What Does Matthew 11:6 Mean?
And flourishing is the one who is not made to stumble over me.
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 blessed is he, whosoever shall not be offended in me.THE KEY
The Greek word for “offended” carries the image of a foot caught by a stumbling block: flourishing remains possible when Jesus does not become the point of the fall.
THE MEANING
Flourishing belongs to you when you do not stumble over Jesus. The verse pictures an encounter that can catch you off guard, then names flourishing where that encounter does not end in a fall.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the assumption that whatever unsettles you about Jesus must disqualify him.
THE ROOT
σκανδαλισθῇ
skandalisthē
GROWS FROM
σκανδαλ-
skandal-
To trip or cause to stumble; the related noun means a snare or stumbling block.
“made to stumble over me” in this verse is skandalisthē. The Greek verb gives “offended” the shape of a stumble: something catches the foot and can bring a person down. The word holds together the inner shock of taking offense and the physical image of being tripped.
ALSO GROWS
skandalon: Snare or stumbling block
σκάνδαλον
This related noun makes the verb’s image visible: the offense is like something in the path that catches the foot.
skandalismos: Stumbling or cause of stumbling
σκανδαλισμός
This related form keeps the movement from being tripped to taking offense within the same word family.
THE PATTERN
An encounter with God’s chosen one can become either a place of refuge or a point of stumbling.
And he shall be for a set-apart place; but for a stone of striking and a rock of stumbling to both houses of Israel, for a trap and for a snare to those who settle in Jerusalem.When Jesus knew within himself that his disciples murmured at it, he said to them, Does this cause you to stumble?And a stone to strike against, and a rock that springs the trap, to those who strike against the word and will not yield, and to this they were also set.THE THREAD
As it is written, "Look, I lay in Zion a stone of stumbling and a rock of the snare, and whoever leans their full weight on him will not be put to shame."Matthew uses the verb from the skandal- word family for being tripped; Romans names the skandalon as a “rock of offence.” Together they reveal the physical image inside “offended”: a stumbling point that catches the foot.
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