What Does Jeremiah 32:25 Mean in the King James?
And thou hast said unto me, O Lord GOD, Buy thee the field for money, and take witnesses; for the city is given into the hand of the Chaldeans.
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
Buying the field is not a denial of surrender; it is a witnessed claim on the future made from inside it.
THE MEANING
A purchase and a sentence of defeat sit in the same moment: the field is bought under witness while the city passes into enemy hands. The witnessed deed gives concrete shape to a claim the visible situation seems to cancel.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that present loss makes every future claim meaningless.
THE ROOT
קְנֵה
qĕnēh
GROWS FROM
קנה
To acquire, buy, or take into possession.
“buy” in this verse is qĕnēh. The purchase is an act of acquisition, not merely a gesture of hope. It gives the future claim a material form even as the city’s control is being transferred.
ALSO GROWS
qanah: To acquire or buy.
קָנָה
This is the action Jeremiah is told to carry out: he takes possession of a field by paying for it.
miqneh: Possessions or livestock.
מִקְנֶה
This related word names what is acquired and owned, underscoring the concrete, economic character of the field purchase.
עֵדִים
ʿedim
GROWS FROM
עוּד
To testify or bear witness; in related uses, to repeat or reaffirm.
The witnesses make the purchase a public fact that can be reaffirmed beyond Jeremiah’s own intention. The verse places testimony beside the deed so the claim can stand through the handover.
ALSO GROWS
ʿēd: A witness.
עֵד
Each witness confirms that the field has actually been acquired.
ʿēdût: Testimony or witness.
עֵדוּת
The related word shows how an act can be preserved as an attested claim.
נִתְּנָה
nittĕnāh
GROWS FROM
נתן
To give, set, or place.
“given” in this verse is nittĕnāh. The city is placed into another power’s hand: the wording describes a transfer of control. Beside qanah, it reveals two transfers at once, the city is handed over while the field is acquired under witness.
ALSO GROWS
natan: To give, set, or place.
נָתַן
This root describes the city’s placement into the Chaldeans’ hand.
mattan: A gift, something given.
מַתָּן
This related noun carries the same idea of something being given or placed into another’s possession.
THE PATTERN
A present act can hold open a claim whose fulfillment is not yet visible.
And the field, and the cave that is therein, were made sure unto Abraham for a possession of a buryingplace by the sons of Heth.These all died in faith, not having received the promises, but having seen them afar off, and were persuaded of them, and embraced them, and confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth.(As it is written, I have made thee a father of many nations,) before him whom he believed, even God, who quickeneth the dead, and calleth those things which be not as though they were.THE THREAD
For thus saith the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel; Houses and fields and vineyards shall be possessed again in this land.The Hebrew word rendered “possessed” comes from the same root, qanah, as “buy” in this verse. The later promise names the acquisition that Jeremiah’s witnessed purchase already embodies.
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