What Does Luke 18:5 Mean?
Yet because this widow wears me down, I will set her straight, lest by her unending coming she strike me under the eye.
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
Yet because this widow troubleth me, I will avenge her, lest by her continual coming she weary me.THE KEY
The word translated “troubleth” pictures a blow beneath the eye: her repeated arrival lands on the judge like a beating until he grants her justice.
THE MEANING
The widow keeps bringing her need before an authority who neither reveres God nor cares about people. Her continual return wears down his refusal, and he acts to give her justice.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
This undoes the belief that an appeal has no force unless the person hearing it already cares: even this unjust judge responds to the widow’s repeated presence.
THE ROOT
ὑπωπιάζῃ
hypōpiazē
GROWS FROM
ὑπωπιάζω
hypōpiazō
To strike beneath the eye; figuratively, to buffet or wear someone down.
“strike me under the eye” in this verse is hypōpiazē. The word translated “troubleth” pictures a blow beneath the eye, giving the widow’s repeated arrival a physical force English softens into annoyance. The same verb appears for buffeting the body in 1 Corinthians 9:27, linking her pressure on the judge to the language of a body being struck.
ALSO GROWS
hypōpiazō: To strike beneath the eye; figuratively, to buffet or wear down.
ὑπωπιάζω
In 1 Corinthians 9:27 this verb describes the speaker keeping his body under discipline, showing the force carried by the widow’s “troubleth.”
hypōpion: The area beneath the eye; a bruise or black eye.
ὑπώπιον
This related form preserves the concrete image beneath the figurative sense of being worn down.
ἐκδικήσω
ekdikēsō
GROWS FROM
δίκη
dikē
Justice, right, or what is due.
“set her straight” in this verse is ekdikēsō. The verb names vindicating someone and giving justice its due. Here even a reluctant judge decides that the widow’s claim must be answered.
ALSO GROWS
dikē: Justice, right, or what is due.
δίκη
This is the seed behind the judge’s decision to act on the widow’s claim.
ekdikēsis: Justice or vindication.
ἐκδίκησις
This noun from the same word family appears in the following verses as Jesus speaks of God bringing justice to those who cry out.
THE PATTERN
Repeated appeal keeps a need present until the one with power responds.
And he spoke a parable to them to this end, that people must always pray and never give out.And it was, as she kept on praying before the LORD, that Eli watched her mouth.I say to you, though he does not rise and give to him because he is his friend, yet because of his shamelessness he rises and gives him as many as he needs.THE THREAD
But I bruise my body and lead it into slavery, lest by any means, after I have heralded to others, I myself should be rejected.“I keep under” translates ὑπωπιάζω (hypōpiazō), the same verb used for the widow’s “troubleth.” Its image of a blow connects bodily buffeting there with the pressure of her repeated return here.
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