What Does Matthew 24:15 Mean?
So when you perceive the stench of the emptying, spoken through Daniel the prophet, standing in the set-apart place, let the reader perceive.
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
When ye therefore shall see the abomination of desolation, spoken of by Daniel the prophet, stand in the holy place, (whoso readeth, let him understand:)THE KEY
The warning pictures desolation as an abhorrent presence taking its stand inside what is set apart.
THE MEANING
The warning addresses the moment you see an abhorrent presence occupying what is set apart: its position signals desolation. Seeing the scene and understanding what it means are distinct; the verse names both.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the assumption that seeing a sign makes its meaning self-evident; the parenthetical distinguishes sight from understanding.
THE ROOT
ἐρημώσεως
erēmōseōs
GROWS FROM
ἐρημ-
erēm-
A lexical family for desert or wilderness, and for making a place deserted.
“emptying” in this verse is erēmōseōs. The word for desolation belongs to the same family as the word for wilderness. It carries the sense of a place made desert, so the phrase points to desolation as an emptied condition taking shape within the scene.
ALSO GROWS
erēmos: Desert, wilderness; deserted
ἔρημος
The shared family connects desolation with the image of a place gone wilderness.
erēmoō: To make desolate or lay waste
ἐρημόω
This verb shows the family can name the making of desolation as well as its resulting condition.
βδέλυγμα
bdélygma
GROWS FROM
βδελυσσ-
bdeluss-
To abhor or regard as detestable.
“stench” in this verse is bdélygma. The Greek noun belongs to the family of the verb for abhorring. It names something detestable while keeping the response of revulsion close to the word itself.
ALSO GROWS
bdelýssomai: To abhor or detest
βδελύσσομαι
The verb makes visible the response contained in the noun for an abomination.
bdelyktós: Detestable, abhorrent
βδελυκτός
This related adjective describes the quality of what the noun names.
ἅγιον
hágion
GROWS FROM
ἁγι-
hagi-
Set apart.
“set-apart” in this verse is hágion. The word centers on being set apart. The warning’s force comes from the clash between what is detestable and the place marked as set apart.
ALSO GROWS
hagiázō: To set apart, consecrate
ἁγιάζω
The verb expresses the action associated with the place called set apart.
hagiasmós: Setting apart, consecration
ἁγιασμός
This noun keeps the same set-apart meaning in another form.
THE PATTERN
Desolation and desecration become recognizable when a presence takes position within what is set apart.
His arms stand on his side, and they pierce the set-apart place of strength. They take away the continual drawing near, and they set the loathsome thing that empties it.And when you see Jerusalem encircled by armies, then know that its emptying has drawn near.He who is set against and lifts himself up over all that is called God, or what is bowed to, so that he sits down in the temple of God as God, displaying himself that he is God.THE THREAD
His arms stand on his side, and they pierce the set-apart place of strength. They take away the continual drawing near, and they set the loathsome thing that empties it.Daniel names the same abomination-and-desolation pattern and links it directly with the pollution of the sanctuary. Matthew sharpens the image to the moment that presence is seen standing in the set-apart place.
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