What Does Luke 21:10 Mean?
Then he said to them, Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom.
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 he unto them, Nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom:THE KEY
The Greek verb translated “rise” is also used for being raised from the dead; the surrounding words determine whether that rising turns toward conflict or life.
THE MEANING
The verse names public upheaval in which peoples and realms of rule rise against one another. Its repeated “against” makes the collision visible at two scales: nation and kingdom.
THE ROOT
ἐγερθήσεται
egerthēsetai
GROWS FROM
ἐγείρω
egeirō
To rouse or raise; also to wake or get up.
“will rise” in this verse is egerthēsetai. The verb carries the sense of rising or being raised, while “against” gives that rising its direction here. The same verb family describes Jesus being raised in Luke 24:6, showing that the verb itself does not dictate whether the rising brings conflict or life.
ALSO GROWS
egeirō: To rouse, wake, or raise.
ἐγείρω
This is the verb’s dictionary form and reveals the movement beneath “shall rise.”
ēgerthē: Was raised; rendered “is risen” in Luke 24:6.
ἠγέρθη
The same verb family describes Jesus’ rising, making the direction of the action depend on its context.
THE PATTERN
Collective conflict can reproduce itself across peoples, cities, and kingdoms.
And I will stir Egypt against Egypt; each man will fight his brother, and each his neighbor, city against city, and kingdom against kingdom.And nation was broken by nation, and city by city, for God stirred them in every narrow place.And another horse goes out, fire-red, and to the one seated upon it is given to take wholeness from the earth, that they slaughter one another, and a great blade is given to him.THE THREAD
He is not here, but has been raised. Remember how he spoke to you while he was still in Galilee.Luke 21:10 and Luke 24:6 use forms of the same verb, ἐγείρω (egeirō), meaning to rouse or raise. Here nations rise against one another; there Jesus is raised, so the shared verb names the rising while each clause gives it direction.
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