What Does Matthew 27:2 Mean?
They bound him, led him away, and handed him over to Pontius Pilate the governor.
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
And when they had bound him, they led him away, and delivered him to Pontius Pilate the governor.THE KEY
The handoff to authority begins with a bound body, making custody visible as force.
THE MEANING
Power takes hold of a person in a sequence the verse keeps visible: restraint, removal, custody. The handoff to the governor starts with a bound body; the official title does not erase that force. You see the bodily cost inside what can be called a transfer of authority.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The verse undoes the belief that an official transfer of custody is neutral: the person is first bound and carried away.
THE ROOT
δέσαντες
desantes
GROWS FROM
δέω
deō
To bind or tie; to restrain.
“bound” in this verse is desantes. English names the restraint, while the Greek word belongs to a family where restraint becomes both a bond and a person held in bonds. Here, binding is the first step in a custody chain: his body is restrained before he is moved and handed over.
ALSO GROWS
desmos: Bond, chain
δεσμός
The bond makes the restraint tangible: this binding is a physical condition, not merely a change in status.
desmios: Prisoner; one held in bonds
δέσμιος
This branch names the person through the restraint imposed on him, showing where the binding leads.
παρέδωκαν
paredōkan
GROWS FROM
δίδωμι
didōmi
To give; in the compound παραδίδωμι (paradidōmi), to hand over or deliver.
“delivered” in this verse is paredōkan. The verb παραδίδωμι carries the sense of giving someone over into another’s hands. Its related forms show how a handover can be passed along as tradition or become betrayal; here, custody itself changes hands.
ALSO GROWS
paradosis: Handing down; tradition
παράδοσις
What is handed over can be carried from one keeper to another, just as this verse transfers custody.
prodidōmi: Betray; give over
προδίδωμι
This related compound makes the personal cost of handing someone over explicit, sharpening the force of the transfer here.
THE PATTERN
Scripture shows control over people becoming concrete through restraint, confinement, and transfer between authorities.
And Joseph's master took him, and placed him in the prison, the place where the king's prisoners were bound; and there he was in the prison.And he asked of him letters to the synagogues at Damascus, so that if he found any who belonged to the Way, whether they were men or women, he might lead them bound to Jerusalem.Who was handed over for our stumbles, and raised for our alignment.THE THREAD
Who was handed over for our stumbles, and raised for our alignment.Matthew’s παρέδωκαν (paredōkan, they handed over) and Romans’ παρεδόθη (paredothē, he was handed over) are forms of the same verb, παραδίδωμι (paradidōmi, hand over). Romans places that handover alongside Jesus’ being raised, opening the custody transfer to a larger sequence without erasing its violence.
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