What Does 2 Peter 1:17 Mean?
For he received honor and weight from God the Father, when such a voice was borne to him from the magnificent weight, saying, "This is my beloved Son, in whom I delight."
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 he received from God the Father honour and glory, when there came such a voice to him from the excellent glory, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.THE KEY
The voice from glory gives glory its content: the Father names the Son beloved.
THE MEANING
The Son receives honor and glory from God the Father, while the voice names him beloved and pleasing. The verse holds public weight together with relationship: from the excellent glory comes a declaration of love. The reader encounters honor as something received and spoken, not self-issued.
THE ROOT
δόξα
doxa
GROWS FROM
δοξ-
dox-
recognized reputation, honor, or splendor
Here glory carries weight: it is the recognized significance the Father gives the Son, not mere decoration. The voice comes from that glory and makes its meaning audible by naming him beloved.
ALSO GROWS
doxa: glory, honor, recognized splendor
δόξα
This is the word for glory in the verse; its pairing with honor makes the Son’s received weight explicit.
doxazō: to glorify, honor, or make glorious
δοξάζω
This verb shows the same word-family in action: glory is recognition given or made visible.
endoxos: honored, glorious, held in esteem
ἔνδοξος
This branch shows glory as a state of recognized worth, the kind of weight voiced over the Son.
ἀγαπητός
agapētos
GROWS FROM
ἀγαπ-
agap-
to love, hold dear
“beloved” in this verse is agapētos. The voice identifies the Son through love, not through a list of accomplishments. The same family names both the act of loving and the love itself, so belovedness is the relationship at the center of the declaration.
ALSO GROWS
agapaō: to love, hold dear
ἀγαπάω
The verb makes the beloved Son’s description relational: he is the one held in love.
agapē: love, affection, regard
ἀγάπη
This noun reveals the love carried inside the word translated beloved.
εὐδόκησα
eudokēsa
GROWS FROM
εὐδοκ-
eudok-
to regard favorably, take pleasure in
The Father’s pleasure is spoken alongside the Son’s belovedness, binding delight to relationship. The voice does not leave approval abstract; it names the one in whom the Father takes pleasure.
ALSO GROWS
eudokeō: to be pleased with, approve
εὐδοκέω
This is the verb-family behind the Father’s stated pleasure in the Son.
eudokia: good pleasure, favor
εὐδοκία
This branch shows the favor contained in the Father’s declaration.
THE PATTERN
The divine voice identifies the beloved one by joining relationship with public recognition.
Look, my servant, whom I hold up, my chosen one, in whom my living soul delights. I have set my breath upon him. He will bring out judgment to the nations.And look, a voice out of the heavens, saying, This is my beloved Son, in whom I have delighted.While he was still speaking, look, a shining cloud cast its shade over them, and look, a voice came out of the cloud, saying, This is my beloved Son, in whom I delight; hear him.THE THREAD
Who, being the radiance of his weight and the exact stamp of his foundation, carrying all things by the word of his power, when he had made the cleansing of shortcomings, sat down at the right hand of the Greatness on high.Hebrews uses the same Greek word for glory, δόξα (doxa), and calls the Son its brightness. That shared word lets the glory from which the voice speaks in 2 Peter be heard as weight and splendor borne by the Son.
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