What Does Acts 5:18 Mean?
And they cast their hands upon the sent ones and placed them in the public keeping.
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 laid their hands on the apostles, and put them in the common prison.THE KEY
The apostles are confined as prisoners, yet their name still means people sent out.
THE MEANING
You can be physically held in one place by another person’s power. That confinement does not, by itself, erase the sending that defines the apostles; their location changes, but their name still points outward.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
Being held back does not necessarily mean the sending over your life has ended.
THE ROOT
ἀποστόλους
apostólous
GROWS FROM
ἀποστέλλω
apostéllō
To send out or dispatch.
“Apostles” can sound like a title, but its Greek word carries movement: these are people sent out. The verse places that outward direction beside public custody, their bodies are held in, while their name still points out.
ALSO GROWS
apostéllō: To send out or dispatch.
ἀποστέλλω
This is the sending verb behind the apostles’ name; the verse’s confinement does not remove that meaning.
apostolē: A sending, commission, or apostleship.
ἀποστολή
This branch names the act or commission of sending, keeping the apostles’ identity tied to a movement outward.
ἐπέβαλον τὰς χεῖρας
epébalon tas cheiras
GROWS FROM
βάλλω
bállō
To throw, cast, or put.
“laid their hands” in this verse is epébalon tas cheiras. The verb translated “laid” comes from a word for throwing or putting something onto something else. It keeps the force of the arrest in view: hands are imposed on the apostles to take hold of them.
ALSO GROWS
epibállō: To lay or throw upon.
ἐπιβάλλω
This is the verb used here; its “upon” sense makes the physical seizure visible.
ekbállō: To cast out or drive out.
ἐκβάλλω
It shares the root for throwing or casting, showing how the compound can describe force directed outward, while this verse describes hands laid upon the apostles.
THE PATTERN
A body can be held in custody while sending and release remain active.
Who makes judgment for the pressed, who gives bread to the hungry. The LORD loosens the bound.And behold, the messenger of the LORD stood over him, and a light shone in the prison, and he struck Peter on the side and raised him up, saying, "Stand up quickly." And his chains fell away from his hands.Then Jesus said to them again, Wholeness be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.THE THREAD
Then Jesus said to them again, Wholeness be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.John’s Greek form ἀπέσταλκεν (apéstalken, “has sent”) comes from ἀποστέλλω (apostéllō, “send out”), the word family behind “apostles.” The shared root makes custody a condition around the sent ones, not a cancellation of their sending.
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