What Does 1 Peter 3:3 Mean in the King James?
Whose adorning let it not be that outward adorning of plaiting the hair, and of wearing of gold, or of putting on of apparel;
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 word for “adorning,” κόσμος (kosmos), also names the ordered world, linking outward display to a larger visible arrangement.
THE MEANING
This verse speaks to you now: hair, gold, and clothing are visible arrangements, but they do not contain the whole of your person. What can be put on does not exhaust who you are.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that visible polish is what makes a person complete or worthy.
THE ROOT
κόσμος
kosmos
GROWS FROM
κοσμ-
kosm-
Order, arrangement, adornment; the same word also names the world as an ordered whole. This is a Greek word stem, not a Hebrew-style three-letter root.
Greek holds adornment, ordered arrangement, and the world in one word family. English “adorning” narrows the sense to ornament, while κόσμος (kosmos, adornment or ordered world) lets outward display echo the wider visible order.
ALSO GROWS
kosmeō: To arrange, put in order, adorn.
κοσμέω
This verb appears in 1 Timothy 2:9, where the same word family describes how women adorn themselves.
kosmios: Orderly, well-arranged, respectable.
κόσμιος
This branch shows that the root’s sense of adornment carries the idea of arrangement, not merely decoration.
THE PATTERN
Scripture distinguishes visible appearance from the deeper measure of a person.
But the LORD said unto Samuel, Look not on his countenance, or on the height of his stature; because I have refused him: for the Lord seeth not as man seeth; for man looketh on the outward appearance, but the LORD looketh on the heart.Favour is deceitful, and beauty is vain: but a woman that feareth the LORD, she shall be praised.In like manner also, that women adorn themselves in modest apparel, with shamefacedness and sobriety; not with broided hair, or gold, or pearls, or costly array;THE THREAD
In like manner also, that women adorn themselves in modest apparel, with shamefacedness and sobriety; not with broided hair, or gold, or pearls, or costly array;Peter’s noun κόσμος (kosmos, adornment or arrangement) and this verse’s verb κοσμέω (kosmeō, to arrange or adorn) belong to the same Greek word family. Both make visible appearance an arrangement, while this verse names modesty and sobriety as part of that arrangement.
Read the SDV Bible.
Every verse has a Deep Dive in the app.
The iPhone Bible app with the Selah Decoded Version.
Does something in this reading look wrong? Tell us