure, and its square includes the city’s holding.
ALSO GROWS
tarimu: You shall raise, lift up.
תָּרִימוּ
This verse’s verb translated “offer” echoes the root of “oblation.”
herim: He raised, lifted up.
הֵרִים
This verb form shows the same root’s concrete action: lifting a portion up.
אֲחֻזַּת
achuzzat
GROWS FROM
אחז
achaz
Grasp, hold, take hold.
The word for possession carries the sense of a holding: land is not merely an abstract title but a bounded place held within the allotment. Its presence in the same square brings the city’s holding into the passage’s measured order.
ALSO GROWS
achaz: To grasp, hold, take hold.
אָחַז
This verb supplies the physical sense beneath the city’s “possession.”
ne'echaz: Caught, held fast.
נֶאֱחַז
The same root can describe something held in place, echoing the bounded landholding named here.
קֹדֶשׁ
qodesh
GROWS FROM
קדש
qadash
Set apart, consecrate.
“holy” in this verse is qodesh. The set-apart portion has a definite measure and place within the same allotment as the city’s holding. Holiness here is spatially located, not left as an undefined idea.
ALSO GROWS
qadosh: Set apart, holy.
קָדוֹשׁ
This adjective names what is set apart in the measured portion.
miqdash: Sanctuary, set-apart place.
מִקְדָּשׁ
The same root can name a dedicated place, linking holiness with space that has a defined location.
THE PATTERN
Set-apart space has a concrete place within the shared life and dwelling of a people.
And let them make me a sanctuary; that I may dwell among them.Command the children of Israel, that they give unto the Levites of the inheritance of their possession cities to dwell in; and ye shall give also unto the Levites suburbs for the cities round about them.And the city lieth foursquare, and the length is as large as the breadth: and he measured the city with the reed, twelve thousand furlongs. The length and the breadth and the height of it are equal.THE THREAD
Moreover, when ye shall divide by lot the land for inheritance, ye shall offer an oblation unto the LORD, an holy portion of the land: the length shall be the length of five and twenty thousand reeds, and the breadth shall be ten thousand. This shall be holy in all the borders thereof round about.Ezekiel 45:1 uses תְּרוּמָה (terumah, raised contribution) for the set-apart land, the same word family heard in “oblation” here. It gives that portion a 25,000-reed length; this verse places the holy portion and the city’s holding within a 25,000-by-25,000 square.
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