What Does 1 Peter 1:23 Mean?
Having been birthed again, not from seed that can be ruined but from what cannot be ruined, through the word of God, living and remaining for the ages.
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
Being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of God, which liveth and abideth for ever.THE KEY
Your new birth comes through a seed that does not decay, because its source, the living word, continues.
THE MEANING
Your life is being brought forth through God’s living word, whose source is not subject to decay. That word remains, so the life it generates is held by something that outlasts what wears down.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
This undoes the belief that whatever is born in you must share the lifespan and fate of what is perishable.
THE ROOT
σπορᾶς
sporas
GROWS FROM
σπείρω (speirō), sow; root family σπειρ- (speir-)
To sow or scatter seed; the noun names what is sown.
The Greek word for seed belongs to the same family as the verb for sowing, so it carries the action of planting within it. The verse joins that planted life to God’s living word as its source.
ALSO GROWS
speirō: To sow or scatter seed.
σπείρω
The verb shows that seed belongs to an act of planting, not just to a thing that sits still.
sporos: Seed; what is sown.
σπόρος
This related form preserves the link between sowing and the life that grows from what is planted.
ἀναγεννηθέντες
anagennēthentes
GROWS FROM
γενν- (genn-), from γεννάω (gennaō)
To beget or bring forth by birth.
“birthed again” in this verse is anagennēthentes. The Greek verb names a begetting anew: life is brought forth from a source. The neighboring seed image shows that source as something planted and living.
ALSO GROWS
gennaō: To beget or give birth.
γεννάω
This is the verb at the heart of the phrase, keeping the image of birth concrete.
gennēma: Offspring; that which is born.
γέννημα
The related noun points to the life brought forth by this birth.
μένοντος
menontos
GROWS FROM
μένω (menō), root family μεν- (men-)
To remain, stay, or continue.
“remaining” in this verse is menontos. The verse says the word remains as well as lives. The same word family can name both staying and a dwelling place, joining enduring life with a place to remain.
ALSO GROWS
monē: A dwelling place or abode.
μονή
The noun gives remaining a place-shaped form: somewhere to stay.
epimenō: To continue or remain.
ἐπιμένω
This compound keeps the root’s sense of staying over time.
THE PATTERN
Life that begins through God’s word carries the enduring character of its source.
So shall my word be that goes forth from my mouth. It shall not return to me empty, but shall do what I delight in, and shall break through in the thing to which I sent it.By his own will he bore us forth through the word of truth, so that we might be a kind of firstfruit of his created things.Everyone who has been born of God does not practice falling short, for his seed remains in him, and he is not able to keep missing the mark, for he has been born of God.THE THREAD
But the word of the Lord remains for the ages. And this is the word that was brought to you as good news.The Greek verb translated endureth shares the μένω (menō) root translated abideth in verse 23. This next verse identifies the enduring word as the message preached to you, bringing the source of new birth into the present.
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