What Does Titus 3:14 Mean in the King James?
And let ours also learn to maintain good works for necessary uses, that they be not unfruitful.
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
Here, learning is revealed by work that stands before a real need and bears fruit.
THE MEANING
Learning reaches into your present life as you take your place in good work that answers real needs. That work bears fruit in the lives of others.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that good intentions are already fruitful even when they never meet a real need.
THE ROOT
προΐστημι
proistēmi
GROWS FROM
ἵστημι
histēmi
to stand, to set or establish
“maintain” in this verse is proistēmi. The verb combines the sense of “before” with “stand,” carrying the image of taking the lead or attending to good work. Learning becomes visible as work that faces a need instead of remaining an idea.
ALSO GROWS
anistēmi: rise, stand up
ἀνίστημι
This branch makes the shared image of standing active: good work rises to meet what is needed.
kathistēmi: set in place, appoint
καθίστημι
This branch shows the same root establishing something in its place, as good work brings needed provision into reach.
ἄκαρπος
akarpos
GROWS FROM
καρπός
karpos
fruit, yield or produce
“unfruitful” in this verse is akarpos. The word adds a negating prefix to the word for “fruit”: what is rejected is not effort, but work that produces no yield. The phrase “for necessary uses” names how that yield appears here: good work meets a real need.
ALSO GROWS
karpophoreō: bear fruit
καρποφορέω
This branch names the positive outcome the verse sets against being unfruitful.
eukarpos: fruitful, bearing good fruit
εὔκαρπος
This branch keeps the image concrete: good work has a yield that can be seen in the help it gives.
THE PATTERN
Good work bears fruit when it reaches beyond the worker to meet another person’s need.
Withhold not good from them to whom it is due, when it is in the power of thine hand to do it.Let him that stole steal no more: but rather let him labour, working with his hands the thing which is good, that he may have to give to him that needeth.And one of you say unto them, Depart in peace, be ye warmed and filled; notwithstanding ye give them not those things which are needful to the body; what doth it profit?THE THREAD
This is a faithful saying, and these things I will that thou affirm constantly, that they which have believed in God might be careful to maintain good works. These things are good and profitable unto men.“Maintain” here and “maintain” in Titus 3:8 translate προΐστημι (proistēmi, take the lead in or attend to). The earlier verse names the benefit to people; this one shows where that benefit lands, in the needs that good work can meet.
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