What Does 2 Corinthians 10:11 Mean?
Let such a one count this, that as we are in word through letters when absent, such we are also in the work when present.
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 such an one think this, that, such as we are in word by letters when we are absent, such will we be also in deed when we are present.THE KEY
Distance does not divide the person who speaks from the person whose actions arrive.
THE MEANING
The words you send from a distance carry the same character as the actions people meet when you are present. Presence does not create a different self; it makes visible in action what your words have already expressed.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that distance lets you claim one character in your words and live out another in person.
THE ROOT
λόγῳ
logō
GROWS FROM
λεγ-/λογ- (λέγω)
To say, speak, or give an account; λόγος means word or speech.
The verse’s “think” (λογιζέσθω, logizesthō) belongs to the λογίζομαι (logizomai) word family, related to λόγος. Considering and speaking are linked in the Greek, as if the words in the letters already give an account of the person whose actions will appear.
ALSO GROWS
logizomai: Reckon, consider, or account for.
λογίζομαι
The verse uses this family for “think,” joining what is considered to what is expressed in words.
logion: A saying or utterance.
λόγιον
Like λόγος, it names spoken words, the kind of expression that can be tested against a person’s actions.
ἔργῳ
ergō
GROWS FROM
ἐργ-
Work or action done.
“Deed” is not an abstract quality here; ἔργον names the work that becomes visible when someone is present. The letters and the actions are different forms of expression, but the verse says the same person is revealed in both.
ALSO GROWS
ergazomai: To work or do.
ἐργάζομαι
It makes the root’s action concrete: what a person does is the work that can be seen.
ergatēs: A worker.
ἐργάτης
The worker is known through the work, echoing the verse’s link between a person’s words and actions.
THE PATTERN
A person’s words and actions are two ways the same character becomes visible.
He who walks whole, works alignment, and speaks truth in his heart.And whatever you do, in word or in work, do all in the nature of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.Little children, let us not love in word, nor in the tongue, but in works and in truth.THE THREAD
But someone will say, You have trust, and I have works. Show me your trust without your works, and I will show you my trust by my works.“Works” here is ἔργων (ergōn), from the same root as “deed” in 2 Corinthians 10:11. Both verses make action visible evidence of what words claim.
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