What Does John 10:35 Mean?
If he called them gods, to whom the word of God came, and the scripture cannot be loosed.
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
If he called them gods, unto whom the word of God came, and the scripture cannot be broken;THE KEY
“Cannot be broken” means Scripture cannot be loosened out of its force, so the startling name “gods” stays on the page.
THE MEANING
The word of God comes to people, and Scripture names those recipients “gods.” That written claim remains intact; it cannot be loosened or annulled to escape its force. The verse lets this startling human title stand beside the claim that Scripture cannot be undone.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The title “gods” is not a disposable phrase that can be loosened out of Scripture when it unsettles the reader.
THE ROOT
λυθῆναι
lythēnai
GROWS FROM
λύω
lyō
To loosen, untie, or release; here, to undo or annul.
“cannot be loosed” in this verse is lythēnai. English “broken” can sound like destroyed; the Greek is “to be loosened,” with the sense here of being undone or annulled. The line says the written witness cannot be unbound from its claim, even where its wording is startling.
ALSO GROWS
lysis: A loosening or dissolution.
λύσις
It makes the image in “cannot be broken” concrete: Scripture cannot be dissolved or loosened from its force.
apolyō: To release or dismiss.
ἀπολύω
This compound carries the same loosening root; Scripture cannot be dismissed from the argument.
λόγος
logos
GROWS FROM
λεγ-/λογ- (leg-/log-)
To say or recount; λόγος names what is said, a word, message, or account.
The Greek logos can name a word, message, or account. Here the word does not merely sit on a page: it comes to people, and its arrival frames the naming that follows.
ALSO GROWS
legō: To say or speak.
λέγω
It shows the speaking sense carried within λόγος: the word of God comes as something spoken to people.
logion: A divine saying or oracle.
λόγιον
This related word keeps the sense of an utterance from God close to the verse’s “word of God.”
γραφή
graphē
GROWS FROM
γράφω
graphō
To write or inscribe; γραφή is writing, an inscription, or Scripture.
Graphē names Scripture as writing or inscription, placing a word that comes to people beside a written witness. The Greek keeps the act and result of writing audible in the claim that Scripture cannot be undone.
ALSO GROWS
graphō: To write or inscribe.
γράφω
The written form is central here: what has been inscribed cannot be loosened from the claim it carries.
gramma: A letter or written character.
γράμμα
It makes the written witness tangible, like the smallest marks that also remain in Matthew 5:18.
THE PATTERN
A word God speaks and Scripture records retains its force even when its language unsettles ordinary categories.
I have said, You are gods, and all of you are children of the Uppermost.The grass dries, the flower withers, but the word of our God stands for the ages.For truly, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass, by no means shall one iota or one little horn pass from the instruction, until all has come to be.THE THREAD
In the beginning was the word, and the word was turned toward God, and the word was God.The same Greek word, λόγος (logos), appears here and in John 1:1. In this verse the Word comes to people and frames the startling “gods” language; John 1:1 places that same Word with God and identifies the Word as God.
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