What Does Matthew 17:21 Mean?
But this kind does not come out except through prayer and fasting.
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
Howbeit this kind goeth not out but by prayer and fasting.THE KEY
Release here joins two movements: attention turns toward God in prayer while ordinary appetite is set aside in fasting.
THE MEANING
Some forces do not leave through a command alone; this verse joins their departure to prayer and fasting. What holds a person goes out as attention is directed toward God and food is withheld.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The lie this undoes is that every force yields to a command alone.
THE ROOT
νηστείᾳ
nēsteia
GROWS FROM
νηστ-
nēst-
Abstaining from food; not eating.
Fasting is a deliberate absence of food, not something added. Beside prayer, it makes release a paired movement: an appeal directed toward God and an appetite set aside.
ALSO GROWS
nēsteia: A fast or abstinence from food.
νηστεία
This is the word used in the verse; its concrete sense keeps fasting tied to food.
nēsteuō: To fast or abstain from food.
νηστεύω
The related verb names the act behind the practice, showing that fasting is a chosen withholding.
προσευχῇ
proseuchē
GROWS FROM
εὐχή
euchē
A wish, vow, or prayer; with πρός (pros), an appeal directed toward.
Prayer carries the sense of a directed appeal, not merely private thought. Beside fasting, it gives the verse both an orientation toward God and a setting aside of appetite.
ALSO GROWS
euchē: A wish, vow, or prayer.
εὐχή
This is the core word within proseuchē and reveals the appeal carried by prayer.
proseuchomai: To pray, to make an appeal toward God.
προσεύχομαι
The related verb makes the direction of prayer explicit.
ἐκπορεύεται
ekporeuetai
GROWS FROM
πορεύομαι
poreuomai
To go, travel, or proceed; with ἐκ (ek), to go out or come forth.
“goeth out” in this verse is ekporeuetai. The verse pictures departure: the force comes out from the person. The wording leaves the emphasis on release, while prayer and fasting name the way this departure occurs.
ALSO GROWS
poreuomai: To go, travel, or proceed.
πορεύομαι
This is the base movement inside the verse’s word for going out.
poreia: A journey or course of travel.
πορεία
This related noun keeps the root’s sense of movement in view: what is held within takes a course outward.
THE PATTERN
Release is joined to a reorientation of attention and appetite.
Is this not the fast I have chosen, to open the bonds of wickedness, to untie the cords of the yoke, to send the crushed away free, and to tear away every yoke?But you, when you pray, enter into your inner room, and when you have shut your door, pray to your Father who is in the hidden. And your Father, who sees in the hidden, will give it back to you in the open.As they served the Lord and fasted, the Set-Apart Breath said, Mark off for me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them.THE THREAD
And he said to them, This kind can come out by nothing, but by prayer and fasting.Mark uses “come forth” for the same departure Matthew calls “goeth out,” making the movement from within to without explicit. The repeated pairing of prayer and fasting shows that release is linked to both directed appeal and abstention.
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