What Does Acts 1:9 Mean in the King James?
And when he had spoken these things, while they beheld, he was taken up; and a cloud received him out of their sight.
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 cloud receives Jesus at the precise instant his ascent passes beyond sight.
THE MEANING
The verse meets you at the edge of what you can see: what passes beyond your sight is still received. Its movement holds both truths together now, he is lifted, and the cloud takes him in, so leaving view is not erasure.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The belief that what leaves your sight is gone loosens here: the cloud receives him at the very point sight ends.
THE ROOT
ὑπέλαβεν
hypelaben
GROWS FROM
λαμβάνω
lambanō
to take, receive
“received” in this verse is hypelaben. The cloud is not merely the backdrop to an ascent: it is the subject that takes him in. The same seed appears in ἀναλαμβάνω, the verb for “taken up” in Acts 1:11, so receiving and being taken up echo as one movement across the scene.
ALSO GROWS
lambanō: to take or receive
λαμβάνω
This is the shared seed beneath the cloud’s act of receiving.
analambanō: to take up, take along
ἀναλαμβάνω
Acts 1:11 uses this related form for Jesus being “taken up,” linking the cloud’s reception with the ascent.
paralambanō: to receive or take alongside
παραλαμβάνω
This branch shows the root’s sense of receiving as taking someone into one’s company.
ἐπήρθη
epērthē
GROWS FROM
αἴρω
airō
to lift, carry, or take away
“taken” in this verse is epērthē. The verb family gathers lifting and carrying away under one action: something is borne from where it was. Here the upward motion meets the cloud’s reception, carrying Jesus beyond the reach of the eyes.
ALSO GROWS
airō: to lift, carry, or take away
αἴρω
Its range holds upward movement together with being carried from a place.
epairō: to raise or lift up
ἐπαίρω
This compound form describes the lifting in the verse.
THE PATTERN
The cloud marks a threshold where presence is encountered beyond ordinary sight.
And the glory of the LORD abode upon mount Sinai, and the cloud covered it six days: and the seventh day he called unto Moses out of the midst of the cloud.While he thus spake, there came a cloud, and overshadowed them: and they feared as they entered into the cloud.Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord.THE THREAD
Which also said, Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven? this same Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven.Here the cloud ὑπέλαβεν (“received”) him; in the next verse, Jesus is ἀναλημφθείς (“taken up”), a related form from the same root λαμβάνω. The shared root ties the cloud’s reception to the ascent, while the promise of his return keeps that movement open.
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