What Does Luke 11:45 Mean?
Then one of the experts in the instruction answered and said to him, Teacher, in saying these things you also insult us.
Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.
Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.
King James wording
King James Version
Then answered one of the lawyers, and said unto him, Master, thus saying thou reproachest us also.THE KEY
The lawyer’s “us also” shows the rebuke crossing the boundary he expected and reaching his own group.
THE MEANING
When a truth reaches your place in a pattern, you may hear it as an insult. This verse lets that reaction speak through the lawyer’s claim that Jesus reproaches his group too, while leaving open whether the charge is fair.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
Feeling personally struck does not, by itself, prove that you are being unfairly insulted; the verse leaves the lawyer’s charge unresolved.
THE ROOT
ὑβρίζεις
hybrizeis
GROWS FROM
ὑβρ- (hybr-), the stem of ὕβρις and ὑβρίζω
Insolence or outrage; to treat someone outrageously or insultingly.
The lawyer’s verb does more than report hurt: it casts Jesus’ words as outrage. The same word family can describe the mistreatment Jesus later undergoes, linking “an insult to us” with the outrage borne by a speaker.
ALSO GROWS
hubris: Insolence, outrage
ὕβρις
The noun names the offense the lawyer says he experiences.
hybristēs: An insolent aggressor; someone who mistreats others
ὑβριστής
This branch shows the word family can describe the one who inflicts outrage, as well as the experience of being outraged.
hybristhēsetai: He will be spitefully treated, or outraged
ὑβρισθήσεται
This form appears in Luke 18:32 for what Jesus will undergo, echoing the lawyer’s word for reproach.
νομικῶν
nomikōn
GROWS FROM
νόμος
nomos
Instruction; a rule or body of instruction.
“experts in the instruction” in this verse is nomikōn. The lawyer’s title identifies him by his relation to instruction. That places him inside the very interpretive structure the rebuke now touches, rather than outside it as a detached observer.
ALSO GROWS
nomikos: One versed in the law or instruction
νομικός
This is the singular form behind the title “lawyer,” naming expertise in the instruction under discussion.
nomothetēs: Lawgiver; one who establishes instruction
νομοθέτης
This related word shows how the same root can name both those who work with instruction and those who set it.
THE PATTERN
A hearer’s sense of being attacked does not alone settle whether a hard word is unjust insult or truthful exposure.
Do not reprove a scoffer, lest he hate you; reprove the wise one, and he will love you.Have I therefore become your enemy, because I tell you the truth?For everyone who does worthless things hates the light, and does not come to the light, so that their deeds would not be exposed.THE THREAD
For he will be handed over to the nations, and will be played with, and handled with outrage, and spat upon.Luke uses the same word family here for the lawyer’s “reproachest” and for what Jesus will suffer as “spitefully entreated.” The echo places the lawyer’s claim of insult beside the outrage borne by the speaker, showing how one word family can name very different positions in a conflict.
Read the SDV Bible.
Every verse has a Deep Dive in the app.
The iPhone Bible app with the Selah Decoded Version.
Does something in this reading look wrong? Tell us