What Does Matthew 23:32 Mean in the King James?

Fill ye up then the measure of your fathers.

Matthew 23:32 · 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.

THE KEY

Inherited violence reaches its full measure through what is continued in the present.

THE MEANING

The verse speaks to the moment when inherited harm becomes present action: the measure is being completed through what you continue now. Its severity stays intact, the measure being filled is charged with wrongdoing, not neutral completion.

WHAT THIS UNDOES

It undoes the belief that inherited wrongdoing belongs only to the past; continuing it brings it into your own hands.

THE ROOT

πληρώσατε

plērōsate

GROWS FROM

πληρ-

plēr-

to make full, bring to completion

“fill up” in this verse is plērōsate. The verb means more than adding to an amount: it names bringing something to its full extent. Paired with “measure,” it presents the inherited pattern as something being completed through present action.

ALSO GROWS

plērēs: full, complete

πλήρης

This related word makes the endpoint inside “fill up” visible: the measure is brought to fullness.

plērōma: fullness, that which fills

πλήρωμα

It carries the same root from the action of filling to the resulting fullness.

μέτρον

metron

GROWS FROM

μετρ-

metr-

to measure, set a quantity or limit

A measure is both a defined amount and the standard by which an amount is assessed. Here, the phrase joins that boundary to an act of completion: the measure is not merely present; it is being filled.

ALSO GROWS

metreō: to measure

μετρέω

The shared stem links the measure to the act of applying it; it is an amount that can be assessed.

ametrētos: immeasurable, without measure

ἀμέτρητος

Its contrast shows the boundary carried by metron: a measure marks a defined amount.

THE PATTERN

Repeated wrongdoing accumulates until a bounded measure reaches completion.

But in the fourth generation they shall come hither again: for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet full.

Genesis 15:16 · KJVThe wrongdoing is described as an amount that has not yet reached completion.

But after thy hardness and impenitent heart treasurest up unto thyself wrath against the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God;

Romans 2:5 · KJVThe verse pictures persistent hardness as something accumulated and stored up.

Forbidding us to speak to the Gentiles that they might be saved, to fill up their sins alway: for the wrath is come upon them to the uttermost.

1 Thessalonians 2:16 · KJVThe phrase “fill up” uses the same Greek root as Matthew’s word for filling, joining repeated wrongdoing to completion.

THE THREAD

Give, and it shall be given unto you; good measure, pressed down, and shaken together, and running over, shall men give into your bosom. For with the same measure that ye mete withal it shall be measured to you again.

Luke 6:38 · KJV

Luke repeats ⁨μέτρον⁩ (metron, “measure”) and pairs it with the related verb ⁨μετρέω⁩ (metreō, “to measure”). The shared root shows measure as relational: what is meted out also becomes the measure encountered in return.

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