What Does Matthew 13:8 Mean?
But others fell into good soil and bore fruit, some a hundredfold, some sixtyfold, some thirtyfold.
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
But other fell into good ground, and brought forth fruit, some an hundredfold, some sixtyfold, some thirtyfold.THE KEY
The ground’s fruitfulness is an ongoing giving, and all three harvest sizes belong to the same fruitful life.
THE MEANING
What reaches receptive ground in you keeps yielding beyond the moment it takes root. Its fruit may come in different measures, and the verse names each measure as fruit.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that fruitfulness counts only at its largest measure: the sixtyfold and thirtyfold yields are fruit too.
THE ROOT
ἐδίδου
edidou
GROWS FROM
διδο- (didō-), the stem of δίδωμι (didōmi)
To give, grant, or yield.
The Greek verb is imperfect, picturing the ground as giving fruit over time. Under “brought forth” is an ongoing yield: the seed’s life becoming visible through receptive soil.
ALSO GROWS
apodidōmi: Give back, render, or repay.
ἀποδίδωμι
The same giving stem appears when something is returned or rendered; here the ground gives a yield.
metadidōmi: Share or impart.
μεταδίδωμι
The ground’s giving makes the life of the seed visible in what it shares as fruit.
καρπόν
karpon
GROWS FROM
καρπ- (karp-), the Greek stem of καρπός (karpos)
Fruit, produce, or yield.
The shared stem names both fruit and fruitlessness, while this verse applies the fruit-word to all three yields. Its contrast is fruit versus no fruit, not large versus small.
ALSO GROWS
karpophoreō: Bear or produce fruit.
καρποφορέω
This verb uses the same fruit stem to name the act of bearing fruit.
akarpos: Fruitless or unfruitful.
ἄκαρπος
The opposite of fruitfulness is named as having no fruit, not as producing a smaller measure.
THE PATTERN
What is rooted in a living source bears visible fruit in its season, with the yield taking different measures.
Then Isaac sowed in that land, and in that same year found a hundredfold, and the LORD blessed him.And he becomes like a tree planted by the channels of the waters, that gives its fruit in its season; its leaf does not wither; whatever he does, he breaks through.I am the vine, and you are the branches. The one who remains in me, and I in him, this one bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing.THE THREAD
But the one sown on good soil is the one who hears the word and puts it together, who also bears fruit and brings forth, one a hundredfold, another sixty, another thirty.This verse opens the picture by showing the movement from receiving and understanding to bearing fruit. It repeats all three harvest measures, placing thirtyfold within fruitfulness alongside a hundredfold.
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