Luke 12:53

Greek (Tischendorf 8th ed.)

English Translation

They will be divided, father against son, and son against father; mother against daughter, and daughter against her mother; mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law, and daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law."

World English Bible · Public Domain

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πενθερὰ

pentherá

G3994

“mother-in-law”

Noun, Nominative, Singular, Feminine

Appears 6× in the Greek New Testament
First appears at Matthew 8:14

Full Thayer's Definition

Origin: from G3995

TDNT: None

1. mother-in-law, a wife's mother

About this verse

These counts appear in no published source. They are computed here, from the morphology-tagged text and Lemma’s own curated glosses. What Lemma adds →

24: words
10: distinct lemmas
Gospels: section

Notable vocabulary

The rarest word here is πενθερὰ mother-in-law G3994 — appearing just 6 times in the whole Greek New Testament.

Shared distinctive vocabulary

πενθερὰ mother-in-law G3994 occurs in 5 verses of the Greek New Testament. Also found in:

Repetition

Words recur within this verse:

ἐπὶ upon G1909 ×6
πατὴρ father G3962 ×2
υἱῷ son G5207 ×2
μήτηρ mother G3384 ×2
θυγατέρα daughter G2364 ×2
πενθερὰ mother-in-law G3994 ×2
νύμφην bride G3565 ×2
καὶ and G2532 ×3
τὴν the G3588 ×2

Cross-references

Topical passages linked to Luke 12:53 in the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge — connected by theme and wording, ordered by reader-vote popularity; previews shown in the World English Bible.

Micah 7:6 For the son dishonors the father, The daughter rises up against her mother, The daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law; A man's enemies are the men of his own house.
Matthew 10:21–22 "Brother will deliver up brother to death, and the father his child. Children will rise up against parents, and cause them to be put to death.
Matthew 24:10 Then many will stumble, and will deliver up one another, and will hate one another.
Zechariah 13:2–6 It will come to pass in that day, says Yahweh of Hosts, that I will cut off the names of the idols out of the land, and they will no more be remembered; and also I will cause the prophets and the spirit of impurity to pass out of the land.

Cross-references courtesy of OpenBible.info (CC BY 4.0).

Commentary

Notes on Luke 12:53 from classic Christian and Jewish commentators (each source and its license shown beneath its notes). The classic Christian expositions comment on the surrounding passage and are grouped to its opening verse, so a note may address several verses; the Jewish commentaries on the Tanakh (Rashi and others) are per-verse, so they appear only where the commentator wrote on this verse.

Lemma curates 59 commentaries, every one of them public domain or Creative Commons licensed, each selected and text-cleaned for this edition rather than reprinted as found. About our sources →

Tyndale Open Study Notes

Tyndale Open Resources

12:53 Jesus quotes Mic 7:6, which was interpreted by the rabbis as the crisis and persecution that would lead to the Messiah’s coming.

Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne

53. The father shall be divided against the son] The verse seems to be a distinct allusion to Mic_7:6. There is in the Greek a delicate change of phrase which can hardly be reproduced in English. It is ‘father against son’ (ἐπὶ υἱῷ), where the preposition takes the dative; but in ‘mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law’ (ἐπὶ τὴν νύμφην αὐτῆς) the preposition takes the accusative;—perhaps to indicate the difference in the relationships, the one natural, the other legal.

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

John Gill's Exposition

And when ye see the south wind blow,.... From the hot countries of Egypt, Ethiopia, and Arabia, which lay south of Judea:

ye say there will be heat; or hot sultry weather, scorching heat, which such a wind brings with it:

and it cometh to pass; generally speaking, as is asserted.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Trapp's Complete Commentary

John Trapp

53 The father shall be divided against the son, and the son against the father; the mother against the daughter, and the daughter against the mother; the mother in law against her daughter in law, and the daughter in law against her mother in law.

Ver. 53. See Mat 10:34.

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

John Wesley's Explanatory Notes

The father against the son - For those who reject me will be implacable toward their very nearest relations who receive me. At this day also is this scripture fulfilled. Now likewise there is no concord between Christ and Belial.

John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.

Cambridge Greek Testament for Schools and Colleges

53. πατὴρ ἐπὶ υἱῷ. The verse seems to be a distinct allusion to Mic 7:6. There is in the Greek a delicate change of phrase which can hardly be reproduced in English. It is ‘father against son’ (ἐπὶ υἱῷ), where the preposition takes the dative; but in ‘mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law’ (ἐπὶ τὴν νύμφην αὐτῆς) the preposition takes the accusative;—perhaps to indicate the difference in the relationships, the one natural, the other legal. ἐπὶ with the dative practically means ‘against’ in the sense of one being an incubus on the other. Compare the German auf ihm. Winer, p. 489 n.

Cambridge Greek Testament for Schools and Colleges (Cambridge University Press, 1896; 21 vols, various authors incl. Carr, Maclear, Plummer, Farrar, Lumby, Moule, M. R. James, Simcox) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

International Critical Commentary

53. πατὴρ ἐπὶ υἱῷ … μήτηρ ἐπὶ θυγατέρα … πενθερὰ ἐπὶ τὴν νύμφην. The change from the dat. to the ace. possibly indicates that the hostility is more intense in the case of the women. But LXX of Mic 7:6 more probably was the cause of the change. There we home ἐπὶ τήν of the women, but υἱὸς ἀτιμάζει πατέρα of the men. In Mat 10:35 we have κατά c. gen. in all three cases. Lk. omits “A man’s foes shall be those of his own household.” Comp. Mal 4:6.

For νύμφη = “daughter-in-law” comp. Mat 10:35; Gen 11:31, 38:11; Lev 18:15, etc.; Jos. Ant. v. 9, 1 In Joh 3:29; Rev 18:23, etc., it has the classical meaning of “bride.”

International Critical Commentary — older volumes (1896–1929), various authors — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Vincent's Word Studies in the New Testament

Marvin R. Vincent

The father shall be divided, etc. But the verb is in the plural.

Rightly, as Rev., "They shall be divided, the father against the son," etc. Daughter - in - law. See on Mt 10:35.

Marvin R. Vincent, Word Studies in the New Testament (1887–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

Lesson kit

Teaching starters — assembled from the data on this page, not authored interpretation. Every prompt links to the verse data it draws on. Edit before teaching.

Luke, in the Gospels, opens this verse with 24 words (10 distinct Greek lemmas). Its most distinctive word is pentherá (“mother-in-law”). A historical commentator’s framing appears above. Read the whole chapter for the surrounding context.

Discussion questions

What does “mother-in-law” (pentherá) contribute to the verse as a whole?
Matthew 8:14 shares the word «mother-in-law» with this verse. How do the two illuminate each other?
“upon” occurs 6× in this one verse. What is the effect of the repetition?
The translations on this page render this verse differently — a whole-verse word diff, not a word-by-word alignment. What might account for the different wordings?
Reading how Tyndale Open Study Notes and The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges read this verse, where do the two commentators agree and where do they part?

Things to notice

These translations choose different wording for 5 words in this verse.
“upon” occurs 6× in this single verse.
10 distinct Greek lemmas span 24 words in this verse.