What Does Matthew 6:6 Mean?
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.
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 thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret; and thy Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly.THE KEY
The closed door removes the human audience, but it cannot make your prayer unseen: the Father sees what the room conceals.
THE MEANING
Your prayer is beyond other people’s eyes, but never beyond the Father’s sight. What remains hidden from people is visible to him, and he answers it in the open. The closed door changes who witnesses your prayer, not whether it is seen.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The lie this undoes is that what no one else witnesses does not count or cannot be heard.
THE ROOT
κρυπτῷ
kryptōi
GROWS FROM
κρυπ-
kryp-
To hide or conceal; that which is out of sight.
The word translated “secret” names what is concealed, not what is unreal or absent. Matthew uses this hiddenness both for the place of prayer and for the Father’s seeing: the very space without a human audience is where the Father sees.
ALSO GROWS
kryptō: To hide or conceal.
κρύπτω
The verb shares the same root, making the verse’s “secret” a state of being hidden.
apokryphos: Hidden or concealed.
ἀπόκρυφος
This related word carries the same hiddenness, showing how the root names what is out of sight without implying it is unknown.
ἀποδώσει
apodōsei
GROWS FROM
δίδωμι
didōmi
To give or render; in this compound, to give back or render in return.
“give it back” in this verse is apodōsei. The Greek verb translated “reward” carries the sense of giving back or rendering. The Father meets what happens in hiddenness with an answering return that comes into view.
ALSO GROWS
dosis: A giving or gift.
δόσις
This noun from the same give-root makes the act of reward legible as giving.
antapodidōmi: To repay or render in return.
ἀνταποδίδωμι
This related compound makes the sense of return explicit, echoing the Father’s response to what is done in secret.
THE PATTERN
What is hidden from human eyes remains fully present to God and can be brought into view by his response.
Even darkness does not darken from you; the night lights up like day, and darkness is as light to you.So that your compassion may be in the hidden; and your Father, who sees in the hidden, himself will give it back to you in the open.And no creation is hidden before him, but all things are naked and bared at the throat to the eyes of him to whom our account belongs.THE THREAD
For there is nothing covered that will not be uncovered, and nothing hidden that will not be known.Luke uses κρυπτόν (kryptón, hidden), from the same κρυπ- root as Matthew’s “in secret.” Matthew says the Father sees the hidden prayer; Luke opens that same hiddenness toward what will be revealed and known.
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