What Does Numbers 3:26 Mean?
And the hangings of the enclosure, and the screen for the opening of the gate of the enclosure, which is by the dwelling and by the altar round about, and the cords of it, for all its serving.
Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.
Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.
King James wording
King James Version
And the hangings of the court, and the curtain for the door of the court, which is by the tabernacle, and by the altar round about, and the cords of it for all the service thereof.THE KEY
The work of service includes every boundary, doorway, and cord that holds the altar’s approach together.
THE MEANING
This verse gathers the court hangings, entrance screen, altar surroundings, and cords into one work of service. In your life now, the structures that hold a meaningful act together belong to that work as fully as its visible center. Support and passage have a place within the service itself.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
Only the visible center counts as service.
THE ROOT
עֲבֹדָתוֹ
avodato
GROWS FROM
עבד
ʿ-b-d
To work, serve, or labor.
“all its serving” in this verse is avodato. The verse’s word for “service” belongs to a root that spans both work and serving. It places the cords, court hangings, and entrance screen within the work itself, revealing that what holds the approach together is part of the service.
ALSO GROWS
eved: Servant
עֶבֶד
The same root connects the person who serves with the work being done; service is both a role and an activity.
avad: To work, serve, or till
עָבַד
This verb can describe labor as well as service, widening the word’s reach to the work that sustains and prepares a place.
THE PATTERN
A shared sacred work is sustained by distinct parts, including the pieces that connect and hold it together.
These are the accountings of the dwelling, the dwelling of the witness, as they were counted according to the mouth of Moses, for the serving of the Levites, by the hand of Ithamar, son of Aaron the priest.But now God has set the limbs, each one of them, in the body, as he willed.from whom the whole body, joined together and knit by every joint that supplies, according to the working in the measure of each part, makes the growth of the body for the building up of itself in love.THE THREAD
These are the accountings of the dwelling, the dwelling of the witness, as they were counted according to the mouth of Moses, for the serving of the Levites, by the hand of Ithamar, son of Aaron the priest.Both verses use עֲבֹדָה (avodah, service/work): Numbers includes the cords and court furnishings within it, and Exodus applies the same word to the tabernacle’s counted work. The shared root lets the quiet labor of holding the whole together appear as service.
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