What Does Acts 16:26 Mean in the King James?
And suddenly there was a great earthquake, so that the foundations of the prison were shaken: and immediately all the doors were opened, and every one’s bands were loosed.
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 shaking reaches both the prison’s foundations and everyone’s bonds, making release structural and personal at once.
THE MEANING
Confinement has layers: foundations, doors, and bonds. A shaking reaches through all of them; every door opens and everyone’s restraints loosen. Release extends to all who are held, not just one person.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The verse undoes the belief that confinement is immovable or that one person’s release must leave everyone else bound.
THE ROOT
ἀνέθη
anethē
GROWS FROM
ἀνίημι
aniēmi
To let up, loosen, or release.
The word translated “loosed” belongs to a Greek word family that also names relief and relaxation. Release is pictured as what happens when the grip on a person lets up.
ALSO GROWS
anesis: Relief, release, or relaxation
ἄνεσις
This related noun shows that loosening a restraint and receiving relief belong to the same word-family.
anientes: Letting up or ceasing
ἀνιέντες
This form of the same verb appears in an instruction to let up on threats, extending the root’s sense from physical bonds to a grip that can be relaxed.
δεσμά
desma
GROWS FROM
δέω
deō
To bind or tie.
“bands” in this verse is desma. The word-family links bonds with the person held in them: restraint is not merely an object beside someone but a condition that can define them. When the bonds loosen, that condition is interrupted.
ALSO GROWS
desmos: A bond or restraint
δεσμός
This related word names the binding itself, showing what is released when the bands come loose.
desmōtēs: A bound person or prisoner
δεσμώτης
This related word names someone by the state of being bound, so the loosening reaches beyond the restraints to the people they hold.
σαλευθῆναι
saleuthēnai
GROWS FROM
σαλεύω
saleuō
To shake, stir, or unsettle.
The same word-family can describe what is shaken and what cannot be shaken. Here the prison’s foundations are unsettled, and the release follows through the structure.
ALSO GROWS
asaleutos: Unshaken or firm
ἀσάλευτος
This opposite form shares the root and makes its range visible: what is shaken is no longer fixed in place.
saleuō: Shake or unsettle
σαλεύω
The verb names the force acting on the prison’s foundations, linking structural disturbance with the opening that follows.
THE PATTERN
Release reaches into confinement and breaks the restraints holding people there.
He brought them out of darkness and the shadow of death, and brake their bands in sunder.To open the blind eyes, to bring out the prisoners from the prison, and them that sit in darkness out of the prison house.And, behold, the angel of the Lord came upon him, and a light shined in the prison: and he smote Peter on the side, and raised him up, saying, Arise up quickly. And his chains fell off from his hands.THE THREAD
And to you who are troubled rest with us, when the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from heaven with his mighty angels,“Rest” translates ἄνεσις (anesis), meaning relief or release, from the same Greek word-family as ἀνίημι (aniēmi), the verb behind “loosed.” The bond falling away in Acts and the relief named here share a root-level image of what happens when the grip lets up.
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