What Does Mark 10:27 Mean?
Jesus looked at them and said, With humankind it is impossible, but not with God, for with God all things are possible.
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 Jesus looking upon them saith, With men it is impossible, but not with God: for with God all things are possible.THE KEY
“Impossible” and “possible” are the same Greek capacity-word with its negation removed, so human limits do not define what can happen with God.
THE MEANING
What is impossible through human capacity, including deliverance, is possible with God. Human inability is real, but it does not set the boundary of God’s ability.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that what you cannot accomplish is impossible altogether.
THE ROOT
δυνατά
dynatá
GROWS FROM
δύναμαι (dýnamai) / δυνα- (dyna-)
Greek δύναμαι (dýnamai) means “to be able”; its stem δυνα- (dyna-) carries the sense of capacity or ability.
The verse sets ἀδύνατον (adýnaton, “impossible,” “incapable”) against δυνατά (dynatá, “possible,” “capable”), two forms from one capacity-root. English preserves the opposition, while the Greek shows that the difference is capacity denied or present, and locates that capacity with God.
ALSO GROWS
adýnatos: incapable; impossible
ἀδύνατος
The privative alpha negates the same capacity-root, showing that “impossible” means capacity is absent.
dýnamis: power; ability
δύναμις
This noun names capacity itself, revealing that “possible” here concerns ability, not mere chance.
dýnamai: to be able
δύναμαι
This verb is the root family’s core sense: what people cannot do is not beyond God’s ability.
THE PATTERN
Human incapacity does not set the limit of what is possible with God.
Is any word too hard for the LORD? At the appointed time I will turn back to you, at this season of life, and Sarah will have a son.Ah, Lord GOD! Behold, you have made the heavens and the earth by your great strength and outstretched arm, and nothing is too hard for you.For with God nothing will be impossible.THE THREAD
And he said, The things without strength for humankind are possible for God.Luke’s parallel keeps the shared Greek root visible: ἀδύνατα (adýnata, “impossible”) and δυνατά (dynatá, “possible”). The contrast is capacity negated or present, with God as the one beyond the human limit.
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