What Does Titus 3:10 Mean?
Set aside the man who splits off, after a first and a second putting in mind.
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
A man that is an heretick after the first and second admonition reject;THE KEY
Once division persists through repeated warning, refusal becomes the boundary.
THE MEANING
A person keeps drawing a community into factions even after repeated warning. Once that persistence is clear, the response shifts from admonition to refusal.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
This undoes the belief that patience always requires continued access: when faction-making persists after repeated warning, the verse names a boundary.
THE ROOT
αἱρετικόν
hairetikón
GROWS FROM
αἱρέω
hairéō
to take, seize, or choose
“the man who splits off” in this verse is hairetikón. The word belongs to the Greek family of choosing or taking up a position: αἵρεσις (hairesis) can mean a chosen party or faction, and αἱρετικός (hairetikos) describes someone marked by faction-making. The verse centers on persistent division after warning, rather than simply a person holding an unpopular belief.
ALSO GROWS
hairesis: choice; party, sect, or faction
αἵρεσις
This related noun shows how the language of choosing a position can name the faction that forms around it.
hairetikos: factional; one who promotes division
αἱρετικός
This is the word used for the person whose divisive pattern persists after admonition.
THE PATTERN
When someone persists in dividing a community after correction, the response can move from warning to a boundary.
Drive out the scorner, and strife goes out; contention and lightness come to rest.And if he turns his ear aside from them, tell it to the assembly. And if he turns his ear aside even from the assembly, let him be to you as one of the nations and as the tax collector.Now I urge you, brothers, watch those who make splits and set snares against the teaching you have learned, and turn aside from them.THE THREAD
For there must also be factions among you, so that the tested ones may be made visible among you.The shared Greek word family, αἱρετικός (hairetikos, factional) in Titus and αἵρεσις (hairesis, faction or sect) here, links the verses directly. Titus describes the person whose faction-making persists after warning, while Corinthians makes the factions within the community visible.
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