What Does Judges 18:13 Mean in the King James?
And they passed thence unto mount Ephraim, and came unto the house of Micah.
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
Their destination is Micah’s house, מִיכָה (Mikhah, “Who is like YHWH?”), so the arrival itself carries a question of likeness.
THE MEANING
The verse holds travel and arrival together: you cross away from one place and reach another person’s home. Micah’s name means “Who is like YHWH?”, bringing the question of likeness into view at the destination.
THE ROOT
וַיַּעַבְרוּ
vayyaʿavru
GROWS FROM
עבר
ʿ-b-r
To cross over or pass across.
The verb translated “passed” carries the sense of crossing a threshold. Paired with the arrival that follows, it makes the route a movement from one place into another.
ALSO GROWS
ʿever: Beyond; across.
עֵבֶר
The sense of crossing over makes “passed thence” more than undirected travel: it marks leaving one side for another.
maʿavar: A passage or crossing.
מַעֲבָר
This related word names the passage itself, bringing out the threshold built into the verse’s first verb.
וַיָּבֹאוּ
vayyavo’u
GROWS FROM
בוא
b-w-ʾ
To come, arrive, or enter.
“came” in this verse is vayyavo’u. The second verb completes the movement: the crossing has a destination. Here the travelers come as far as a particular home, where the journey meets another person’s settled world.
ALSO GROWS
mavo: Entrance; access.
מָבוֹא
This branch connects coming to the place one enters, sharpening the sense of arrival at a household.
bi’ah: Coming; entry.
בִּיאָה
This noun preserves the movement inside arrival: reaching a place is also entering into it.
THE PATTERN
Crossing carries movement across a threshold, while arrival shows what lies on the other side.
And Abram passed through the land unto the place of Sichem, unto the plain of Moreh. And the Canaanite was then in the land.And the priests that bare the ark of the covenant of the LORD stood firm on dry ground in the midst of Jordan, and all the Israelites passed over on dry ground, until all the people were passed clean over Jordan.Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation; but is passed from death unto life.THE THREAD
And Abram passed through the land unto the place of Sichem, unto the plain of Moreh. And the Canaanite was then in the land.“Passed” in Genesis comes from the same Hebrew root עבר (ʿ-b-r) as “passed” here. Genesis also joins crossing to a destination, opening the movement in Judges, from “thence” to Micah’s house, as a passage that arrives at a threshold.
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