What Does Mark 6:37 Mean?
He answered and said to them, Give them to eat. And they said to him, Shall we go and buy two hundred denarii of bread and give them to eat?
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
He answered and said unto them, Give ye them to eat. And they say unto him, Shall we go and buy two hundred pennyworth of bread, and give them to eat?THE KEY
Before the disciples price the bread, Jesus names the crowd’s hunger as something to be met by giving.
THE MEANING
When hunger stands in front of you, this verse sets a direct charge to give beside the reflex to calculate what buying enough will cost. It holds the command and the cost in the same moment, without pretending the need is small.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the assumption that money is the only answer to need: Jesus names giving before the disciples propose buying.
THE ROOT
δότε
dóte
GROWS FROM
δο-/δω- (do-/dō-)
to give, grant, or place in another’s hands
“give” in this verse is dóte. This is a transfer verb: food passes from someone’s hands to someone who can receive it. Its word family folds the act of giving into the gift itself, revealing provision as something handed onward.
ALSO GROWS
dōron: gift
δῶρον
The gift belongs to the same word family as the command to give, bringing the result of the act into view.
dosis: giving; a gift or act of giving
δόσις
This noun keeps the movement of giving visible: what is given becomes provision another can receive.
ἀγοράσωμεν
agorasōmen
GROWS FROM
ἀγορα-
agora-
marketplace; the verb means to buy or purchase
“buy” in this verse is agorasōmen. The disciples frame the hunger through the marketplace and a calculable sum. Beside δότε, this root sharpens the verse’s tension between handing food over and pricing provision.
ALSO GROWS
agorá: marketplace
ἀγορά
The noun names the setting underneath the buying verb and makes its economic frame audible.
agoraíos: of or belonging to the marketplace
ἀγοραῖος
This related word keeps the family tied to the marketplace, the place that shapes the disciples’ question.
THE PATTERN
Provision moves through open hands, from source to recipient.
You open your hand and fill every living thing with delight.And when he had taken the five loaves and the two fish, he looked up to heaven and spoke good over them, and broke the loaves and gave them to his disciples to set before them, and the two fish he divided among them all.Now the one who supplies seed to the sower supplies bread for eating, and fills out your sown seed, and makes grow the fruits of your alignment.THE THREAD
And when he had taken the five loaves and the two fish, he looked up to heaven and spoke good over them, and broke the loaves and gave them to his disciples to set before them, and the two fish he divided among them all.Mark 6:41 uses the same Greek verb, δίδωμι (didōmi, “give”), that appears in Jesus’ command here. The later verse lets the command’s shape become visible: provision passes through the disciples’ hands to the crowd.
Read the SDV Bible.
Every verse has a Deep Dive in the app.
The iPhone Bible app with the Selah Decoded Version.
Does something in this reading look wrong? Tell us