What Does 1 Corinthians 13:7 Mean?
Love covers all things, leans its weight on them, hopes for them, and remains beneath all things.
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
Beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things.THE KEY
The word translated “beareth” also means “covers”: love endures by holding shelter over what presses on it.
THE MEANING
Love shelters what is exposed, places trust, keeps hope open, and remains under pressure; the repeated “all things” gives each verb the same wide reach. Its endurance is active: it covers and stays through the full weight of what comes.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
This undoes the idea that love lasts only while conditions are easy: here love is shelter, trust, hope, and endurance under pressure.
THE ROOT
στέγει
stégei
GROWS FROM
στεγ-
steg-
To cover or roof over; by extension, to bear or endure.
“covers all things” in this verse is stégei. The verb holds sheltering and enduring together: love bears by covering. English carries the sense of bearing, while the root also gives the image of a roof held over what is exposed.
ALSO GROWS
stegē: Roof, covering
στέγη
The roof is a concrete image of the covering present in “beareth.”
stegazō: Cover, shelter, roof over
στεγάζω
This related verb makes explicit the protective action carried within the root.
πιστεύει
pisteuei
GROWS FROM
πιστ-
pist-
Trust, rely on; place confidence in.
“leans its weight on them” in this verse is pisteuei. This is trust one can lean a full weight on, not bare agreement. Love’s believing is a way of relating through reliance.
ALSO GROWS
pistis: Trust, confidence
πίστις
The noun names the trust that the verb expresses as an action.
pistos: Firm, steady; trustworthy
πιστός
The same word family links trust with steadiness, giving “believeth” the feel of reliable reliance.
ὑπομένει
hypomenei
GROWS FROM
μεν- (men-), with ὑπο- (hypo-, under)
To remain; in this compound, to remain under.
“remains beneath all things” in this verse is hypomenei. Endurance is staying under pressure rather than escaping its presence. Set beside shelter, trust, and hope, this staying shows love remaining present through the weight.
ALSO GROWS
menō: Remain, stay
μένω
This is the core verb of remaining within the compound.
hypomonē: Endurance, steadfastness
ὑπομονή
The related noun names the staying power expressed by “endureth.”
THE PATTERN
Love covers what is exposed and persists through pressure in trust, expectation, and endurance.
Hatred wakes strife, but love covers all rebellions.And above all, hold love stretched out among yourselves, for love covers a multitude of missed marks.Remembering without a gap your work of trust, your toil of love, and your remaining under of hope in our Lord Jesus, the Anointed One, before the face of God and our Father.THE THREAD
If others share this right over you, are we not even more so? Yet we have not used this right, but bear all things, lest we block the good news of the Anointed One.The verb here is στέγω (stegō), “cover” or “bear,” the same root rendered “beareth” in 1 Corinthians 13:7. Here it is translated “suffer,” showing that this covering word also names what is borne under pressure.
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