What Does Luke 6:44 Mean in the King James?
For every tree is known by his own fruit. For of thorns men do not gather figs, nor of a bramble bush gather they grapes.
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
Fruit is how a tree’s hidden nature becomes knowable.
THE MEANING
What your life brings forth makes its source recognizable. The image stays exact: figs do not come from thorns, and grapes do not grow from a bramble.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that a claim or appearance alone establishes a thing’s nature; what it bears reveals its source.
THE ROOT
γινώσκεται
ginōsketai
GROWS FROM
γνω-/γνο- (Greek cognate stem, not a Hebrew-style triliteral root)
To know, recognize, or perceive.
“known” in this verse is ginōsketai. The tree is not identified by a label but recognized through what it bears. This Greek word family joins knowing with recognition: the fruit makes the tree’s source perceptible.
ALSO GROWS
gnōsis: knowledge, recognition
γνῶσις
It shares the knowing family that makes the tree’s fruit a means of recognition.
gnōstos: known, recognized
γνωστός
It describes what becomes apparent when the tree’s own yield is seen.
καρπός
karpos
GROWS FROM
καρπ-
Greek stem
Fruit, produce, or yield.
The tree’s fruit is its own yield, the outcome that discloses the life bearing it. The same Greek stem names both fruit-bearing and fruitlessness, holding the passage’s contrast between source and outcome together.
ALSO GROWS
karpophoreō: to bear fruit
καρποφορέω
It names the act of producing the yield by which a tree is recognized.
akarpos: fruitless, unfruitful
ἄκαρπος
It names the absence of yield, the opposite condition implied by the tree’s fruit.
THE PATTERN
What a life produces reveals its kind and source.
And God said, Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after his kind, whose seed is in itself, upon the earth: and it was so.Ye shall know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles?But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith,THE THREAD
I am the good shepherd, and know my sheep, and am known of mine.Luke uses γινώσκω (ginōskō, to know or recognize) for the tree becoming known through its fruit. John uses the same verb for knowing between shepherd and sheep, opening recognition beyond outward yield into relationship.
Read the SDV Bible.
Every verse has a Deep Dive in the app.
The iPhone Bible app with the Selah Decoded Version.
Does something in this reading look wrong? Tell us