What Does Acts 20:14 Mean?
And when he came together with us at Assos, we took him aboard, and came to Mitylene.
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
And when he met with us at Assos, we took him in, and came to Mitylene.THE KEY
The word for “met” carries the sense of bringing things together, and the next action turns that meeting into a shared journey.
THE MEANING
A meeting can change who travels with you: one person is met at Assos, taken aboard, and included in the group’s arrival at Mitylene. Here, belonging takes a concrete form, a place in the journey.
THE ROOT
συνέβαλεν
synebalen
GROWS FROM
βαλλ-
ball-
The Greek verbal stem βαλλ- (ball-) carries the basic sense of throwing or putting.
“met” in this verse is synebalen. The verb συμβάλλω (symballō), “bring together” or “meet,” joins σύν (syn), “together,” with βάλλω (ballō), “throw” or “put.” The meeting is pictured as a convergence: separate travelers come together before continuing as one company.
ALSO GROWS
ballō: Throw, cast, put.
βάλλω
This is the basic verbal stem inside συμβάλλω, lending the meeting its image of things brought together.
symballō: Bring together, meet, confer.
συμβάλλω
This is the verb used here: the travelers come together at Assos.
ἀναλαβόντες
analabontes
GROWS FROM
λαμβαν-
lamban-
The verbal stem λαμβαν- (lamban-) carries the sense of taking or receiving.
“took him aboard” in this verse is analabontes. The form comes from ἀναλαμβάνω (analambanō), “take up” or “take along.” In the ship’s context, the meeting becomes tangible: they take him aboard and continue the route with him.
ALSO GROWS
lambanō: Take, receive.
λαμβάνω
This is the base verb beneath the action of taking him along.
paralambanō: Take along, receive.
παραλαμβάνω
This related compound makes the sense of receiving someone into one’s company especially visible.
THE PATTERN
Receiving someone into the journey turns a meeting into shared movement toward a destination.
And Ruth said, Do not press me to let go of you, or to turn back from following after you. For where you walk, I will walk, and where you lodge, I will lodge. Your people are my people, and your God my God.And it happened, while they talked and searched together, that Jesus himself drew near and went with them.Then they willingly received him into the boat, and immediately the boat was at the land whither they went.THE THREAD
And we went ahead to the ship, and put out for Assos, there intending to take Paul aboard; for so he had set it in order, he himself meaning to go on foot.Acts 20:13 uses ἀναλαμβάνω (analambanō), “take up” or “take along,” for the group’s plan to take Paul aboard. Verse 14 repeats that verb for the completed action after they meet at Assos: the planned reunion becomes the shared voyage.
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