What Does Luke 7:27 Mean?
This is the one of whom it is written, Behold, I send my messenger before your face, who will build your way before you.
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
This is he, of whom it is written, Behold, I send my messenger before thy face, which shall prepare thy way before thee.THE KEY
The messenger is sent ahead to ready the path; the one whose presence fills it is still approaching.
THE MEANING
A message reaches you ahead of the presence it announces and makes the way ready for arrival. What is sent first directs your attention beyond itself to the one approaching.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that the messenger is the arrival itself: the signal comes first so the one it announces can be recognized.
THE ROOT
ἀποστέλλω
apostellō
GROWS FROM
στέλλω
stellō
To send or dispatch; with apo-, to send out or away.
“send” in this verse is apostellō. The Greek word places the messenger in motion before the one who is coming. Its family keeps the emphasis on being sent: the messenger’s role is defined by the route opened ahead, not by replacing the arrival.
ALSO GROWS
apostolos: A sent one, an apostle.
ἀπόστολος
The messenger is one sent ahead; the word family names a person through that sending.
apostolē: A sending or commission.
ἀποστολή
The verse’s action is a sending with a purpose: making the way ready.
ἄγγελος
angelos
GROWS FROM
ἀγγελ-
angel-
To announce or report; a messenger bears a message.
The Greek word means a messenger, a carrier of an announcement. The verse defines this figure by what the figure carries and by arriving before the one being announced.
ALSO GROWS
angellō: To announce or report.
ἀγγέλλω
The messenger’s presence points beyond itself to the announcement.
angelia: A message or report.
ἀγγελία
The message moves ahead of the arrival and prepares the way for recognition.
שָׁלַח
shalach
GROWS FROM
שלח
To send, send forth, release, or let go.
Luke’s Greek uses apostellō for send; the Hebrew wording of the quotation in Malachi uses the שׁלח root. That root lets sending carry the sense of being released outward: the messenger goes ahead, and the path opens for the one who follows.
ALSO GROWS
shaluaḥ: Sent or dispatched.
שָׁלוּחַ
The messenger is one sent ahead, with the route-opening task carried in the act of sending.
Shiloach: Sent forth; the name associated with the waters of Siloam.
שִׁלֹחַ
The image of sent water gives sending an outward movement; here the sent messenger similarly moves ahead and opens a way.
THE PATTERN
A way is prepared ahead of an arrival so the presence can be met and recognized.
Look, I send a messenger before you to guard you in the way and to bring you to the place I have established.A voice calls out in the wilderness, Clear the way of the LORD; make straight in the desert a raised road for our God.He said, "I am the voice of one crying out in the wilderness, straighten the way of the LORD, as the prophet Isaiah said."THE THREAD
Look, I am sending my messenger, and he will clear the way before me. And suddenly the Lord whom you seek will come to his temple, the messenger of the covenant whom you delight in. Look, he is coming, says the LORD of hosts.Luke’s line follows Malachi’s sequence: the messenger is sent, the way is prepared, and then the Lord comes. Malachi’s Hebrew uses shalach for send, a root that also carries release and sending forth; the messenger’s departure and the opening of the way belong to one movement.
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