What Does Luke 5:36 Mean in the King James?

And he spake also a parable unto them; No man putteth a piece of a new garment upon an old; if otherwise, then both the new maketh a rent, and the piece that was taken out of the new agreeth not with the old.

Luke 5:36 · KJV

The analysis reads the King James wording.

King James Version The King James Version, first published in 1611. Selah Verse shows the standard text.

This verse in the Selah Decoded Version

THE KEY

A patch cut from the new tears its source and still cannot sound together with the old.

THE MEANING

A piece cut from the new garment tears it, then still fails to join the old. The attempted repair leaves the source torn and the mismatch unresolved.

WHAT THIS UNDOES

It undoes the belief that a new thing can repair an old form simply by being cut down to fit it.

THE ROOT

σχίσει

schisei

GROWS FROM

σχιζ

schiz

to split or tear apart

The garment’s rent and a division among people share this Greek root. English separates those images, while the root reveals the same kind of break in both.

ALSO GROWS

schizō: to tear or split

σχίζω

This is the verb’s root form: the new garment is split by the attempted repair.

schisma: a split or division

σχίσμα

The same root names a division among people in John 7:43, linking the garment’s tear with a human split.

συμφωνήσει

symphōnēsei

GROWS FROM

φων

phōn

sound or voice

The word translated “agreeth” carries the sense of sounding together. The patch and the old garment do not share a resonance; placing one against the other does not create harmony.

ALSO GROWS

phōnē: voice or sound

φωνή

This root keeps sound inside the verse’s idea of agreement.

symphōnia: harmony or music

συμφωνία

This related word makes the image concrete: agreement is like parts sounding together.

THE PATTERN

The new exposes the limits of an old form that cannot hold it.

No man also seweth a piece of new cloth on an old garment: else the new piece that filled it up taketh away from the old, and the rent is made worse.

Mark 2:21 · KJVThe attempted patch makes the tear worse, showing the old garment cannot be repaired by taking from the new.

And no man putteth new wine into old bottles; else the new wine will burst the bottles, and be spilled, and the bottles shall perish.

Luke 5:37 · KJVThe new wine breaks the old container, repeating the mismatch between new life and an old form.

In that he saith, A new covenant, he hath made the first old. Now that which decayeth and waxeth old is ready to vanish away.

Hebrews 8:13 · KJVThe new covenant reveals that the first form is already wearing out and cannot remain the lasting container.

THE THREAD

So there was a division among the people because of him.

John 7:43 · KJV

Luke’s “rent” is ⁨σχίσει⁩, while John calls the division among the people ⁨σχίσμα⁩, from the same Greek root. A tear in cloth and a split among people are named as one kind of break.

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