What Does Romans 16:21 Mean?
Timothy, my fellow worker, and Lucius, and Jason, and Sosipater, my kinsmen, embrace you.
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
Timotheus my workfellow, and Lucius, and Jason, and Sosipater, my kinsmen, salute you.THE KEY
The greeting reaches you through named relationships: shared work and kinship make belonging personal.
THE MEANING
You are met by a greeting carried through real bonds: shared labor and kinship make its welcome personal. Belonging reaches across distance through people who remain connected to one another.
THE ROOT
συνεργός
synergos
GROWS FROM
ἔργον
ergon
Work, deed, or activity.
“fellow worker” in this verse is synergos. The word carries the sense of someone working alongside another, not simply a colleague named in passing. The greeting arrives through a shared undertaking, where labor itself gives people a bond.
ALSO GROWS
ergazomai: To work or labor.
ἐργάζομαι
It keeps the shared work of the verse connected to active labor.
synergeō: To work together.
συνεργέω
It makes explicit the togetherness carried by “workfellow.”
συγγενεῖς
syngeneis
GROWS FROM
γένος
genos
Family, kind, or stock, a group understood as sharing an origin.
“Kinsmen” carries the sense of people belonging to a shared family or stock. Alongside the word for shared work, it shows two forms of connection bearing this greeting.
ALSO GROWS
genos: Family, kind, or stock.
γένος
It exposes the shared-belonging idea within “kinsmen.”
syngeneia: Kinship or relationship.
συγγένεια
It keeps the verse’s kinship language connected to an ongoing bond.
genesis: Birth or origin.
γένεσις
It echoes the idea of belonging through a common origin.
THE PATTERN
Personal greetings carry belonging through a network of named relationships and shared life.
Embrace Priscilla and Aquila, my fellow workers in the anointed one, Jesus.All the brothers embrace you. Embrace one another with a set-apart kiss.But I hope to see you straightaway, and we will speak mouth to mouth. Wholeness to you. The friends embrace you. Embrace the friends by name.THE THREAD
Embrace Priscilla and Aquila, my fellow workers in the anointed one, Jesus.Both verses use συνεργός (synergos, fellow worker), though the KJV renders it “workfellow” here and “helpers” there. The shared term places this greeting inside an ongoing bond of shared labor.
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