What Does Acts 27:41 Mean in the King James?
And falling into a place where two seas met, they ran the ship aground; and the forepart stuck fast, and remained unmoveable, but the hinder part was broken with the violence of the waves.
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 Greek pictures the stern being loosened apart while the bow is held fast, one vessel simultaneously anchored and coming undone.
THE MEANING
Under pressure, you can be held fast in one part and coming apart in another; both conditions can be true at once. The verse names the violence of the waves without hiding what they do.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
Being fixed in one place does not prove the whole vessel is secure: the forepart is immovable even as the hinder part breaks apart.
THE ROOT
ἐλύετο
elyeto
GROWS FROM
λύω
lyō
To loosen, untie, or undo; in context, to break apart.
“was broken” in this verse is elyeto. The Greek verb pictures the stern as being loosened under the waves’ force. “Broken” gives the result; the root lets you see the structure coming unfastened.
ALSO GROWS
katalyō: Dismantle, tear down
καταλύω
This compound uses the same root for taking a structure apart, making the ship’s breakage an undoing of what held it together.
apolyō: Release, send away
ἀπολύω
This branch carries the root’s sense of loosening into release, while the ship’s stern is released from its joined structure by force.
ἀσάλευτος
asaleutos
GROWS FROM
σαλεύω
saleuō
To shake or set in motion; with the privative prefix a-, ἀσάλευτος means unshaken.
“unmoveable” in this verse is asaleutos. The same word family names both shaking and the absence of shaking. Here the forepart’s stillness does not mean the entire ship is safe: the stern is coming apart at the same time.
ALSO GROWS
saleuō: Shake, move to and fro
σαλεύω
This is the motion the adjective negates; the forepart remains beyond the movement of the waves.
saleuomena: Things being shaken
σαλευόμενα
This form shows the same root describing what is in motion, sharpening the contrast between the fixed forepart and the ship’s breaking stern.
THE PATTERN
Pressure can expose unequal stability: what is anchored holds while what is unfastened gives way.
Therefore will not we fear, though the earth be removed, and though the mountains be carried into the midst of the sea; Though the waters thereof roar and be troubled, though the mountains shake with the swelling thereof. Selah.And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house; and it fell not: for it was founded upon a rock.And this word, Yet once more, signifieth the removing of those things that are shaken, as of things that are made, that those things which cannot be shaken may remain.THE THREAD
Wherefore we receiving a kingdom which cannot be moved, let us have grace, whereby we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear:“Cannot be moved” translates the same Greek adjective Acts uses for the forepart’s “unmoveable” position. Acts complicates the image: fixedness alone is not safety, since the vessel still tears apart; Hebrews applies that word to what remains unshaken.
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