What Does Acts 20:7 Mean?
And on the first day of the week, when we were gathered together to break bread, Paul talked it through with them, about to leave the next day, and stretched his word out until midnight.
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 upon the first day of the week, when the disciples came together to break bread, Paul preached unto them, ready to depart on the morrow; and continued his speech until midnight.THE KEY
The Greek word rendered “preached” also carries the sense of reasoned discourse, and the verse names the speech that lasts until midnight as a word unfolding.
THE MEANING
The verse holds shared food and sustained teaching within one gathering. Words continue into the night while bread is broken among the disciples, so the table and the unfolding discourse occupy the same communal space. Nourishment and understanding belong together here.
THE ROOT
διελέγετο
dielegeto
GROWS FROM
λέγω
legō
to say or speak; in this word family, to reason or discuss through speech
The verb belongs to a family of speaking and reasoning, and its compound form can describe discussing a matter. The verse then names what continues until midnight as a word or discourse, so “preached” carries an added sense of thought spoken through at length.
ALSO GROWS
dialexis: discussion, discourse
διάλεξις
This related noun makes the discourse sense of the verb visible.
logos: word, discourse
λόγος
The same verse calls Paul’s prolonged speech a word or discourse, linking the act of speaking with what unfolds until midnight.
κλάσαι
klasai
GROWS FROM
κλάω
klaō
to break, break into pieces
“break” in this verse is klasai. The word for breaking shares its root with the noun translated “breaking” in the community’s “breaking of bread.” English keeps the action visible here, while the shared root lets this meal echo a continuing form of life together.
ALSO GROWS
klasis: breaking; breaking of bread
κλάσις
This noun appears in Acts 2:42 for the community’s breaking of bread, linking this meal to a repeated shared practice.
klasma: a broken piece, fragment
κλάσμα
This branch names what results from breaking, making the root’s movement from action to shared pieces clear.
THE PATTERN
Breaking bread becomes a shared act through which recognition and participation are named.
And they led out the things that had happened on the road, and how he was known by them in the breaking of the bread.Is not the cup of blessing that we bless a sharing in common of the blood of the Anointed One? Is not the bread that we break a sharing in common of the body of the Anointed One?And when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, Take, eat. This is my body, which is broken for you. Do this in remembrance of me.THE THREAD
And they held fast in the teaching of the sent ones, and in sharing in common, and in the breaking of bread, and in prayers.Acts 20:7 uses the verb for breaking bread; Acts 2:42 names the same action as the community’s “breaking of bread.” The shared root connects one meal to a repeated practice of life together.
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