What Does Matthew 22:30 Mean?
For in the rising they neither marry, nor are given in marriage, but are as the messengers of God in heaven.
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
For in the resurrection they neither marry, nor are given in marriage, but are as the angels of God in heaven.THE KEY
The two forms of “marry” share one Greek root, so the verse sets aside both entering marriage and being given in marriage in resurrection.
THE MEANING
You are reading a claim about resurrection life: people there neither marry nor are given in marriage. The comparison to God’s messengers in heaven points to a mode of life beyond marriage, without saying what every other human bond becomes.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the assumption that resurrection simply resumes this life with its marriage arrangements intact.
THE ROOT
γαμέω
gameō
GROWS FROM
γαμ
gam
The shared Greek stem for marriage.
English makes “marry” and “are given in marriage” sound like separate ideas, but both verbs grow from the same γαμ (gam) stem. The verse names both sides of the marriage arrangement, then says neither belongs to resurrection life.
ALSO GROWS
gameō: To marry.
γαμέω
This is the active verb in the verse: a person enters marriage.
gamizō: To give someone in marriage.
γαμίζω
This is the passive-side counterpart in the verse, completing the pair.
gamos: Marriage or a wedding.
γάμος
The noun shows the shared stem names the marriage bond itself, not only one person’s action.
THE PATTERN
Resurrection is a transformed mode of life, not a simple continuation of present arrangements.
Nor can they die any longer, for they are equal to the messengers, and they are children of God, being children of the rising.It is sown a body of living soul; it is raised a body of breath. If there is a body of living soul, there is also a body of breath.So we were laid in the ground with him through immersion into death, that as the Anointed One was raised from the dead through the weight of the Father, so also we might walk in newness of life.THE THREAD
And Jesus answered and said to them, The children of this age marry, and are given in marriage.Luke places the same two marriage verbs on the side of this world, then contrasts them with resurrection life. Their shared γαμ (gam) stem makes clear that Matthew’s pair names the whole marriage arrangement.
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