What Does Luke 7:21 Mean?
In that same hour he tended many from illnesses and scourges and evil breaths, and he favored many of the blind with sight.
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 in that same hour he cured many of their infirmities and plagues, and of evil spirits; and unto many that were blind he gave sight.THE KEY
The verb translated “gave” means to bestow as a favor, so sight arrives as a gift within the same hour that every kind of affliction is healed.
THE MEANING
In your present hour, the verse holds bodily illness, plagues, evil spirits, and blindness in one scene of restoration. The same care reaches each affliction, and sight arrives as favor freely bestowed.
THE ROOT
ἐχαρίσατο
echarisato
GROWS FROM
χάρις
charis
Favor; freely bestowed goodwill.
“gave sight” in this verse is echarisato. The verb for “gave” belongs to the χάρις family of favor: seeing is graciously bestowed. English makes this sound like a neutral transfer, while the Greek carries the sense of a gift.
ALSO GROWS
charizomai: To grant or give as a favor.
χαρίζομαι
This is the verb used for “gave,” making favor part of how the verse describes restored sight.
charisma: A gift or gracious endowment.
χάρισμα
This related word makes visible the gift-shaped meaning carried by the act of giving sight.
ἐθεράπευσεν
etherapeusen
GROWS FROM
θεραπεύω
therapeuō
To attend to, care for, or heal.
“tended” in this verse is etherapeusen. The word translated “cured” carries the sense of attending to someone as well as healing them. In this verse, that care reaches diseases, plagues, and evil spirits.
ALSO GROWS
therapeia: Care, service, or healing.
θεραπεία
It keeps the sense of attentive care within the healing named in the verse.
therapeutēs: An attendant or healer.
θεραπευτής
This related word names one who attends to another, illuminating the care carried by “cured.”
πνευμάτων
pneumatōn
GROWS FROM
πνεῦμα
pneuma
Breath, wind, or spirit.
“evil breaths” in this verse is pneumatōn. “Evil spirits” uses pneuma, the same Greek word whose range includes breath and wind; “evil” qualifies what is named without erasing that range. English separates spirit from breath and wind, while Greek leaves their shared word audible.
ALSO GROWS
pneō: To blow or breathe.
πνέω
This verb shares the pneu- word family and shows its connection to blowing and breath.
pnoē: Breath or blowing.
πνοή
This related noun makes the breath and wind senses of pneuma visible.
THE PATTERN
Restoration reaches disease, affliction, spirits, and impaired sight within one movement of care.
The LORD opens the eyes of the blind; the LORD straightens the bent; the LORD loves the aligned.Then the eyes of the blind open, and the ears of the deaf open.The blind look up again, and the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, and the deaf hear, the dead are roused, and good news is carried to the emptied.THE THREAD
The blind look up again, and the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, and the deaf hear, the dead are roused, and good news is carried to the emptied.Luke’s “to see” is βλέπειν (blepein); Matthew’s “receive their sight” is ἀναβλέπουσιν (anablepousin), a compound carrying the same βλέπω (blepō) seeing-root. The shared root links the gift of sight here to Matthew’s wider pattern of restoration.
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