What Does 2 Peter 1:2 Mean?
Favor and wholeness be multiplied to you through the full knowing of God and of Jesus our Lord.
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
Grace and peace be multiplied unto you through the knowledge of God, and of Jesus our Lord,THE KEY
Favor and wholeness multiply through the living recognition of God and Jesus.
THE MEANING
Favor and wholeness are multiplied in you through knowing God and Jesus your Lord. This knowing carries recognition through lived acquaintance, so the verse locates their increase in an active relationship with them.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The belief that favor and wholeness are fixed quantities dissolves here: the verse speaks of them multiplying through knowing God and Jesus.
THE ROOT
ἐπίγνωσις
epignōsis
GROWS FROM
γνω-
gnō-
Know, recognize; epignōsis carries the sense of recognition or coming to know.
“full knowing” in this verse is epignōsis. The word translated “knowledge” belongs to the same word family as the verb “to know,” tying understanding to recognition. In this verse, favor and wholeness grow through knowing God and Jesus, not through knowledge left at the level of information.
ALSO GROWS
ginōskō: Know, recognize
γινώσκω
This verb shares the knowing root and shows knowledge as an act of recognition.
gnōsis: Knowledge, understanding
γνῶσις
This noun shares the same root, linking the verse’s epignōsis to knowing and understanding.
epiginōskō: Recognize, come to know
ἐπιγινώσκω
This related verb echoes the verse’s emphasis on knowing God and Jesus through recognition.
THE PATTERN
Knowing God is presented as a source through which life and wholeness increase.
But let the one who boasts boast in this, that he discerns and perceives me, that I am the LORD who does faithful love, judgment, and alignment in the earth. For in these things I delight, says the LORD.And this is the life of the ages, that they might know you, the only God of truth, and Jesus, the Anointed One, whom you have sent.As his divine power has given us all things that belong to life and awe, through the full knowing of the one who called us to weight and strength.THE THREAD
As his divine power has given us all things that belong to life and awe, through the full knowing of the one who called us to weight and strength.The Greek word for “knowledge” here shares the same root as the word in 2 Peter 1:2. The next verse opens that connection further: through knowing God, life and godliness are given.
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