What Does Mark 14:56 Mean?
For many bore false testimony against him, but their testimonies did not match.
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 many bare false witness against him, but their witness agreed not together.THE KEY
A lie can borrow the form of testimony, but repetition cannot make its accounts agree.
THE MEANING
A charge can be loud around you and still lack a coherent witness. Many mouths do not turn contradiction into truth; the testimony remains divided even when the accusation is aimed at one person.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that being accused by many people proves guilt. Repetition cannot supply agreement that is absent from the testimony.
THE ROOT
ἐψευδομαρτύρουν
epseudomartyroun
GROWS FROM
ψευδο- + μαρτυρ- (pseud- + martyr-)
False testimony being borne: ψευδο- means false, and μαρτυρ- carries the sense of witness or testimony.
“bore false testimony” in this verse is epseudomartyroun. The Greek word joins falsehood to the act of witnessing: the claim takes the recognizable form of testimony, but its content is false. The same witness-family words name both the person who testifies and the testimony itself, showing why a crowd of voices can still fail to produce one coherent account.
ALSO GROWS
martys: A person who testifies.
μάρτυς
The accusation presents itself as a witness’s assertion, even though it is false.
martyria: Testimony or evidence.
μαρτυρία
The same word-family names what a witness produces; several testimonies can be heard without forming a consistent account.
ἴσαι
isai
GROWS FROM
ἰσο-
iso-
Equal, the same, or on the same level.
“did not match” in this verse is isai. The Greek literally says the testimonies were not equal, which gives the KJV’s “agreed not together” a concrete shape: their accounts do not match. The speakers are many, but their testimony has no common measure.
ALSO GROWS
isotimos: Of equal value or honor.
ἰσότιμος
It shows the basic sense of iso- as equality or parity.
isopsychos: Of the same mind or feeling.
ἰσόψυχος
It shows how equality can describe people whose thoughts align, the very coherence missing from these testimonies.
THE PATTERN
An accusation is established through converging testimony, not by the sheer number of voices repeating it.
One witness shall not rise up against a man for any crookedness, or for any falling short, in it he misses the mark; upon the mouth of two witnesses, or upon the mouth of three witnesses, the word shall stand.And in your instruction it stands written, that the witness of two people is true.This is the third time I am coming to you. In the mouth of two or three witnesses shall every word stand.THE THREAD
Do not take up an accusation against an elder, unless it rests upon two or three witnesses.“Witnesses” is μάρτυρες (martyres), from the same μαρτυρ- family as Mark’s word for bearing false witness. Mark shows many testimonies failing to agree; this verse makes corroboration the condition for receiving an accusation.
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