What Does Nahum 3:13 Mean in the King James?
Behold, thy people in the midst of thee are women: the gates of thy land shall be set wide open unto thine enemies: the fire shall devour thy bars.
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 city’s defeat is complete when its boundary stops holding: its people are exposed, its gates open, and its bars become fuel.
THE MEANING
The taunt casts the city’s own people as women, naming them as unable to defend it; its gates stand open to enemies, and fire consumes the bars meant to hold them out. The image shows vulnerability within the boundary itself: protection has failed at every layer.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The verse overturns the belief that visible defenses guarantee safety: when the gates open and the bars burn, their appearance cannot keep danger out.
THE ROOT
נִפְתְּחוּ
niftəḥu
GROWS FROM
פתח
To open, unfasten, or make an entrance.
“opened wide” in this verse is niftəḥu. The verb describes the boundary becoming permeable, giving the enemies access through the city’s gates. This root also names the opening itself and the key that opens it, linking the breach to the threshold and its means of access.
ALSO GROWS
pataḥ: To open or unfasten
פָּתַח
It is the verb whose action leaves the gates exposed.
petaḥ: Entrance, doorway, or opening
פֶּתַח
The root names both the act of opening and the threshold through which entry happens.
maphteaḥ: Key
מַפְתֵּחַ
The key belongs to the same word family: the verse’s danger is access granted through an opening.
אָכְלָה
ʾāḵəlâ
GROWS FROM
אכל
To eat or consume.
“devour” in this verse is ʾāḵəlâ. The fire is pictured as eating the bars, not merely scorching them. What should secure the threshold becomes fuel, so the barrier disappears through consumption.
ALSO GROWS
ʾākhal: To eat
אָכַל
The verb’s basic sense makes the fire’s action concrete: it eats through the city’s defense.
maʾakhal: Food, something eaten
מַאֲכָל
The bars become what the fire consumes, turning protection into fuel.
ʾokhel: Eater, one who eats
אֹכֵל
The fire functions as the eater in the image, consuming the barrier itself.
THE PATTERN
A gate is a boundary whose opening determines whether force enters or a captive gets out.
For he hath broken the gates of brass, and cut the bars of iron in sunder.I will go before thee, and make the crooked places straight: I will break in pieces the gates of brass, and cut in sunder the bars of iron:When they were past the first and the second ward, they came unto the iron gate that leadeth unto the city; which opened to them of his own accord: and they went out, and passed on through one street; and forthwith the angel departed from him.THE THREAD
In the six hundredth year of Noah’s life, in the second month, the seventeenth day of the month, the same day were all the fountains of the great deep broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened.Both verses use נִפְתְּחוּ (niftəḥu, ‘were opened’), from פתח (pataḥ, ‘to open’). In Nahum, the opening gives enemies entry; here, opened windows release floodwaters. The same root marks a sealed boundary giving way, while the force passing through takes a different form.
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