What Does Mark 13:22 Mean?
For false anointed ones and false prophets will rise, and will show signs and wonders, to lead astray, if it were possible, even the picked-out ones.
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
For false Christs and false prophets shall rise, and shall shew signs and wonders, to seduce, if it were possible, even the elect.THE KEY
A sign can make wandering feel like revelation.
THE MEANING
This verse speaks to the moment when a dramatic sign makes a voice feel reliable. A display can draw you off course even when the claim sounds sacred, and even the chosen are named as targets. The measure is where the voice leads, not how astonishing its signs appear.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that an extraordinary sign proves the voice behind it is trustworthy.
THE ROOT
ἀποπλανᾶν
apoplanan
GROWS FROM
πλαν-
To wander, or to cause someone to wander from the way.
“lead astray” in this verse is apoplanan. The word translated “seduce” carries the sense of leading someone off course. The warning is about the direction a sign takes you: a striking display can accompany a voice that draws you away from the way.
ALSO GROWS
planē: Wandering; error or deception.
πλάνη
This branch names the state of being led off course, the outcome Mark warns the signs may produce.
planētēs: Wanderer; wandering star.
πλανήτης
The shared root carries the image of movement without a fixed course, echoing the verse’s warning about where a voice leads.
THE PATTERN
A sign may be striking and still lead away from the way.
If a prophet stands up in your midst, or a dreamer of dreams, and gives you a sign or a wonder, And the sign or the wonder comes to pass, of which he spoke to you, saying, Let us walk after other gods, which you have not known, and let us serve them; You shall not hear and respond to the words of that prophet, or that dreamer of dreams, for the LORD your God is testing you, to know whether you love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your living soul.Jesus answered and said to them, Watch that no one leads you off the path.And he sends wandering those who settle upon the earth through the signs which are given to him to do before the face of the beast, saying to those who settle upon the earth, to make an image to the beast, which has the blow of the sword and lives.THE THREAD
Jesus answered and said to them, Watch that no one leads you off the path.Mark’s “seduce” and Matthew’s “deceive” use forms of the Greek root πλαν- (plan-), to wander or lead astray. Together they show that the central danger is being carried off course, even by something that appears powerful.
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