What Does Romans 8:5 Mean?

For those who are after the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who are after the breath set their minds on the things of the breath.

Romans 8:5 · SDV

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.

This verse in the King James

King James wording

King James Version

For they that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh; but they that are after the Spirit the things of the Spirit.

THE KEY

The mind follows what it is “after,” and the Greek word translated “Spirit” also means breath.

THE MEANING

Your present direction shows up in where your mind settles: your thoughts take up the concerns of what you follow. The word translated “Spirit” also means breath, giving this orientation a living, present sense.

WHAT THIS UNDOES

The verse undoes the idea that what you follow can be separated from what occupies your mind; here, attention reveals direction.

THE ROOT

πνεῦμα

pneuma

GROWS FROM

πνέω

pneō

To breathe or blow; the source of the word for breath, wind, or spirit.

The Greek word translated “Spirit” is also the word for breath. So the things of the Spirit carry the image of breath’s domain, joining the verse’s inward direction to something living and near.

ALSO GROWS

pnoē: Breath or a blowing.

πνοή

This related word makes audible the breath that the word for Spirit also contains.

pneumatikos: Pertaining to spirit or breath.

πνευματικός

This adjective carries the same word-family into descriptions of what belongs to the breath.

φρονοῦσιν

phronousin

GROWS FROM

φρήν

phrēn

Mind or understanding; the word-family describes setting one’s mind or orientation.

“set their minds on” in this verse is phronousin. This verb names more than a passing thought: it describes where the mind is set. The same word-family appears as “mindset” in the next verse, where the consequences of each orientation are named.

ALSO GROWS

phronēma: A mindset or settled orientation.

φρόνημα

Romans 8:6 uses this related noun to trace the direction named here to its outcome.

sōphroneō: To think with soundness or self-control.

σωφρονέω

This related word shows the family can describe the quality and steadiness of a person’s thinking, not just an isolated thought.

THE PATTERN

The direction that governs a life becomes visible in the concerns that hold the mind.

But his delight is in the instruction of the LORD; and over his instruction he murmurs day and night.

Psalm 1:2 · SDVContinual meditation shows which instruction gives this person’s inner life its direction.

Do not take the shape of this age, but be reshaped by the renewing of your mind, so that you may test what is the good, well-pleasing, and complete will of God.

Romans 12:2 · SDVA renewed mind changes the pattern of life and recognizes what is good.

If we live by the breath, let us also keep in step with the breath.

Galatians 5:25 · SDVLife in the breath is expressed as a walk that follows the same breath.

THE THREAD

For the setting of the mind on the flesh is death, but the setting of the mind on the breath is life and wholeness.

Romans 8:6 · SDV

Verse 5 names the mind’s direction; verse 6 traces that orientation to death or to life and wholeness. The word rendered “minded” in verse 6 belongs to the same Greek family as “do mind” here, so the connection is in the wording as well as the pattern.

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