What Does Luke 13:23 Mean?
Someone said to him, "Lord, are there few who are being delivered?" And he said to them.
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 said one unto him, Lord, are there few that be saved? And he said unto them,THE KEY
The verse opens with a headcount question, then leaves the number unanswered as Jesus’ reply begins to turn toward a way through.
THE MEANING
The question asks how many are being delivered. The verse leaves that count open, and its unfinished sentence leads straight into an answer about a narrow gate. The focus shifts from tallying other people to the reader’s own relation to that passage.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The belief that deliverance can be understood by counting how many qualify gives way to an image of entering through a narrow gate.
THE ROOT
σωζόμενοι
sōzomenoi
GROWS FROM
σωζ-
To rescue, preserve, or bring safely out of danger.
The Greek uses a present participle, describing “those being delivered” as rescue in progress. The same word family names deliverance itself and the deliverer, so the question about a number opens onto the process and source of being brought out.
ALSO GROWS
sōtēria: Rescue or deliverance.
σωτηρία
The related noun names the rescue the question counts, connecting those being delivered with deliverance itself.
sōtēr: A rescuer or deliverer.
σωτήρ
This related word names the one who brings rescue, completing the word family around those being delivered.
THE PATTERN
Scripture presents deliverance as entering through a way into life, not as a count of who qualifies.
This is the gate to the LORD; the aligned enter into it.For narrow is the gate, and pressed in is the way that leads to life, and few are those who find it.I am the door. Through me, if anyone enters, he shall be delivered, and shall go in and out, and shall find pasture.THE THREAD
Wrestle to enter through the narrow door, for many, I say to you, will seek to enter and will not have the strength.This is the answer the final words of 13:23 announce. The question asks how many are being delivered; the response turns toward a narrow gate and the difference between seeking to enter and entering.
This reading is from Selah Verse.
You can read any verse this way in the app, keep it as a card, and send it on.
A Bible app where you send verses from your keyboard and in Messages, and every verse has a Deep Dive.
Does something in this reading look wrong? Tell us