What Does Luke 5:3 Mean?
And he stepped into one of the boats, the one that was Simon's, and asked him to draw out a little from the land. And he sat down and taught the crowd from the boat.
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
And he entered into one of the ships, which was Simon’s, and prayed him that he would thrust out a little from the land. And he sat down, and taught the people out of the ship.THE KEY
A small shift of Simon’s working boat turns it into a place where a crowd can hear.
THE MEANING
An ordinary boat moves a little from shore, and a gathered crowd receives teaching from it. The verse holds open how a small change of position can create a new vantage point.
THE ROOT
ἐπαναγαγεῖν
epanagagein
GROWS FROM
ἄγω
agō
To lead, bring, or carry.
“asked him to draw out” in this verse is epanagagein. The request directs the boat a little outward from shore. Luke repeats this verb in the next verse for “Launch out into the deep,” so the small movement that gives the teaching a place to be heard opens into a farther movement.
ALSO GROWS
anagō: To lead or bring up, or to put out to sea.
ἀνάγω
This related form also describes movement onto the water, echoing the boat’s departure from land.
exagō: To lead or bring out from a place.
ἐξάγω
It shares the root’s sense of being led from one position toward another.
πλοίων
ploiōn
GROWS FROM
πλέω
pleō
To sail or travel by water.
“ships” in this verse is ploiōn. The word for boat is related to πλέω (pleō), “to sail”: the vessel is named through its movement across water. Simon’s working boat becomes a place of teaching as it moves just beyond the shore.
ALSO GROWS
ploion: A vessel used for travel by water.
πλοῖον
This is the boat Simon owns, whose movement creates the teaching place.
plous: A voyage or passage by sea.
πλοῦς
It keeps the focus on movement: the boat is a vessel whose defining work is going across water.
THE PATTERN
A vessel carrying a gathered people can also become the place from which a word reaches them.
And great crowds were gathered together to him, so that he got into a boat and sat down, and the whole crowd stood on the shore.And he began again to teach beside the sea. A great crowd was gathered together to him, so that he entered a boat and sat in the sea, and the whole crowd was on the land beside the sea.So take heart, Men, for I lean my weight upon God, that it will be just as it was spoken to me.THE THREAD
And when he stopped speaking, he said to Simon, Draw out into the deep, and loosen your nets for a catch.Luke uses the same verb, ἐπανάγω (epanagō), for moving the boat a little from land here and launching it into the deep in the next verse. The movement that gives the teaching a place to be heard becomes the movement that carries Simon into deeper water.
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