What Does 1 John 5:3 Mean?
For this is the love of God, that we guard his commands; and his commands are not heavy.
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
For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments: and his commandments are not grievous.THE KEY
The verse joins love to guarding what is received, then says that what is kept in love is no crushing weight.
THE MEANING
Love for God takes shape now as keeping what God commands, with the sense of guarding and preserving. The verse calls those commands no crushing weight: what is held in love does not press life down as a burden.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
This undoes the belief that God’s commands are necessarily a crushing load set against love; here love and keeping belong together, and the command is named as no crushing weight.
THE ROOT
τηρῶμεν
tērōmen
GROWS FROM
τηρ-
tēr-
to guard, keep watch over, preserve
“guard” in this verse is tērōmen. English “keep” can sound like compliance alone, but τηρέω carries the image of guarding and preserving. Its compound διατηρέω is used when Mary keeps the sayings in her heart, so the keeping here can be heard as care for what is received.
ALSO GROWS
tērēsis: keeping, observance
τήρησις
This noun names the act of keeping; 1 Corinthians 7:19 uses it for keeping God’s commandments, echoing the same link between command and care.
diatēreō: preserve, keep continually
διατηρέω
In Luke 2:51 Mary keeps the sayings in her heart; this branch shows keeping as holding something received in memory and care.
βαρεῖαι
bareiai
GROWS FROM
βαρυ-
bary-
heavy, weighty
The word translated “grievous” literally carries the sense of “heavy.” Its family includes words for weight and for weighing someone down, giving the verse a physical image: God’s commands are not a weight pressing the reader down.
ALSO GROWS
baros: weight, burden
βάρος
This noun makes the load imagery explicit; in Galatians 6:2 it names the burdens people bear.
barynō: weigh down, burden
βαρύνω
This verb describes the pressing force that the verse says God’s commandments do not have.
THE PATTERN
What is held close in love is not experienced as a crushing weight.
But the word is very near to you, in your mouth and in your heart, that you may do it.I delight myself in your commands, which I love.For my yoke fits well, and my load is light.THE THREAD
Jesus answered and said to him, If anyone loves me, that one will guard my word, and my Father will love that one, and we will come to him and make a place to remain with him.John 14:23 uses the same verb τηρέω (tēreō, to keep or guard) for keeping Jesus’ words. There, love, keeping, and divine dwelling sit in one sentence, opening this verse’s keeping as a form of relational care.
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