What Does Hebrews 10:17 Mean?
And their shortcomings and their breaking away I will remember no more.
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 their sins and iniquities will I remember no more.THE KEY
The promise is not that the misses never happened, but that they no longer remain in the living account.
THE MEANING
The verse names your missing and crookedness as things that are no longer called back into account. It does not say they never happened; it says they no longer define the relation between you and God.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
This undoes the belief that every failure remains an active charge by which God defines you.
THE ROOT
μνησθῶ
mnēsthō
GROWS FROM
μιμνῄσκομαι
mimnēskomai
To remember or call something to mind.
The Greek word translated “remember” belongs to the same word family as words for memory and remembrance. Here, what is no longer recalled is the record of the missing, not because it never existed, but because it is released from the account held against you.
ALSO GROWS
mnēmē: Memory; remembrance.
μνήμη
It shows that remembering is a way of bringing something to mind, which sharpens the force of the promise that the missing is no longer called back.
anamnēsis: Remembrance; a recalling.
ἀνάμνησις
This related word appears in the instruction to remember Jesus, linking the root to what is deliberately kept present.
ἁμαρτιῶν
hamartiōn
GROWS FROM
ἁμαρτάνω
hamartanō
To miss or fail to reach what is aimed at.
“shortcomings” in this verse is hamartiōn. The word names misses, not an unchangeable nature. The promise releases those misses from the record by which a person might be defined.
ALSO GROWS
hamartēma: A miss, error, or wrong action.
ἁμάρτημα
It names a particular failure as something that can be released rather than a permanent identity.
hamartōlos: A person described as a sinner or one who misses.
ἁμαρτωλός
The branch shows how a miss can become a label; this verse says the misses are no longer kept as the defining record.
ἀνομιῶν
anomiōn
GROWS FROM
νόμος
nomos
Instruction, established order, or a guiding rule.
“breaking away” in this verse is anomiōn. The Greek term translated “iniquities” is formed around being outside instruction; it also carries the sense of crookedness found in the Hebrew wording behind this quotation. Alongside the missed mark, it names a course that has strayed from the way, a whole pattern now released from the account.
ALSO GROWS
anomos: Lawless; outside instruction or order.
ἄνομος
It makes visible the word’s contrast with instruction, extending the promise beyond isolated mistakes to a straying course.
nomimos: Lawful; in keeping with a rule or order.
νόμιμος
Its contrast helps reveal the gap between instruction and the crookedness this promise releases.
THE PATTERN
Release breaks the claim of the record: what has gone wrong is moved away, blotted out, or no longer counted against the person.
As far as the east is from the west, so far he puts our rebellions from us.I, even I, I AM, the one who wipes away your rebellion for my own sake, and I will not remember your missed marks.That God was in the Anointed One, exchanging the world back to himself, not counting their falls against them, and setting in us the word of exchange.THE THREAD
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 Greek term translated “remembrance” here belongs to the same word family as “remember” in Hebrews. The shared root sets two things side by side: the missing is no longer recalled, while the offered body is deliberately held in remembrance.
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