What Does Luke 12:25 Mean in the King James?
And which of you with taking thought can add to his stature one cubit?
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 word translated “stature” can also mean “age,” so the cubit measures either bodily height or the span of a life, neither grows through worry.
THE MEANING
Worry occupies the mind as though it could enlarge the life you inhabit. Yet it cannot make your body taller or your span longer by even one measured unit. Its effort does not add to the measure of your life.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that worrying harder can buy more time or greater bodily security.
THE ROOT
ἡλικίαν
hēlikian
GROWS FROM
ἡλικ-
hēlik-
Age or stage of life; also stature or bodily height.
Ἡλικία can name either a person’s age or physical stature, so the verse’s cubit may be heard as a measure of height while the word also opens onto the span of life. Worry cannot enlarge either measure.
ALSO GROWS
hēlikia: Age, lifespan, or stature.
ἡλικία
The same word holds time and bodily height together.
hēlikos: How great, how old, or of what size.
ἡλίκος
This related form also speaks in terms of magnitude, keeping both size and age within the root’s reach.
προσθεῖναι
prostheinai
GROWS FROM
τίθημι
tithēmi
To put, place, or set.
The verb translated “add” is built from προστίθημι, “put onto” or “place beside.” The verse pictures an added cubit as something set onto an existing measure, and shows that anxious thought cannot place one there.
ALSO GROWS
tithēmi: Put, place, or set.
τίθημι
This is the base verb that gives “add” its image of placing something.
epitithēmi: Lay upon or impose.
ἐπιτίθημι
The same root can describe placing something onto another thing, echoing the added unit in the verse.
paratithēmi: Place beside or entrust.
παρατίθημι
Another compound of the same root keeps the sense of placing at the center.
THE PATTERN
Anxious human effort cannot enlarge the measure of a life.
Seeing his days are determined, the number of his months are with thee, thou hast appointed his bounds that he cannot pass;Behold, thou hast made my days as an handbreadth; and mine age is as nothing before thee: verily every man at his best state is altogether vanity. Selah.I know that, whatsoever God doeth, it shall be for ever: nothing can be put to it, nor any thing taken from it: and God doeth it, that men should fear before him.THE THREAD
Which of you by taking thought can add one cubit unto his stature?Matthew uses the same Greek word for “stature” and the same verb for “add,” carrying the double sense of age and height into its parallel question. The repeated cubit makes the limit of worry concrete: it cannot extend the measure of a life.
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