What Does 2 Corinthians 2:10 Mean?
To whom you release anything, I release also. For what I have released, if anything at all, I have released it for your sake in the face of the Anointed One.
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
To whom ye forgive any thing, I forgive also: for if I forgave any thing, to whom I forgave it, for your sakes forgave I it in the person of Christ;THE KEY
Forgiveness here is a shared release, freely given in Christ’s presence for the good of the whole community.
THE MEANING
When you release someone, that release does not remain yours alone; others join in it. The act serves the community in Christ’s presence.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that forgiveness is only a private act between the one who was harmed and the one who caused harm: here, release is shared for the community’s sake.
THE ROOT
χαρίζομαι
charizomai
GROWS FROM
χαρι-
charis word-family
Favor freely given; to grant freely.
“release anything” in this verse is charizomai. Alongside the sense of release, this Greek word keeps a gift-shaped motion visible: favor is freely bestowed. The same release passes between the community and Paul, held in Christ’s person for their sake.
ALSO GROWS
charis: favor
χάρις
This is the word-family behind the verb: forgiveness carries the sense of favor freely given.
charisma: gift, a freely given endowment
χάρισμα
The related word shows favor taking the shape of a gift, illuminating release as something freely granted.
charitoō: to favor, bestow favor
χαριτόω
This related verb makes the word-family’s movement explicit: favor is actively bestowed.
THE PATTERN
Release moves beyond the one who offers it: a burden is sent away, and forgiveness is extended between people and God.
The goat carries upon himself all their crookedness into a cut-off land, and he sends the goat away into the wilderness.For if you release people's false steps, your heavenly Father will also release yours.And be useful to one another, tender in the inward parts, releasing one another, just as God in the Anointed One has released you.THE THREAD
Holding up one another, and releasing one another, if anyone has a complaint against another, just as the Anointed One released you, so also you do.Both verses use χαρίζομαι (charizomai), the verb of freely granting favor, for forgiveness. Colossians makes the movement explicit in both directions: Christ releases you, and you release one another; 2 Corinthians shows that this shared release serves the community in Christ’s presence.
Read the SDV Bible.
Every verse has a Deep Dive in the app.
The iPhone Bible app with the Selah Decoded Version.
Does something in this reading look wrong? Tell us