What Does John 16:29 Mean?
His disciples said to him, Look, now you speak in full voice, and you speak no saying.
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
His disciples said unto him, Lo, now speakest thou plainly, and speakest no proverb.THE KEY
The speech has come out from behind the proverb, but hearing that it is plain does not yet prove its meaning has fully landed.
THE MEANING
You recognize when words stop reaching you through a figure and come into the open. Yet clear wording and full understanding are not the same thing.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The belief that recognizing a message as clear means you have already understood all it reveals.
THE ROOT
παρρησίᾳ
parrēsia
GROWS FROM
παρρησία
Open, unrestricted speech; frankness.
“in full voice” in this verse is parrēsia. The word translated “plainly” carries the sense of speaking openly and without reserve. Set beside παροιμία, “proverb” or figurative saying, it marks a change from speech mediated by a figure to speech out in the open, though openness alone does not guarantee that its meaning has fully landed.
ALSO GROWS
parrēsia: Frankness or freedom of speech.
παρρησία
This is the dictionary form behind the verse’s “plainly,” naming speech that comes into the open.
parrēsiazomai: To speak openly or boldly.
παρρησιάζομαι
The related verb shows the same quality as an act: saying something without reserve.
THE PATTERN
Speech becomes public and direct when what was veiled or unspoken is voiced openly.
I have spoken these things to you in sayings. An hour is coming when I will no longer speak to you in sayings, but in full voice I will bring you word of the Father.Now when they saw the boldness of Peter and John, and grasped that they were unlettered and ordinary men, they marveled, and they knew them, that they had been with Jesus.Wisdom rings out in the open; in the wide places she gives her voice.THE THREAD
I have spoken these things to you in sayings. An hour is coming when I will no longer speak to you in sayings, but in full voice I will bring you word of the Father.The same word translated “plainly” here appears in Jesus’ promise to disclose the Father plainly, after speaking in proverbs. The disciples recognize that shift in this verse; the connection leaves open whether they yet grasp everything it reveals.
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