What Does John 11:55 Mean in the King James?
And the Jews’ passover was nigh at hand: and many went out of the country up to Jerusalem before the passover, to purify themselves.
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 crowd’s approach to the feast is also a movement into purity: the word for purifying shares its seed with the word for pure.
THE MEANING
A sacred moment draws near, and you move toward it while clearing what clouds your readiness. The verse holds arrival and self-purification together, making preparation part of the approach. Readiness appears as what obscures it is removed.
THE ROOT
ἁγνίσωσιν
hagnisōsin
GROWS FROM
ἁγν-
hagn-
Pure or clean; this word family names both the act of purifying and the state of being pure.
“purify” in this verse is hagnisōsin. The Greek word for purifying belongs to the same family as ἁγνός (hagnos), meaning pure. English separates the cleansing action from the quality it opens into, while the shared stem joins them in one movement.
ALSO GROWS
hagnizō: To purify or cleanse.
ἁγνίζω
This is the verb whose form describes the people preparing themselves before the feast.
hagnos: Pure.
ἁγνός
The related adjective names the state toward which the act of purification moves.
hagneia: Purity.
ἁγνεία
This related noun gives the same word family a name for the quality itself, linking the act of cleansing with the condition it reveals.
THE PATTERN
Nearness to a shared encounter is paired with preparation that makes a person ready for presence and relation.
And the LORD said unto Moses, Go unto the people, and sanctify them to day and to morrow, and let them wash their clothes,Who shall ascend into the hill of the LORD? or who shall stand in his holy place? He that hath clean hands, and a pure heart; who hath not lifted up his soul unto vanity, nor sworn deceitfully.Seeing ye have purified your souls in obeying the truth through the Spirit unto unfeigned love of the brethren, see that ye love one another with a pure heart fervently:THE THREAD
And every man that hath this hope in him purifieth himself, even as he is pure.The verb translated purifieth belongs to the same Greek word family as purify here, and the verse ends with the related word for pure. In John 11, people prepare themselves as the feast draws near; here, purification and purity appear together within one person.
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