What Does 1 Peter 1:4 Mean in the King James?
To an inheritance incorruptible, and undefiled, and that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for you,
The analysis reads the King James wording.
King James Version The King James Version, first published in 1611. Selah Verse shows the standard text.
THE KEY
The inheritance is not merely waiting for you; it is already kept beyond the reach of decay.
THE MEANING
The verse places your promised inheritance beyond decay, contamination, and fading, and says it is kept for you in the heavens. Its security is present even while its full possession is still ahead.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that what is promised to you must already be slipping away: this inheritance is described as neither deteriorating nor unguarded.
THE ROOT
τετηρημένην
tetērēmenēn
GROWS FROM
τηρέω
tēreō
To keep watch over, guard, or preserve.
The Greek form translated “reserved” is a perfect passive participle: the inheritance has been kept and remains in that kept state. The root carries the sense of guarding what is entrusted, beyond merely setting something aside.
ALSO GROWS
tēreō: To keep or guard.
τηρέω
This is the verb beneath “reserved,” showing the inheritance as kept under care.
tērēsis: Keeping or guarding.
τήρησις
This noun names the act or condition of keeping, sharpening the sense of preservation.
ἀμάραντον
amaranton
GROWS FROM
μαραίνω
marainō
To wither or fade.
“fadeth” in this verse is amaranton. The adjective names an inheritance that does not wither. The same root describes a rich man’s fading in James 1:11, drawing a line between the share kept for you and human splendor that withers.
ALSO GROWS
marainō: To wither or fade.
μαραίνω
This verb names the fading that the inheritance is said to escape.
amarantos: Unfading.
ἀμάραντος
This adjective gives the inheritance its quality of enduring without withering.
ἄφθαρτον
aphtharton
GROWS FROM
φθείρω
phtheirō
To spoil, damage, or destroy.
“incorruptible” in this verse is aphtharton. This describes more than something that has not yet decayed; it names something not subject to decay at all. The inheritance stands outside the ordinary course of corruption and loss.
ALSO GROWS
phthora: Corruption or decay.
φθορά
This noun names the decay the inheritance escapes.
phthartos: Perishable or subject to decay.
φθαρτός
This adjective makes the vulnerability denied by “incorruptible” concrete.
THE PATTERN
The promised share is held beyond decay, corruption, and loss.
The LORD is the portion of mine inheritance and of my cup: thou maintainest my lot.But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal:And for this cause he is the mediator of the new testament, that by means of death, for the redemption of the transgressions that were under the first testament, they which are called might receive the promise of eternal inheritance.THE THREAD
For the sun is no sooner risen with a burning heat, but it withereth the grass, and the flower thereof falleth, and the grace of the fashion of it perisheth: so also shall the rich man fade away in his ways.The same root behind “fadeth not away” appears in James where the rich man fades. James shows what withers; 1 Peter describes an inheritance untouched by that same fading.
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