What Does Colossians 2:13 Mean?
And you, being dead in your stumbles and in the uncircumcision of your flesh, he made you alive together with him, having released us from all our stumbles.
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 you, being dead in your sins and the uncircumcision of your flesh, hath he quickened together with him, having forgiven you all trespasses;THE KEY
The “sins” in which you are dead and the “trespasses” released are the same word in Greek.
THE MEANING
You are made alive together with Christ while every one of those trespasses is released. The verse holds your deadness and shared life in one movement, so the trespasses associated with death do not define your life now.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that your missteps remain an unpaid barrier between you and life with Christ: the very trespasses named alongside death are all released.
THE ROOT
παραπτώμασιν
paraptōmasin
GROWS FROM
πίπτ- (pipt-, fall) with παρά (para-, beside)
A fall beside; a false step or lapse.
“stumbles” in this verse is paraptōmasin. The verse uses the same Greek noun twice, though English renders it first as “sins” and then as “trespasses.” The thing associated with your deadness is the very thing the verse says is released.
ALSO GROWS
piptō: Fall.
πίπτω
This basic verb supplies the image of falling that underlies a trespass as a fall aside.
parapiptō: Fall aside or fall away.
παραπίπτω
This related verb makes visible the sideways fall carried in the word translated “sins” and “trespasses” here.
συνεζωοποίησεν
synezōopoiēsen
GROWS FROM
ζωοποι- (zōopoi-, make alive) with σύν (syn-, together)
Make alive; with the together-prefix, make alive together.
“made you alive together with him” in this verse is synezōopoiēsen. The “together” is built into the verb: you are made alive together with Christ. English can make this sound like life plus companionship, while the word holds them in one shared act.
ALSO GROWS
zōopoieō: Make alive; give life.
ζωοποιέω
This is the life-giving verb without the together-prefix, as in Jesus making the dead live.
syzōopoieō: Make alive together.
συζωοποιέω
This is the same verb family with the shared-life meaning explicit, as in Ephesians 2:5.
χαρισάμενος
charisamenos
GROWS FROM
χαριζ- (chariz-, favor or grant), related to χάρις (charis, favor)
Grant freely as a favor; in this verse, forgive or release.
“released” in this verse is charisamenos. The verb for forgiveness belongs to the word-family of favor and giving. The release of every trespass is expressed as a favoring grant.
ALSO GROWS
charis: Favor.
χάρις
It gives the forgiveness verb its language of favor.
charisma: Gift or favor freely given.
χάρισμα
This related word makes the family’s sense of freely granted favor concrete.
THE PATTERN
God’s life reaches what is dead and makes it live.
Thus says the Lord GOD to these bones, Behold, I will cause breath to enter into you, and you shall live.For just as the Father raises the dead and makes them alive, so the Son makes alive whomever he wills.For as in Adam all die, so also in the Anointed One all will be made alive.THE THREAD
Even when we were dead in our stumbles, he made us alive together with the Anointed One, by favor you have been delivered.Ephesians uses the same Greek verb translated “quickened together,” making explicit that the life-giving act is shared with Christ. It also repeats the movement from being dead in trespasses to being made alive that Colossians holds in one sentence.
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