What Does Luke 22:53 Mean in the King James?
When I was daily with you in the temple, ye stretched forth no hands against me: but this is your hour, and the power of darkness.
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 gives darkness real authority for an hour, refusing to confuse its moment of power with the whole of reality.
THE MEANING
When open presence gives way to coercive hands, the verse names the change plainly: darkness has authority, and its hour is real. Yet an hour is a span of time, so that authority does not name the whole of reality.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
A violent hour means darkness has permanent, total authority; the verse names its authority as belonging to an hour.
THE ROOT
σκότος
skotos
GROWS FROM
σκοτ-
skot-
Darkness, obscurity.
The Greek phrase makes darkness the domain whose authority marks this hour, not merely the night sky. Its word family also names the act of darkening, linking the ruling domain to the obscuring it brings.
ALSO GROWS
skotia: Darkness.
σκοτία
This related noun appears in John 1:5, where light shines within darkness; the same word family frames darkness as a condition light can meet.
skotizō: Darken, make obscure.
σκοτίζω
The related verb shows darkness as an obscuring action as well as a domain.
ἐξουσία
exousia
GROWS FROM
ἐξουσι- (exousi-), related to ἔξεστιν (exestin)
Authority, jurisdiction, or the right to act; related to the sense “it is permitted” or “it is possible.”
“power” in this verse is exousia. The word names authority or jurisdiction, not only brute force. Darkness is described as exercising a real ruling claim during this hour.
ALSO GROWS
exousiazō: Exercise authority.
ἐξουσιάζω
Luke 22:25 uses this related verb for rulers exercising authority over others, showing the active rule carried by the noun here.
exousia: Authority; power.
ἐξουσία
Colossians 1:13 uses the same noun in “the power of darkness,” making the shared phrase visible across both verses.
ὥρα
hōra
GROWS FROM
ὡρ-
hōr-
An hour, time, or season.
The Greek word can mark a season or decisive time, not only a sixty-minute measure. “Your hour” gives darkness’s authority a temporal boundary: it belongs to a particular span.
ALSO GROWS
hōra: Hour, time, or season.
ὥρα
In John 7:30, the crowd seeks to seize Jesus, but “his hour was not yet come”; the same word ties the moment of seizure to a time that has not yet arrived.
hōraios: Timely, in season; beautiful.
ὡραῖος
This related adjective appears in Romans 10:15 as “beautiful”; its link to season or proper time echoes the fitting, bounded moment named by “hour.”
THE PATTERN
Darkness has a real sphere of authority, yet Scripture also describes light and deliverance in relation to it.
And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not.To open their eyes, and to turn them from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan unto God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins, and inheritance among them which are sanctified by faith that is in me.Who hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of his dear Son:THE THREAD
Who hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of his dear Son:Luke and Colossians share the Greek phrase ἐξουσία τοῦ σκότους (exousia tou skotous), “the authority of darkness.” Luke locates that authority in an hour; Colossians describes deliverance from its domain, giving the phrase a boundary without denying the violence of the moment.
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