What Does Matthew 15:20 Mean in the King James?
These are the things which defile a man: but to eat with unwashen hands defileth not a man.
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
Defilement is a movement from set-apart to common, and this verse locates it in what comes from a person, not in food touching unwashed hands.
THE MEANING
What comes from within you carries the power to make you common; eating with unwashed hands does not. The verse locates the deeper boundary in what your inner life sends outward, not in what merely touches your body.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The belief that outward washing can make a person clean while what they release from within goes untouched.
THE ROOT
κοινόω
koinoō
GROWS FROM
κοιν-
koin-
Common; to make common or treat as profane.
“defile” in this verse is koinoō. The Greek verb κοινόω (koinoō, make common or treat as profane) gives defilement the sense of a shift from set-apart to common. Its word family also includes κοινός (koinos, common or shared) and κοινωνία (koinōnia, sharing in common), revealing a change in how a person is regarded rather than contamination from an unwashed meal.
ALSO GROWS
koinos: Common, shared, or ordinary.
κοινός
This branch makes visible the contrast beneath “defile”: what is set apart becomes common.
koinōnia: Sharing in common; participation.
κοινωνία
This related word carries the same seed of commonness into shared participation, showing how the root reaches beyond physical cleanliness.
THE PATTERN
What flows from within a person carries the deeper weight, while outward contact alone does not define their purity.
There is nothing from without a man, that entering into him can defile him: but the things which come out of him, those are they that defile the man.Keep thy heart with all diligence; for out of it are the issues of life.And the tongue is a fire, a world of iniquity: so is the tongue among our members, that it defileth the whole body, and setteth on fire the course of nature; and it is set on fire of hell.THE THREAD
But those things which proceed out of the mouth come forth from the heart; and they defile the man.Matthew 15:18 uses the same Greek verb κοινόω (koinoō, make common) for what comes from the heart and defiles. Read beside it, the contrast with unwashed hands directs attention to the inner source of what a person sends outward.
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