ClericSteadfast endurance

Luke 21 — Greek text and reception

Saints Translation: Luke 1–24 [V2]

Each card preserves the Greek reading and its textual and reception notes. This source provides a Greek study edition; Hebrew counterparts and Hebrew–Greek classifications are not supplied.

Chapter 21

The widow’s gift, Jerusalem’s distress, and watchfulness

Verse 21:1

Greek–English Saints Priority

Looking up, He saw the rich putting their gifts into the treasury.

Textual & Reception Notes

Verse 21:2

Greek–English Saints Priority

And He saw a certain needy widow putting two lepta in there.

Textual & Reception Notes

Two lepta are two ancient small coins. The original count and denomination are retained.

Verse 21:3

Greek–English Saints Priority

And He said, “Truly, I tell you, this poor widow put in more than all of them.

Textual & Reception Notes

Verse 21:4

Greek–English Saints Priority

For all these put into the gifts out of their abundance, but she, out of her lack, put in all the livelihood she had.”

Textual & Reception Notes

βίος is livelihood or means of living; the widow gives all she had for living, not a specified percentage.

Verse 21:5

Greek–English Saints Priority

And as some were speaking about the temple, how it was adorned with beautiful stones and dedicated offerings, He said,

Textual & Reception Notes

Verse 21:6

Greek–English Saints Priority

“As for these things you see, days will come in which stone will not be left upon stone without being torn down.”

Textual & Reception Notes

Verse 21:7

Greek–English Saints Priority

They questioned Him, saying, “Teacher, when, then, will these things be, and what will be the sign when these things are about to happen?”

Textual & Reception Notes

Verse 21:8

Greek–English Saints Priority

And He said, “See that you are not led astray. For many will come in My name, saying, ‘I am he,’ and, ‘The time has drawn near.’ Do not go after them.

Textual & Reception Notes

The claim ἐγώ εἰμι is literally ‘I am,’ with its identification understood in context. Lower-case ‘he’ expresses that implied claim without supplying the title Christ.

Verse 21:9

Greek–English Saints Priority

When you hear of wars and disturbances, do not be terrified, for these things must happen first, but the end will not come immediately.”

Textual & Reception Notes

Verse 21:10

Greek–English Saints Priority

Then He said to them, “Nation will rise against nation and kingdom against kingdom.

Textual & Reception Notes

Verse 21:11

Greek–English Saints Priority

There will be great earthquakes, and famines and plagues in various places. There will also be terrors and great signs from heaven.

Textual & Reception Notes

Verse 21:12

Greek–English Saints Priority

But before all these things they will lay their hands on you and persecute you, handing you over to synagogues and prisons, and you will be led before kings and governors because of My name.

Textual & Reception Notes

Verse 21:13

Greek–English Saints Priority

It will turn out as an opportunity for you to bear witness.

Textual & Reception Notes

εἰς μαρτύριον gives the outcome as witness or testimony; ‘opportunity’ makes the English connection idiomatic but is not a separate Greek noun.

Verse 21:14

Greek–English Saints Priority

Therefore settle it in your hearts not to rehearse beforehand how to defend yourselves,

Textual & Reception Notes

Verse 21:15

Greek–English Saints Priority

for I will give you a mouth and wisdom that all who oppose you will be unable to resist or contradict.

Textual & Reception Notes

‘A mouth and wisdom’ preserves the bodily image of speech as well as the promised wisdom.

Verse 21:16

Greek–English Saints Priority

You will be handed over even by parents and brothers and relatives and friends, and they will put some of you to death.

Textual & Reception Notes

Verse 21:17

Greek–English Saints Priority

And you will be hated by all because of My name.

Textual & Reception Notes

Verse 21:18

Greek–English Saints Priority

Yet certainly not a hair from your head will perish.

Textual & Reception Notes

The emphatic negative promise is retained alongside verse sixteen’s explicit prediction that some will be killed. The apparent tension is not removed by inserting an explanation into either verse.

Verse 21:19

Greek–English Saints Priority

By your endurance gain your souls.

Textual & Reception Notes

The source reads the imperative κτήσασθε, ‘gain,’ rather than a future prediction. ψυχάς is rendered ‘souls,’ while its range includes lives; the relationship between endurance and preservation must be interpreted with the surrounding promises.

