What Does Luke 23:36 Mean in the King James?
And the soldiers also mocked him, coming to him, and offering him vinegar,
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 for “mocked” is built from “play,” so even the soldiers’ approach with vinegar becomes part of turning his suffering into their amusement.
THE MEANING
The verse names a living form of contempt: someone in pain becomes entertainment, and an offered gesture can carry humiliation. The mockery takes shape in what is brought near, not only in what is said.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that cruelty becomes harmless when it is presented as play or as an offer.
THE ROOT
ἐνέπαιζον
enepaizon
GROWS FROM
παίζω
paizō
To play or sport; in the compound ἐμπαίζω (empaizō), to mock or make sport of someone.
English “mocked” names the contempt but hides the word for play inside it. The soldiers make him the object of their amusement, and the approach with vinegar becomes part of that enacted derision.
ALSO GROWS
empaizō: Mock, deride, make sport of.
ἐμπαίζω
This is the compound verb behind the verse’s word: play turned against a person as ridicule.
empaiktēs: A mocker or scoffer.
ἐμπαίκτης
This related word names someone who makes sport of another, showing the same movement from play into contempt.
THE PATTERN
Contempt turns a person’s need or dignity into a prop, then makes the performance seem like play.
So is the man that deceiveth his neighbour, and saith, Am not I in sport?They gave me also gall for my meat; and in my thirst they gave me vinegar to drink.And when they had platted a crown of thorns, they put it upon his head, and a reed in his right hand: and they bowed the knee before him, and mocked him, saying, Hail, King of the Jews!THE THREAD
Knowing this first, that there shall come in the last days scoffers, walking after their own lusts,“Scoffers” translates ἐμπαῖκται (empaiktai), a word from the same Greek family as Luke’s “mocked,” rooted in παίζω (paizō), “to play.” Luke shows that play turned against a suffering person; Peter uses the same word family for scoffing as a posture.
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