What Does Luke 9:31 Mean?
Who appeared clothed in weight, and spoke of his exodus, which he was about to fulfill at Jerusalem.
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
Who appeared in glory, and spake of his decease which he should accomplish at Jerusalem.THE KEY
The word translated “decease” is exodos, a going out, so death is named as a passage Jesus is about to bring to completion.
THE MEANING
The verse holds glory and death in one frame: splendor does not erase the cost being named. It calls death an exodos, a going out, and gives that passage the language of completion. Radiance and loss remain visible together; neither cancels the other.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
Glory does not mean immunity from death; the verse places radiant glory beside a death that is openly named.
THE ROOT
ἔξοδος
exodos
GROWS FROM
ὁδός
hodos
Way, road, path. Exodos joins ex (out of) with hodos (way): a way out, departure.
“exodus” in this verse is exodos. The word gives death the shape of a going out. Its pairing with “accomplish” makes this departure a passage Jesus is about to complete in Jerusalem.
ALSO GROWS
exodos: Going out, departure
ἔξοδος
This is the word translated “decease”; its image of going out keeps a passage inside the meaning of death.
eisodos: Entrance, entry
εἴσοδος
Built with the same hodos (way), it names movement into a place, echoing the passage language in exodos.
πληροῦν
plēroun
GROWS FROM
πληρ
plēr
Fill, make full; by extension, bring to completion.
“fulfill” in this verse is plēroun. The phrase joins a going out with filling or completion: Jesus is about to bring this departure to completion in Jerusalem. That gives “accomplish” more force than an event that simply happens to him.
ALSO GROWS
plērōma: Fullness, that which is full
πλήρωμα
It carries the same root of filling, making completion more than a mere ending.
plērēs: Full, complete
πλήρης
This related form shows the root’s movement from filling toward a state of completion.
THE PATTERN
A departure can be named as a passage that reaches completion.
And it came to be at the end of four hundred and thirty years, and on this very bone of the day it came to be, that all the hosts of the LORD went out from the land of Egypt.By trust Joseph, when he was ending, remembered the going out of the sons of Israel, and gave charge concerning his bones.And I will also press that, after my going out, you may always be able to hold these things in remembrance.THE THREAD
By trust Joseph, when he was ending, remembered the going out of the sons of Israel, and gave charge concerning his bones.The Greek word is the same ἔξοδος (exodos): Hebrews uses it for Israel’s departure, while Luke uses it for Jesus’ decease. That shared word makes the Exodus story audible inside this scene, where death is named as a going out.
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