What Does Jeremiah 13:3 Mean in the King James?

And the word of the LORD came unto me the second time, saying,

Jeremiah 13:3 · 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.

THE KEY

The word that returns is not only speech: Hebrew davar can also mean a matter or thing, so the message already belongs to what is unfolding.

THE MEANING

A word can meet you again at the edge of its meaning. Here the LORD’s address returns for a second time, and the sentence holds you at the instant before its content is spoken. The return is part of the encounter; what follows is still opening.

THE ROOT

דָּבָר

davar

GROWS FROM

דבר

d-b-r

To speak; as a noun, word, matter, or thing.

English gives you a message arriving; Hebrew gives you davar, a word that can also name a matter or thing. The language holds speech and matter close together, so this returning address is more than a repetition of sound: it puts something before the hearer.

ALSO GROWS

dibber: He spoke; to speak.

דִּבֵּר

The verse ends with “saying”; the noun and the act of speaking grow from the same root, joining the arriving word to the voice that speaks it.

davar: Matter, affair, or thing.

דָּבָר

The English “word” does not show this range; the Hebrew lets the address carry the sense of a matter being placed before the hearer.

THE PATTERN

In Scripture, a divine address can return while its meaning is still being perceived and brought into form.

For God speaketh once, yea twice, yet man perceiveth it not.

Job 33:14 · KJVSpeech comes once, then twice, while the hearer still fails to perceive it; repetition meets incomplete understanding.

And for that the dream was doubled unto Pharaoh twice; it is because the thing is established by God, and God will shortly bring it to pass.

Genesis 41:32 · KJVThe doubled dream signals that a matter is established and will be brought to pass, joining repetition with fulfillment.

And the voice spake unto him again the second time, What God hath cleansed, that call not thou common.

Acts 10:15 · KJVA voice speaks a second time and overturns the hearer’s distinction between clean and common.

THE THREAD

By the word of the LORD were the heavens made; and all the host of them by the breath of his mouth.

Psalm 33:6 · KJV

The same Hebrew word, davar (⁨דָּבָר⁩, word or matter), appears here: Psalm says the heavens are made by the LORD’s word. Jeremiah’s returning word belongs to the same scriptural pattern in which speech carries a matter toward realization.

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