Verse 21:20

Greek–English Saints Priority

But when you see Jerusalem surrounded by armies, then know that her desolation has drawn near.

Textual & Reception Notes

Verse 21:21

Greek–English Saints Priority

Then let those in Judea flee to the mountains, and let those within her depart, and let those in the countryside not enter her,

Textual & Reception Notes

Verse 21:22

Greek–English Saints Priority

because these are days of vengeance, for all that is written to be fulfilled.

Textual & Reception Notes

ἐκδίκησις is vengeance or the carrying out of justice. The statement about all that is written is not expanded into an unprovided list.

Verse 21:23

Greek–English Saints Priority

Woe to those who are pregnant and those nursing infants in those days! For there will be great distress upon the land and wrath against this people.

Textual & Reception Notes

γῆ can mean land or earth. ‘Land’ is adopted here in the immediate Jerusalem and Judea context; the scope broadens explicitly to the inhabited world in verse twenty-six.

Verse 21:24

Greek–English Saints Priority

They will fall by the edge of the sword and be led captive into all the nations. And Jerusalem will be trampled by nations until the times of nations are fulfilled.

Textual & Reception Notes

ἔθνη can be rendered nations or Gentiles. ‘Nations’ is used consistently here, preserving the repetition without specifying a modern political timetable.

Verse 21:25

Greek–English Saints Priority

And there will be signs in sun and moon and stars, and on the earth distress among nations in perplexity at the roar of the sea and its surging,

Textual & Reception Notes

Verse 21:26

Greek–English Saints Priority

people fainting from fear and expectation of what is coming upon the inhabited world, for the powers of the heavens will be shaken.

Textual & Reception Notes

ἀποψύχω can mean faint or expire; ‘fainting’ is the provisional reading in this description of overwhelming fear. ‘Powers of the heavens’ is not reduced to one proposed physical or spiritual referent.

Verse 21:27

Greek–English Saints Priority

And then they will see the Son of Man coming in a cloud with power and great glory.

Textual & Reception Notes

Verse 21:28

Greek–English Saints Priority

But when these things begin to happen, straighten up and lift your heads, because your redemption is drawing near.”

Textual & Reception Notes

Verse 21:29

Greek–English Saints Priority

And He told them a parable: “Look at the fig tree and all the trees.

Textual & Reception Notes

Verse 21:30

Greek–English Saints Priority

When they already put out shoots, you see and know for yourselves that summer is already near.

Textual & Reception Notes

Verse 21:31

Greek–English Saints Priority

So also you, when you see these things happening, know that the kingdom of God is near.

Textual & Reception Notes

Verse 21:32

Greek–English Saints Priority

Amen, I tell you: this generation will certainly not pass away until all things happen.

Textual & Reception Notes

‘This generation’ renders ἡ γενεὰ αὕτη directly. Neither a date nor a substitute such as race is inserted.

Verse 21:33

Greek–English Saints Priority

Heaven and earth will pass away, but My words will certainly not pass away.

Textual & Reception Notes

Verse 21:34

Greek–English Saints Priority

But watch yourselves, lest your hearts be weighed down with carousing and drunkenness and the cares of life, and that day come upon you suddenly

Textual & Reception Notes

κραιπάλη denotes the burden or excess of indulgence, especially drinking; ‘carousing’ is distinguished from the following μέθη, drunkenness.

Verse 21:35

Greek–English Saints Priority

like a trap. For it will come upon all who dwell on the face of the whole earth.

Textual & Reception Notes

Verse 21:36

Greek–English Saints Priority

But stay awake at every season, praying that you may have strength to escape all these things that are about to happen and to stand before the Son of Man.”

Textual & Reception Notes

The base has κατισχύσητε, ‘have strength’ or prevail, not a verb meaning be counted worthy.

Verse 21:37

Greek–English Saints Priority

By day He was teaching in the temple, but at night He went out and lodged on the mount called Olivet.

Textual & Reception Notes

Verse 21:38

Greek–English Saints Priority

And all the people would come early in the morning to Him in the temple to hear Him.

Textual & Reception Notes