What Does Mark 11:17 Mean?
And he taught, saying to them, Is it not written, My house shall be called a house of prayer for all the nations? But you have made it a cave of robbers.
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 he taught, saying unto them, Is it not written, My house shall be called of all nations the house of prayer? but ye have made it a den of thieves.THE KEY
The house meant to open prayer to every nation has become a shelter for bandits.
THE MEANING
The verse speaks wherever a place meant for prayer and shared access becomes cover for taking from others. Its sacred name does not conceal what happens inside: it is either open toward prayer for all peoples or sheltering those who prey on them. The verse holds that contradiction in full view.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
A sacred label does not make a place sacred in its use; calling it a house of prayer cannot cover the harm done there.
THE ROOT
λῃστῶν
lēstōn
GROWS FROM
λῃστ
λῃστ- (lēst-): robber or bandit, especially one who plunders.
“robbers” in this verse is lēstōn. The Greek word can suggest bandits rather than only people who steal secretly. Calling the place their den pictures a refuge that shelters predation, the opposite of a house opened for prayer across peoples.
ALSO GROWS
lēstēs: robber, bandit
λῃστής
This singular noun belongs to the same λῃστ- family; the verse uses its plural form for those sheltered by the den.
lēsteuō: to rob or plunder as a bandit
λῃστεύω
This verb shares the λῃστ- stem and names the predatory action the den shelters.
ἔθνεσιν
ethnesin
GROWS FROM
ἐθν
ἐθν- (ethn-): a people or nation.
“nations” in this verse is ethnesin. The phrase reaches toward all peoples, not one community alone. That open horizon stands against the bandits’ enclosed refuge: welcome is part of what this house is meant to be.
ALSO GROWS
ethnos: nation, people
ἔθνος
This is the singular form behind the verse’s plural “nations,” grounding the house’s wide welcome in the word for a people.
ethnikos: of the nations; Gentile
ἐθνικός
This related word carries the same ἐθν- family into the distinction between a people and the nations beyond it.
προσευχῆς
proseuchēs
GROWS FROM
εὐχ
εὐχ- (euch-): pray, wish, or vow.
The word translated “prayer” belongs to a family that also carries the sense of a vow or expressed wish. The house is defined by directed appeal to God, and that appeal is declared open to every people.
ALSO GROWS
euchomai: to pray, wish, or vow
εὔχομαι
This verb belongs to the same εὐχ- family, linking prayer with an expressed desire or commitment.
euchē: prayer, wish, or vow
εὐχή
This related noun shows that prayer shares a word-family with a voiced wish or vow, not merely a label for a building.
THE PATTERN
A place dedicated to God’s presence is meant to open prayer across peoples, and its sacred name cannot hide exploitation within it.
Them also will I bring to my set-apart mountain, and gladden them in my house of prayer. Their ascending offerings and their sacrifices shall be received with favor upon my altar, for my house shall be called a house of prayer for all the peoples.Has this house, which is called by my name, become a cave of robbers, in your eyes? Look, I myself have seen it, says the LORD.And to those who sold the doves he said, Lift these things from here. Do not make my Father's house a house of trade.THE THREAD
Has this house, which is called by my name, become a cave of robbers, in your eyes? Look, I myself have seen it, says the LORD.Mark reprises Jeremiah’s phrase “den of robbers”; in the Greek wording of both verses, the word is λῃστῶν (lēstōn, bandits). The earlier charge opens Mark’s line further: a sacred name cannot hide a place that shelters predation.
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