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Glite Dictionary
2 Kings

2 Kings

2 6.8
A book of the Bible that tells the history of Judah and Israel
  • noun
: 2 Reyes

Examples

  • 2 Kings 15:16 He Menahem, king of Israel, sacked Tiphsah and ripped open all the pregnant women.

    Blog text (33)

  • The prophetic events are beautifully illustrated in 2 Kings, particularly the story of Elijah.

  • In 2 Kings, the fall of Jerusalem is a pivotal moment in the history of Israel.

  • The lessons of faith and leadership can be found throughout 2 Kings as it details the reigns of various kings.

Synonyms

II Kings
vs2 Kings
1 8.8

The second book of the Old Testament that tells the history of Judah and Israel

uses an Arabic numeral in its title instead of Roman numerals

Surface Forms

2 Kings singular

Morphology

2 + king

The meaning 'the second book of Kings' is directly derivable from '2' (second) + 'kings' (plural of king) and follows the common numbering convention for books/volumes. This compositional pattern is cross-linguistically familiar (e.g. Spanish '2 Reyes'), so a B1 learner who knows the constituents will readily infer the MWE's referent.

Etymology

2 Kings gets its name because editors split an older 'Book of Kings' into two parts. The second part keeps telling the story of the kings of Israel and Judah, so 2 Kings refers to 'the second book of Kings' in the Bible.