What Does John 9:10 Mean?
So they said to him, How were your eyes opened?
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
Therefore said they unto him, How were thine eyes opened?THE KEY
The change in sight is visible before anyone understands how the opening happened.
THE MEANING
The people can see that his eyes are open, yet they still ask how it happened. A changed capacity is present before its cause is clear. The verse meets you wherever a real change is easier to recognize than to explain.
THE ROOT
ἠνεῴχθησαν
ēneōchthēsan
GROWS FROM
ἀνοίγω
anoigō
To open, to open up.
The verb appears in the passive: his eyes “were opened,” foregrounding a change he receives. This opening family also describes eyes coming to sight and perception opening to recognition, a connection the English word “opened” leaves mostly hidden.
ALSO GROWS
dianoigō: To open through or fully; also to open understanding.
διανοίγω
Luke 24:31 uses this expanded form when the travelers’ eyes are opened, sharing the same opening root.
ánoigma: An opening or aperture.
ἄνοιγμα
This related noun names the opening itself, keeping attention on the newly available passage of sight.
THE PATTERN
An opening changes what can be perceived, whether eyes receive sight or a heart receives a message.
And the eyes of them both were opened, and they perceived that they were bare, and they sewed fig leaves together, and made for themselves waistcloths.And their eyes were thrown open, and they recognized him, and he became unseen to them.And a certain woman named Lydia, a seller of purple from the city of Thyatira, who stood in awe of God, listened to us. The Lord opened her heart wide, and she held fast to the things Paul spoke.THE THREAD
And their eyes were thrown open, and they recognized him, and he became unseen to them.John’s question centers on how bodily sight opened; Luke uses an expanded form of the same Greek opening verb when eyes open into recognition. The shared root lets the physical opening in John resonate with perception becoming recognizable in Luke.
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