What Does Matthew 5:14 Mean in the King James?
Ye are the light of the world. A city that is set on an hill cannot be hid.
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 “you” is plural: this light is shared, and its image is a city whose presence cannot be concealed.
THE MEANING
The verse addresses the reader as part of a shared light, pictured as a city raised above its surroundings. Its visibility belongs to the image itself: the city cannot be hidden, just as light makes itself seen.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that this light can be entirely private or unseen.
THE ROOT
φῶς
phōs
GROWS FROM
φωτ-
phōt-
Light, illumination, what makes visible.
The word’s stem appears in a family of words for shining and illumination. The verse calls the hearers light itself, then pictures that shared illumination as a city that cannot be concealed.
ALSO GROWS
phōtizō: To illuminate or bring to light.
φωτίζω
It makes explicit the revealing action carried by the image of light.
phōstēr: A body that gives light.
φωστήρ
It shows the same word family can name a bearer of light, fitting the verse’s image of a visible community.
πόλις
polis
GROWS FROM
πολι-
poli-
City and civic community.
The word belongs to a family that names both a city and the people and shared life connected with it. Beside the plural “you,” the image makes visibility collective: the light takes the form of a public community.
ALSO GROWS
politēs: A member of a city or civic community.
πολίτης
It draws attention to the people who make the city a shared reality.
politeia: Civic life, citizenship, or a commonwealth.
πολιτεία
It extends the city image from a visible place to a shared public life.
THE PATTERN
Light makes life and what it reaches perceptible, and its presence resists concealment.
For with thee is the fountain of life: in thy light shall we see light.And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not.But all things that are reproved are made manifest by the light: for whatsoever doth make manifest is light.THE THREAD
Then spake Jesus again unto them, saying, I am the light of the world: he that followeth me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life.Matthew and John use the same Greek noun for light, linking the reader’s shared illumination with the light Jesus names. John connects that light with life and a way through darkness; Matthew pictures its visibility as a city on a hill.
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