What Does Matthew 12:22 Mean?
Then a man was brought to him who was held by a demon, blind and mute, and he healed him, so that the blind and mute both spoke and saw.
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
Then was brought unto him one possessed with a devil, blind, and dumb: and he healed him, insomuch that the blind and dumb both spake and saw.THE KEY
The Greek word κωφός (kōphos) can mean deaf or mute, holding hearing and speech in one word while the healing restores sight and voice.
THE MEANING
Demonic affliction, blindness, and muteness stand together without euphemism; healing appears as restored sight and speech. The verse meets the reader now with restoration made visible: what was closed becomes perceptible and expressible.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The assumption that a person’s visible limitation is the whole story of what can be true about them.
THE ROOT
κωφὸν
kōphon
GROWS FROM
κωφ-
Dull, blunted; used for deafness or muteness.
“mute” in this verse is kōphon. The KJV’s “dumb” renders κωφός, a word whose range also includes deafness. The same Greek word appears in Matthew 11:5, where “the deaf hear,” so the language joins hearing and speech within one field of dulled capacity.
ALSO GROWS
kōphoō: To make deaf or mute; to dull.
κωφόω
This verb retains the sense of dulling or closure behind the adjective used here.
kōphōsis: Deafness or dullness.
κώφωσις
This related noun makes the connection between deafness and the broader sense of being dulled explicit.
ἐθεράπευσεν
etherapeusen
GROWS FROM
θεραπεύ-
To attend or serve; also to care for, treat, or heal.
The verb translated “healed” carries the shade of attending to and caring for someone. Here that care is visible in its result: the man speaks and sees.
ALSO GROWS
therapeia: Attendance, service, care, or healing.
θεραπεία
This related word keeps the sense of care close to the healing named in the verse.
therapeutēs: An attendant or healer.
θεραπευτής
This related noun names one who attends or cares, echoing the restorative action in the verse.
THE PATTERN
Healing is recognized by the opening of what had been closed: eyes see, deaf ears hear, and silent tongues speak.
Then the eyes of the blind open, and the ears of the deaf open.The LORD opens the eyes of the blind; the LORD straightens the bent; the LORD loves the aligned.And they were struck out of themselves beyond all overflowing, saying, He has done all things finely. He makes the deaf to hear, and the mute to speak.THE THREAD
The blind look up again, and the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, and the deaf hear, the dead are roused, and good news is carried to the emptied.Matthew 11:5 uses κωφός (kōphos), the same word rendered “dumb” in Matthew 12:22, when it says “the deaf hear.” One word spans deafness and muteness, linking this healing to the opening of both perception and expression.
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