What Does Mark 1:21 Mean?
And they went into Capernaum, and straightway on the sabbath he entered the synagogue and taught.
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 they went into Capernaum; and straightway on the sabbath day he entered into the synagogue, and taught.THE KEY
The place of teaching is itself named by the act that brings people together.
THE MEANING
You meet instruction in the midst of a gathered people. The Greek name “synagogue” carries the action of gathering within it, so people coming together belongs to the teaching moment.
THE ROOT
συναγωγή
synagōgē
GROWS FROM
συνάγω
synagō
to gather, bring together
Beneath “synagogue” is συναγωγή (synagōgē, “gathering, assembly”): the name carries people coming together within it. The verse places teaching inside that gathering, keeping the people’s assembly part of the teaching moment.
ALSO GROWS
synagō: to gather, bring together
συνάγω
This verb names the gathering action carried within the assembly word.
episynagō: to gather together
ἐπισυνάγω
Mark 13:27 uses this same verb family for people gathered from every direction, opening the assembly word into an action that reaches across distance.
THE PATTERN
Teaching and hearing take shape within a people gathered together.
Assemble the people, the men, the women, and the little ones, and the sojourner within your gates, so that they may hear and respond, and so that they may learn, and be struck with awe of the LORD your God, and guard to do all the words of this instruction;And he came to Nazareth, where he had been nourished. As was his custom, he entered the synagogue on the sabbath day, and stood up to read.And after the reading of the instruction and the prophets, the heads of the synagogue sent to them, saying, Men and brothers, if you have any word of urging for the people, speak.THE THREAD
Then he will send out his messengers, and will gather his picked-out ones from the four winds, from the outermost edge of the earth to the outermost edge of the heavens.The verb ἐπισυνάγω (episynagō, “gather together”) grows from the same word-family as συναγωγή (synagōgē, “gathering, assembly”). Mark moves from people gathered in a meeting place to people gathered from every direction.
This reading is from Selah Verse.
You can read any verse this way in the app, keep it as a card, and send it on.
A Bible app where you send verses from your keyboard and in Messages, and every verse has a Deep Dive.
Does something in this reading look wrong? Tell us