What Does 1 Corinthians 16:11 Mean?
Let no one therefore treat him as nothing, but send him forward in wholeness, so that he may come to me, for I wait for him with the brothers.
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
Let no man therefore despise him: but conduct him forth in peace, that he may come unto me: for I look for him with the brethren.THE KEY
The verse answers contempt with a concrete act: send the person onward accompanied by wholeness, toward a community already waiting.
THE MEANING
Another person’s contempt does not make you insignificant. Regard takes shape in accompanying someone forward in wholeness, while others make room and wait to receive him. Sending and welcoming belong to the same act of communal care.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The lie that another person’s contempt determines your worth dissolves here: the response is care that honors and accompanies the person.
THE ROOT
ἐξουθενήσῃ
exouthenēsē
GROWS FROM
οὐδέν
ouden
Nothing; treating someone as though they amount to nothing.
“treat as nothing” in this verse is exouthenēsē. The word translated “despise” carries the image of making someone nothing in your regard. The verse places that reduction beside an active response: accompany him onward and wait to receive him.
ALSO GROWS
ouden: Nothing.
οὐδέν
This is the word-stuff beneath the contempt verb: the person is regarded as nothing.
exoutheneō: Treat as nothing; despise.
ἐξουθενέω
This is the verb used here, making contempt a way of reducing someone in your regard.
exoudenoō: Treat as nothing; regard with contempt.
ἐξουδενόω
This variant form makes the same underlying image visible: contempt counts a person as nothing.
προπέμψατε
propempsate
GROWS FROM
πέμπω
pempō
Send; with προ- (pro-) in this compound, send forward or onward.
“send him forward” in this verse is propempsate. The verb can mean more than dispatching someone: it can carry the sense of escorting or helping someone on the way. The verse’s answer to contempt is practical accompaniment.
ALSO GROWS
pempō: Send.
πέμπω
The base action is sending; the compound directs that action forward.
propempō: Send forward; accompany on a journey.
προπέμπω
This is the verse’s verb: care extends into helping him continue onward.
propompē: An escort or help on a journey.
προπομπή
The related noun shows the concrete support contained in this kind of sending.
εἰρήνῃ
eirēnē
GROWS FROM
εἰρην-
eirēn-
Peace as wholeness and harmony.
The phrase “in peace” carries the sense of being sent forward in wholeness. The verse joins the act of sending with the condition in which the person is held and received.
ALSO GROWS
eirēnē: Peace; wholeness.
εἰρήνη
This is the word in the verse: Timothy is sent onward within wholeness.
eirēneuō: Be at peace; live peaceably.
εἰρηνεύω
The related verb shows peace as a lived condition, not merely a quiet departure.
eirēnikos: Peaceable; conducive to peace.
εἰρηνικός
The word family keeps the focus on a whole, peaceable relation as he is sent onward.
THE PATTERN
Honor becomes visible when people are sent onward with care and received with regard.
Who have borne witness to your love before the assembly, whom you will do well to send on their way in a manner that matches the weight of God.And after they had stayed there a while, they were let go in wholeness from the brethren to the sent ones.Take him in, therefore, in the Lord, with all joy; and hold such people as precious.THE THREAD
Let no one look down on your youth, but become an imprint of the steady ones, in word, in how you walk, in love, in breath, in trust, in cleanness.The same Greek verb for “despise” appears in both verses. Together they reveal contempt as treating someone as nothing, while refusing that reduction preserves a person’s dignity and makes room for their example.
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