What Does Matthew 24:8 Mean in the King James?

All these are the beginning of sorrows.

Matthew 24:8 · 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

The word translated “sorrows” carries the image of birth pangs: painful upheaval is named as labor beginning.

THE MEANING

The upheavals in this verse are pictured as the first contractions of labor. The pain is real, and the image places it at the start of a process still unfolding.

WHAT THIS UNDOES

Pain does not mean the process has already reached its end.

THE ROOT

ὠδίνων

ōdinōn

GROWS FROM

ὠδίν

ōdin

Birth pangs; the pains of labor.

Under “sorrows” is the image of childbirth. The verse holds pain and beginning together: these are pangs at the onset of labor, not a declaration that the process is complete.

ALSO GROWS

ōdinō: To be in labor; to travail.

ὠδίνω

Galatians 4:19 uses this verb for travail in birth, making the shared labor image explicit.

synōdinō: To travail together; to share birth pangs.

συνωδίνω

Romans 8:22 uses this related verb for creation’s shared labor, extending the image beyond a single person.

THE PATTERN

Birth-pang language presents painful distress as labor at the threshold of what is being brought forth.

Now why dost thou cry out aloud? is there no king in thee? is thy counsellor perished? for pangs have taken thee as a woman in travail.

Micah 4:9 · KJVPangs of distress are pictured as the labor of a woman nearing delivery.

For we know that the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now.

Romans 8:22 · KJVThe labor image widens to creation itself, groaning and travailing together.

My little children, of whom I travail in birth again until Christ be formed in you,

Galatians 4:19 · KJVThe same birth-pang language describes an unfolding process that has not yet reached its formed state.

THE THREAD

For we know that the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now.

Romans 8:22 · KJV

Romans uses ⁨συνωδίνει⁩ (synōdinei), “travails together,” from the same birth-pang root, ⁨ὠδίν⁩ (ōdin). It widens Matthew’s image: labor is shared across creation, and the pains belong to a process still unfolding.

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