What Does Colossians 3:20 Mean?
Children, hear and respond to your parents in all things, for this is well pleasing to the 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
Children, obey your parents in all things: for this is well pleasing unto the Lord.THE KEY
The Greek word for “obey” is built on “hear”: here, listening already leans toward response.
THE MEANING
This verse speaks to a child now as a relationship where hearing their parents takes the shape of response, across the whole scope named by “in all things.” That response is called well pleasing to the Lord.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the idea that obedience is separate from listening: the verse’s word for obey carries hearing within it.
THE ROOT
ὑπακούω
hypakouō
GROWS FROM
ἀκούω (akouō), joined with ὑπό (hypo)
ἀκούω (akouō) means “hear” or “listen”; joined with ὑπό (hypo), “under,” it forms the sense “hear under” or “heed.”
“hear and respond” in this verse is hypakouō. English “obey” can sound like bare compliance, while the Greek keeps hearing inside the act: ὑπακούω (hypakouō) joins ὑπό (hypo, “under”) to ἀκούω (akouō, “hear”). The verse frames response as attentive hearing carried into action.
ALSO GROWS
hypakoē: obedience, heeding
ὑπακοή
This related noun preserves the same link between hearing and a response that follows.
akoē: hearing, report
ἀκοή
This branch names hearing itself, showing that the word for obey still holds the ear within it.
THE PATTERN
Scripture treats hearing as a response that takes form in what is kept and done.
Hear and respond, O Israel. The LORD our God is one LORD.But he said, Rather, flourishing are those who hear and respond to the word of God and guard it.But be makers of the word, and not hearers only, miscounting yourselves.THE THREAD
Children, hear and respond to your parents in the Lord, for this is aligned.Both verses use the same Greek verb, ὑπακούω (hypakouō, “obey” or “heed”). Ephesians calls this response right; Colossians calls it well pleasing to the Lord, and the shared word keeps hearing at the center of both.
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