What Does Acts 20:30 Mean in the King James?

Also of your own selves shall men arise, speaking perverse things, to draw away disciples after them.

Acts 20:30 · KJV

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 speech twists a path, then gathers learners after the speaker: distortion becomes a rival following.

THE MEANING

A trusted community is not immune: voices can rise from within it and bend what is true until learners begin following the speakers themselves. The danger reaches beyond mistaken words; it pulls disciples away from the path they came to learn.

WHAT THIS UNDOES

It undoes the assumption that spiritual danger only comes from outsiders: the speakers can arise from within your own circle, and their distortion gathers followers around themselves.

THE ROOT

διεστραμμένα

diestrammena

GROWS FROM

στρέφω

strephō

To turn or twist; to change direction.

“perverse things” in this verse is diestrammena. “Perverse” describes words turned out of their course. The root carries direction: speech twists a path, and the next phrase shows learners being drawn onto the speaker’s path.

ALSO GROWS

epistrephō: Turn back; return.

ἐπιστρέφω

The same turning motion can restore someone to a path; here it is bent away.

apostrephō: Turn away; reject.

ἀποστρέφω

This branch makes the directional force explicit: words can turn hearers away from the source they should follow.

μαθητάς

mathētas

GROWS FROM

μανθάνω

manthanō

To learn; to acquire understanding.

The word rendered “disciples” names learners, so the danger begins by redirecting what they are learning and from whom. They are gathered into a new relationship of following.

ALSO GROWS

mathētēs: Learner; disciple.

μαθητής

It names the learner whose direction the speakers seek to change.

mathēma: Lesson; that which is learned.

μάθημα

It points to the content being shaped: the distortion works through what learners are taught.

THE PATTERN

Distorted speech gains force by arising within a trusted community and redirecting learners toward another source of allegiance.

And the sign or the wonder come to pass, whereof he spake unto thee, saying, Let us go after other gods, which thou hast not known, and let us serve them;

Deuteronomy 13:2 · KJVThe sign becomes a means of drawing people after other gods, so persuasive evidence itself can serve a redirected allegiance.

Thus saith the LORD of hosts, Hearken not unto the words of the prophets that prophesy unto you: they make you vain: they speak a vision of their own heart, and not out of the mouth of the LORD.

Jeremiah 23:16 · KJVThe prophets speak from their own heart rather than the LORD, making hearers wander from the word that should orient them.

But there were false prophets also among the people, even as there shall be false teachers among you, who privily shall bring in damnable heresies, even denying the Lord that bought them, and bring upon themselves swift destruction.

2 Peter 2:1 · KJVFalse teaching arises among the community and pulls people toward denial of their Lord.

THE THREAD

And said, O full of all subtilty and all mischief, thou child of the devil, thou enemy of all righteousness, wilt thou not cease to pervert the right ways of the Lord?

Acts 13:10 · KJV

Acts 13:10 uses ⁨διαστρέφω⁩ (diastrephō), meaning to turn aside or distort, for perverting the Lord’s ways. The shared root reveals the mechanism: speech bends a path, then people are drawn after the one bending it.

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