What Does Matthew 24:42 Mean in the King James?
Watch therefore: for ye know not what hour your Lord doth come.
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 unknown hour is the very condition that makes wakefulness meaningful.
THE MEANING
You live inside an hour you cannot name: your Lord is coming, though the timing stays hidden. “Watch” describes being awake and attentive to that arrival. Uncertainty does not mean absence; it is where wakefulness matters.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The verse dissolves the belief that what cannot be timed can be treated as absent: the unknown hour calls for wakefulness precisely because the Lord is coming.
THE ROOT
γρηγορεῖτε
grēgoreite
GROWS FROM
ἐγείρω
egeirō
To awaken, rouse, or raise.
The Greek verb γρηγορέω (grēgoreō, stay awake or keep watch) comes through the perfect form of ἐγείρω (egeirō, awaken or raise). So “watch” carries the sense of staying awake, not merely tracking the clock: the unknown hour calls for alert presence, not a successful prediction.
ALSO GROWS
egeirō: Awaken, rouse, or raise.
ἐγείρω
This source verb shows that watching begins with being awake to what is present, rather than calculating when something will happen.
egersis: A raising; resurrection.
ἔγερσις
This related noun shares the awakening and raising family, widening the sense of watchfulness toward readiness for what arrives.
THE PATTERN
When arrival cannot be timed, the living response is wakeful attention rather than prediction.
My soul waiteth for the Lord more than they that watch for the morning: I say, more than they that watch for the morning.I will stand upon my watch, and set me upon the tower, and will watch to see what he will say unto me, and what I shall answer when I am reproved.Therefore let us not sleep, as do others; but let us watch and be sober.THE THREAD
Watch therefore, for ye know neither the day nor the hour wherein the Son of man cometh.This repeats the same Greek verb γρηγορέω (grēgoreō, stay awake or keep watch) and makes the uncertainty even wider: neither day nor hour is known. The shared word reveals watchfulness as the steady posture while the timing remains hidden.
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