What Does 2 Timothy 4:7 Mean in the King James?
I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith:
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 verse’s final measure is trust guarded through the contest and all the way to its finish.
THE MEANING
Your life is a course where strain and completion coexist, and trust is something guarded through it. The verse holds struggle, finishing, and trust together as parts of one continuous life.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It dissolves the belief that a difficult struggle means trust has been lost; here, effort and guarded trust endure together through the finish.
THE ROOT
τετήρηκα
tetērēka
GROWS FROM
τηρ-
tēr-
To keep, guard, watch over, or preserve.
The Greek verb τηρέω (tēreō, to guard or preserve) gives “kept” the sense of watching over something entrusted to you. Its perfect form presents that keeping as completed and still bearing on the present: trust has been guarded through the course.
ALSO GROWS
syntēreō: Preserve or keep safe.
συντηρέω
This compound verb carries the same keeping into careful preservation, illuminating the sustained care implied by “I have kept.”
tērēsis: Keeping, custody, or observance.
τήρησις
This noun names the act of keeping itself, showing that the verse describes trust as something held and guarded.
πίστιν
pistin
GROWS FROM
πειθ-
peith-
To persuade or bring confidence; to trust.
“faith” in this verse is pistin. The word πίστις (pistis, trust) belongs to a family that describes trusting and being firm or steady. Here, trust is something you lean your full weight on and keep present through the course, not merely an idea you hold.
ALSO GROWS
peithō: Persuade, win confidence, or trust.
πείθω
This related verb reveals the confidence carried within trust, the reliance that remains through effort.
pisteuō: Trust or entrust oneself.
πιστεύω
This verb makes trust an act of reliance, clarifying what the speaker has kept through the struggle.
pistos: Firm, steady, or trustworthy.
πιστός
This related word connects trust with steadiness, echoing the endurance of the completed course.
ἀγῶνα
agōna
GROWS FROM
ἀγων-
agōn-
A contest or struggle, especially an athletic contest.
“fight” in this verse is agōna. The Greek ἀγών (agōn, contest) can name demanding athletic effort as well as struggle. Its related forms describe contending in a contest, and the verse’s “course” continues that image of sustained effort.
ALSO GROWS
agōnizomai: Contend or strive in a contest.
ἀγωνίζομαι
This verb makes the effort of the “fight” explicit as sustained contention.
agōnistēs: Contestant or competitor.
ἀγωνιστής
This related noun names one who enters the contest, connecting the struggle to the personal course being completed.
THE PATTERN
A course is completed through persistent effort that guards what gives life and releases what impedes it.
Take fast hold of instruction; let her not go: keep her; for she is thy life.Know ye not that they which run in a race run all, but one receiveth the prize? So run, that ye may obtain.Wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us,THE THREAD
Fight the good fight of faith, lay hold on eternal life, where unto thou art also called, and hast professed a good profession before many witnesses.The same Greek noun ἀγών (agōn, “contest”) appears in “fight,” while πίστις (pistis, “trust”) names its field. This makes explicit the link carried by 2 Timothy: the struggle is the fight of trust, kept through to the end.
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