What Does John 17:8 Mean?
For I have given them the words you gave me. They have taken hold of them, and they have known in truth that I came out from you, and they have leaned their full weight on the fact that you sent me.
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
For I have given unto them the words which thou gavest me; and they have received them, and have known surely that I came out from thee, and they have believed that thou didst send me.THE KEY
Here belief is the far end of a chain: what is given is received, known, and finally trusted as a sending.
THE MEANING
As you receive the words given by the Father to Jesus, you recognize that Jesus comes from the Father. That knowing becomes trust in Jesus as the one the Father sends.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
This undoes the belief that trust is only agreement with a claim from a distance. Here trust grows from words received and recognition of Jesus’ relation to the Father.
THE ROOT
ἐπίστευσαν
episteusan
GROWS FROM
πιστ-
pist-
Trust, reliance, or being persuaded.
“leaned their full weight on the fact that you sent me” in this verse is episteusan. The Greek word translated “believed” belongs to the same word family as trust and what is trustworthy. The verse presents belief as reliance that follows receiving the words and recognizing where Jesus comes from, not as bare agreement.
ALSO GROWS
pistis: Trust, reliance, faith.
πίστις
This noun names the trust expressed by the verb translated “believed.”
pistos: Trustworthy, reliable, firm.
πιστός
This branch connects trusting with the quality of being reliable.
ἀπέστειλας
apesteilas
GROWS FROM
ἀποστέλλω
apostellō
To send forth or dispatch.
Jesus is named here through his relation to the Father: he is the one sent forth. The same verb returns in John 17:18, where Jesus sends his followers into the world.
ALSO GROWS
apostolos: A sent one, envoy, or messenger.
ἀπόστολος
The sent one carries the relation named by the verb in this verse.
apostolē: A sending or mission.
ἀποστολή
This noun makes the act of sending itself visible in the word family.
ἔγνωσαν
egnōsan
GROWS FROM
γινώσκω
ginōskō
To know, recognize, or perceive.
“known” in this verse is egnōsan. This is knowing as recognition, not merely possessing information. What the disciples receive becomes clear to them as Jesus’ origin in the Father.
ALSO GROWS
gnōsis: Knowledge or understanding.
γνῶσις
This noun shows the same family’s movement from knowing to knowledge.
gnōstos: Known or familiar.
γνωστός
This branch carries the sense of what has become recognized.
THE PATTERN
A word received becomes understanding and trust.
The opening of your words gives light; it gives understanding to the open ones.So then trust comes out of hearing, and hearing comes through the word of God.So shall my word be that goes forth from my mouth. It shall not return to me empty, but shall do what I delight in, and shall break through in the thing to which I sent it.THE THREAD
As you sent me into the world, so I also have sent them into the world.The same Greek verb for “send forth” appears in both verses. John 17:8 names Jesus as sent by the Father; here that sending extends through Jesus to those who receive his words.
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