What Does John 8:48 Mean?
Then the Jews answered him, and said, Do we not speak well, that you are a Samaritan and have a demon?
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
Then answered the Jews, and said unto him, Say we not well that thou art a Samaritan, and hast a devil?THE KEY
By calling him both an outsider and demon-bearing, his accusers shift the dispute from what he says to what kind of person they say he is.
THE MEANING
The verse exposes a move that still happens now: a speaker is marked as an outsider and as carrying a hostile spirit, so attention shifts from the words to the speaker. The accusation presents that label as obvious, but it does not answer the claim being made.
THE ROOT
δαιμόνιον
daimonion
GROWS FROM
δαίμων (daimōn), with word-family stem δαιμον-
A spirit-being or supernatural power; in this accusation, a hostile spirit.
The Greek wording says Jesus has a demon; it does not name Jesus himself as that being. The accusation frames his words as coming under hostile spiritual influence, shifting attention from what he says to the source they assign him.
ALSO GROWS
daimōn: A spirit-being or deity.
δαίμων
This related word shows the spirit-being at the center of the word family.
daimonizomai: To be under demonic influence or possessed.
δαιμονίζομαι
This related verb shows how the word family describes a person’s claimed relation to a hostile spirit.
daimoniōdēs: Demonic; belonging to a demon.
δαιμονιώδης
This adjective carries the same word family into a description of something as demonic.
ἔχεις
echeis
GROWS FROM
ἔχω
echō
To have, hold, or possess.
“hast” in this verse is echeis. The verb makes the demon something the accusers claim Jesus has. Their words cast him as bearing hostile agency, turning his identity into their answer to his speech.
ALSO GROWS
katechō: To hold fast, retain, or restrain.
κατέχω
This compound shows the root’s sense of holding or keeping something in hand.
metechō: To share in or partake of.
μετέχω
Here the same root extends from having something to sharing in it.
THE PATTERN
A word that unsettles its hearers can be met by discrediting or attacking the messenger who speaks it.
And the writers of instruction who came down from Jerusalem said, He has Beelzebub, and by the ruler of the demons he throws out the demons.And many of them said, He has a demon and is raving. Why do you hear him?Then the priests and the prophets spoke to the princes and to all the people, saying, "This man bears the judgment of death, for he has prophesied against this city, as you have heard with your ears."THE THREAD
And many of them said, He has a demon and is raving. Why do you hear him?The accusation repeats the same claim that Jesus “hath a devil,” then adds that he is mad and asks why anyone should hear him. That repetition reveals how the label works: it discredits the speaker so his words can be dismissed.
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