What Does 2 Peter 2:6 Mean in the King James?
And turning the cities of Sodom and Gomorrha into ashes condemned them with an overthrow, making them an ensample unto those that after should live ungodly;
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 ashes are not just what remains after judgment; they are the example made visible.
THE MEANING
The cities’ collapse is exposed as a pattern that condemns the way leading toward ungodliness. The image still addresses the reader now: ruin can become a visible warning whose meaning is carried forward by what remains.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The lie that destruction is only an ending, leaving nothing to teach those who follow. Here the overthrow becomes an example for those still to come.
THE ROOT
ὑπόδειγμα
hypodeigma
GROWS FROM
δεικ-
deik-
To show or point out.
“ensample” in this verse is hypodeigma. English “example” can sound like an illustration attached to the story. The Greek word belongs to the family of showing: the overthrow is set in view as a pattern that makes the outcome legible.
ALSO GROWS
deiknymi: To show, point out.
δείκνυμι
This is the root action: making something visible for another to see.
hypodeiknymi: To show or point out.
ὑποδείκνυμι
This related verb carries the act of presenting something as a demonstration.
apodeixis: Demonstration, proof.
ἀπόδειξις
A demonstration makes its point through what it sets before the observer.
καταστροφή
katastrophē
GROWS FROM
στρεφ-
streph-
To turn or twist.
“overthrow” in this verse is katastrophē. The Greek word carries the image of a turning over. The city’s collapse is not an abstract verdict here: its overturned state is what becomes visible as an example.
ALSO GROWS
strephō: To turn, twist.
στρέφω
This is the turning motion contained in the word for overthrow.
katastrephō: To overturn, overthrow.
καταστρέφω
This form makes the turning downward explicit, matching the cities’ collapse.
apostrephō: To turn away.
ἀποστρέφω
The same root can describe a turning in another direction, showing how much meaning the root carries beyond simple destruction.
THE PATTERN
What is overturned becomes a visible warning for those who come after.
And he overthrew those cities, and all the plain, and all the inhabitants of the cities, and that which grew upon the ground.Even as Sodom and Gomorrha, and the cities about them in like manner, giving themselves over to fornication, and going after strange flesh, are set forth for an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire.Now all these things happened unto them for ensamples: and they are written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the world are come.THE THREAD
For I have given you an example, that ye should do as I have done to you.The Greek word translated “ensample” here, ὑπόδειγμα (hypodeigma), is the same word Jesus uses for “example.” Its root centers on showing: here the visible pattern is ruin; in Jesus’ sentence it is an enacted model.
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