What Does Ephesians 1:23 Mean?

Which is his body, the fullness of the one who fills all things in all.

Ephesians 1:23 · SDV

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.

This verse in the King James

King James wording

King James Version

Which is his body, the fulness of him that filleth all in all.

THE KEY

The body is the fullness of the one who is actively filling everything.

THE MEANING

The body is his fullness now; the one filling all things is present through embodied people. The repeated Greek word family ties “fulness” and “filleth” together, holding the body’s fullness within his ongoing act of filling all in all.

WHAT THIS UNDOES

This undoes the belief that Christ’s fullness is detached from his embodied people.

THE ROOT

πλήρωμα

plērōma

GROWS FROM

⁨πληρόω⁩ (plēroō), family stem ⁨πληρ-⁩ (plēr-)

To fill, make full, bring to fullness.

“fills” in this verse is plērōma. The repeated ⁨πληρ-⁩ sound binds “fulness” and “filleth” into one word family. The body is named as the fullness of the one whose ongoing action is to fill all in all.

ALSO GROWS

plērēs: Full, complete.

πλήρης

This related form carries the same sense of fullness that the verse names as the body’s relation to him.

plēroō: To fill, fulfill, bring to completion.

πληρόω

This is the verb behind “filleth”; it connects the body’s fullness with his active filling of all things.

THE PATTERN

God’s fullness extends into all things and takes shape in an embodied people.

And let his weighty name be blessed for the ages, and let the whole earth be filled with his weight. Amen, and amen.

Psalm 72:19 · SDVThe whole earth is described as filled with God’s glory, widening the verse’s image of fullness beyond the body.

And to know the love of the Anointed One, which is thrown beyond knowing, that you might be filled to all the fullness of God.

Ephesians 3:19 · SDVGod’s fullness is something people receive and embody, echoing the body named as Christ’s fullness.

Now you are the body of the Anointed One, and limbs, each from its portion.

1 Corinthians 12:27 · SDVThe body is made of distinct people held together as Christ’s embodied presence.

THE THREAD

The one who went down is the same one who went up far above all the heavens, that he might fill all things.

Ephesians 4:10 · SDV

Ephesians 1:23 places ⁨πλήρωμα⁩ (plērōma, fullness) beside a form of ⁨πληρόω⁩ (plēroō, to fill); Ephesians 4:10 uses ⁨πληρῶσαι⁩ (plērōsai, to fill) for filling all things. Together they join the body’s fullness to his ongoing act of filling.

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