What Does Jeremiah 52:28 Mean in the King James?

This is the people whom Nebuchadrezzar carried away captive: in the seventh year three thousand Jews and three and twenty:

Jeremiah 52:28 · 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.

This verse in the Selah Decoded Version

THE KEY

Captivity can carry people from their place without making them disappear: the verse still names and counts them as a people.

THE MEANING

This verse holds forced removal and belonging in the same frame: 3,023 people are carried away, and they remain “the people” in the telling. Their displacement is real, but the count does not let them dissolve into an anonymous crowd.

WHAT THIS UNDOES

Being driven from home means you no longer belong or count as part of your people.

THE ROOT

הֶגְלָה

heglah

GROWS FROM

גלה

Uncover or reveal; in the Hiphil form used here, cause someone to go into exile.

“carried away captive” in this verse is heglah. This verb belongs to ⁨גלה⁩ (galah, uncover or reveal), a root that also names going into exile. The English phrase gives the forced movement; the shared root adds the sense of being exposed and removed from one’s place.

ALSO GROWS

gillah: Uncovered; disclosed.

גִּלָּה

This form shares the root’s consonants and makes the root’s sense of uncovering visible alongside the verse’s sense of exile.

hitgallah: Was revealed; appeared.

הִתְגַּלָּה

This form also belongs to the same root, showing how ⁨גלה⁩ can describe what is brought out into the open.

THE PATTERN

Exile is a real constriction, but it does not erase a people or become their final condition.

And I will be found of you, saith the LORD: and I will turn away your captivity, and I will gather you from all the nations, and from all the places whither I have driven you, saith the LORD; and I will bring you again into the place whence I caused you to be carried away captive.

Jeremiah 29:14 · KJVThe people carried away are gathered again, so their displacement does not become their final state.

A Song of degrees. When the LORD turned again the captivity of Zion, we were like them that dream.

Psalm 126:1 · KJVThe captivity that once constricts Zion gives way to a return so startling it feels unreal.

The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised,

Luke 4:18 · KJVCaptives are named among those who receive release, making liberation part of the work unfolding now.

THE THREAD

And I will be found of you, saith the LORD: and I will turn away your captivity, and I will gather you from all the nations, and from all the places whither I have driven you, saith the LORD; and I will bring you again into the place whence I caused you to be carried away captive.

Jeremiah 29:14 · KJV

Jeremiah 52:28 uses ⁨הֶגְלָה⁩ (heglah, caused to go into exile), from ⁨גלה⁩ (galah, uncover or reveal); Jeremiah 29:14 uses the same root in “caused you to be carried away captive.” The later verse places that displacement inside a promise of gathering, so the count here marks who has been taken, not who has been erased.

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