What Does Ephesians 5:21 Mean in the King James?
Submitting yourselves one to another in the fear of God.
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 order runs both ways: each person makes room for the other under awe of God.
THE MEANING
In your relationships, the order is mutual: each person yields place to the other. Awe of God gives that shared yielding its measure.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that godly order only moves from a superior to a subordinate. Here, the relation moves both ways.
THE ROOT
ὑποτασσόμενοι
hypotassomenoi
GROWS FROM
τάσσω
tassō
To arrange, set in order.
“submitting yourselves” in this verse is hypotassomenoi. The root carries the sense of arranging or ordering, and the verse makes that ordering mutual: each person takes a place in relation to the other. Submission here shapes a shared arrangement.
ALSO GROWS
taxis: Order, arrangement.
τάξις
This branch makes visible the ordering within the idea of submission: relationships take shape through how people place themselves with one another.
hypotagē: Submission, subjection.
ὑποταγή
This related word names the state of being placed within an order, echoing the verse’s shared relational structure.
φόβῳ
phobō
GROWS FROM
φόβος
phobos
Fear, dread, reverential awe.
The verse places mutual yielding within awe of God. The word still carries the edge of fear, giving this shared order a weight beyond either person.
ALSO GROWS
phobeomai: To fear, stand in awe.
φοβέομαι
This verb shows how the root can describe a response of awe as well as fear, bringing reverence into the frame of mutual yielding.
phoberos: Fearsome, awe-inspiring.
φοβερός
This branch underscores the weight of what inspires awe, the measure named in the verse for how people relate.
THE PATTERN
A community takes shape through reciprocal humility, with each person making room for the other.
Likewise, ye younger, submit yourselves unto the elder. Yea, all of you be subject one to another, and be clothed with humility: for God resisteth the proud, and giveth grace to the humble.Let nothing be done through strife or vainglory; but in lowliness of mind let each esteem other better than themselves.That there should be no schism in the body; but that the members should have the same care one for another.THE THREAD
Likewise, ye younger, submit yourselves unto the elder. Yea, all of you be subject one to another, and be clothed with humility: for God resisteth the proud, and giveth grace to the humble.Peter uses the same verb, ὑποτάσσω (hypotassō, to place under), and then says, “all of you be subject one to another.” The shared root shows the mutual order in Ephesians taking shape through humility.
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