What Does Mark 6:46 Mean?
And when he had sent them away, he went away to the mountain to pray.
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 when he had sent them away, he departed into a mountain to pray.THE KEY
The Greek shifts from repeated “away” to “toward”: this solitude is not mere absence but a movement oriented toward prayer.
THE MEANING
The verse holds two directions together: he leaves the company around him, then turns toward prayer. The prayer word carries the sense of “toward,” so solitude has an orientation rather than being mere absence. That movement remains present: distance from others can become space directed toward God.
THE ROOT
προσεύξασθαι
proseuxasthai
GROWS FROM
εὔχομαι
euchomai
Pray or express a wish; joined with πρός (pros, “toward” or “to”), it forms a word for directed prayer.
“to pray” in this verse is proseuxasthai. The English “pray” gives the act but hides its built-in direction: πρός (pros, “toward”) joins εὔχομαι (euchomai, “pray” or “wish”). Prayer here is not empty withdrawal; it turns toward.
ALSO GROWS
euchomai: Pray; wish.
εὔχομαι
This verb supplies the prayer or expressed desire at the heart of the compound.
proseuchē: Prayer.
προσευχή
This noun comes from the same compound and names the practice toward which the verse turns.
ἀποταξάμενος
apotaxamenos
GROWS FROM
τάσσω
tassō
Set in order, appoint, or assign; ἀποτάσσομαι (apotassomai) can mean take leave or say farewell.
“sent them away” in this verse is apotaxamenos. The participle describes taking leave; then ἀπῆλθεν (apēlthen, “he went away”) repeats ἀπό (apo, “away” or “from”). The repeated movement away is followed by prayer, whose compound begins with πρός (pros, “toward”).
ALSO GROWS
taxis: Order; arrangement.
τάξις
This related noun carries the base family’s sense of setting things in order.
syntassō: Arrange together; instruct.
συντάσσω
This related verb shares the τάσσω (tassō) base; the verse’s compound uses it in a leave-taking sense.
THE PATTERN
Prayer turns a person toward God and can follow a deliberate withdrawal from surrounding company.
And in the morning, while it was still dark, rising long before day, he went out and went away to an empty place, and there he prayed.But he himself pulled back into the wilderness and prayed.You hear my voice at morning, LORD; at morning I lay out my prayer before you, and keep watch from the height.THE THREAD
But he himself pulled back into the wilderness and prayed.Luke uses the same Greek prayer verb, προσεύχομαι (proseuchomai, “to pray”), and describes him withdrawing into the wilderness. The shared root makes the movement clear: the withdrawal has a direction, toward prayer.
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