What Does Nehemiah 2:17 Mean in the King James?
Then said I unto them, Ye see the distress that we are in, how Jerusalem lieth waste, and the gates thereof are burned with fire: come, and let us build up the wall of Jerusalem, that we be no more a reproach.
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 wall is the visible repair, but the deeper rebuilding is a people no longer defined by the shame of their exposure.
THE MEANING
You see the damage without disguising it: the city lies waste, its gates are burned, and reproach is real. Yet the verse speaks from within a shared “we” that can build again, so the ruin is a condition to be faced and changed, not the reader’s final name.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that visible ruin proves a community is permanently disgraced: the shame is named, but it does not get the final word.
THE ROOT
נִבְנֶה
nivneh
GROWS FROM
בנה
banah
to build, build up, establish
“build” in this verse is nivneh. The same root appears in Genesis 16:2 as אִבָּנֶה (ibaneh), meaning “I may be built,” though the KJV renders it “obtain children.” This root lets rebuilding carry more than the raising of a wall: it can also speak of restoring a shared life and future.
ALSO GROWS
banah: build, build up
בָּנָה
This is the base verb behind the invitation to raise what has collapsed.
binyan: building, structure
בִּנְיָן
The related noun joins the act of building to the structure that the people can inhabit.
ben: son, child
בֵּן
Often linked with בנה, this word carries the image of a household continuing through its children; in Genesis 16:2, building language describes the hope of a future.
THE PATTERN
Repair begins when a community names its breach together and takes up the work of rebuilding.
And they that shall be of thee shall build the old waste places: thou shalt raise up the foundations of many generations; and thou shalt be called, The repairer of the breach, The restorer of paths to dwell in.Ye also, as lively stones, are built up a spiritual house, an holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God by Jesus Christ.THE THREAD
And Sarai said unto Abram, Behold now, the LORD hath restrained me from bearing: I pray thee, go in unto my maid; it may be that I may obtain children by her. And Abram hearkened to the voice of Sarai.The phrase rendered “obtain children” is אִבָּנֶה (ibaneh), meaning “I may be built,” from בנה (banah), “to build.” That same root lets Nehemiah’s call to rebuild the wall open onto the restoration of a community’s life and future.
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