Matthew 24:39

Greek (Tischendorf 8th ed.)

English Translation

and they didn't know until the flood came, and took them all away, so will be the coming of the Son of Man.

World English Bible · Public Domain

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κατακλυσμὸς

kataklysmós

G2627

“deluge”

Noun, Nominative, Singular, Masculine

Appears 4× in the Greek New Testament
First appears at Matthew 24:38

Full Thayer's Definition

Origin: from G2626

TDNT: None

1. inundation, deluge a. of Noah's deluge

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 →

19: words
14: distinct lemmas
Gospels: section

Notable vocabulary

The rarest word here is κατακλυσμὸς deluge G2627 — appearing just 4 times in the whole Greek New Testament.

Shared distinctive vocabulary

κατακλυσμὸς deluge G2627 occurs in 4 verses of the Greek New Testament. Also found in:

Repetition

Words recur within this verse:

ὁ the G3588 ×4
καὶ and G2532 ×3

Cross-references

Topical passages linked to Matthew 24:39 in the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge — connected by theme and wording, ordered by reader-vote popularity; previews shown in the World English Bible.

John 3:20 For everyone who does evil hates the light, and doesn't come to the light, lest his works would be exposed.
Matthew 24:37 "As the days of Noah were, so will be the coming of the Son of Man.
Acts 13:41 'Behold, you scoffers, and wonder, and perish; For I work a work in your days, A work which you will in no way believe, if one declares it to you.'"
Proverbs 24:12 If you say, "Behold, we didn't know this;" Doesn't he who weighs the hearts consider it? He who keeps your soul, doesn't he know it? Shall he not render to every man according to his work?
Isaiah 44:18–19 They don't know, neither do they consider: for he has shut their eyes, that they can't see; and their hearts, that they can't understand.
Proverbs 29:7 The righteous care about justice for the poor. The wicked aren't concerned about knowledge.
2 Peter 3:5 For this they willfully forget, that there were heavens from of old, and an earth formed out of water and amid water, by the word of God;
Judges 20:34 There came over against Gibeah ten thousand chosen men out of all Israel, and the battle was sore; but they didn't know that evil was close on them.

Proverbs 23:35 "They hit me, and I was not hurt; They beat me, and I don't feel it! When will I wake up? I can do it again. I can find another."
Isaiah 42:25 Therefore he poured on him the fierceness of his anger, and the strength of battle; and it set him on fire round about, yet he didn't know; and it burned him, yet he didn't lay it to heart.
Matthew 13:13–15 Therefore I speak to them in parables, because seeing they don't see, and hearing, they don't hear, neither do they understand.
Luke 19:44 and will dash you and your children within you to the ground. They will not leave in you one stone on another, because you didn't know the time of your visitation."
Romans 1:28 Even as they refused to have God in their knowledge, God gave them up to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not fitting;

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

Commentary

Notes on Matthew 24:39 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 →

Bengel's Gnomon

Johann Albrecht Bengel

Mat 24:39. οὐκ ἔγνωσαν, knew not) Their ignorance was voluntary.

Bengel's Gnomon of the New Testament — English translation (T&T Clark, Edinburgh, 1860) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Expositor's Greek Testament

ed. W. Robertson Nicoll

Mat 24:39 . οὐκ ἔγνωσαν , they did not know, scil., that the flood was coming till it was on them.

The Expositor's Greek Testament, edited by W. Robertson Nicoll (1897–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Adam Clarke's Commentary

Verse 39. And knew not] They considered not - did not lay Noah's warning to heart, till it was too late to profit by it: so shall it be - and so it was in this coming of the Son of man.

Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(39) So shall also the coming of the Son of man be.—The words justify the interpretation given above of Mat_24:29-30. If the “signs” of the Advent were to be phenomena visible to the eye of sense, there could not be this reckless apathy of nescience. If they are to be tokens, “signs of the times,” which can be discerned only by the illumined insight of the faithful, the hardened unbelief on the one side, and the expectant watchfulness on the other, are the natural result of the power or the want of power to discern them.

A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

John Gill's Exposition

Then shall two be in the field,.... About their proper business, of husbandry, ploughing, or sowing, or any other rural employment:

the one shall be taken; not by the preaching of the Gospel, into the kingdom of God, or Gospel dispensation; though such a distinction God makes, by the ministry of the word, accompanied by his Spirit and power; nor by angels, to meet Christ in the air, and to be introduced into his kingdom and glory; but by the eagles, the Roman army, and either killed or carried captive by them:

and the other left; not in a state of nature and unregeneracy, as many are, to whom the Gospel is preached; nor with devils at the last day, to be thrust down by them into the infernal regions; but by the Romans, being by some remarkable providence, or another, delivered out of their hands; which was the case of some few, and these of the meaner sort; and therefore persons of a rural life and occupation are instanced in.

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

39 And knew not until the flood came, and took them all away; so shall also the coming of the Son of man be.

Ver. 39. And knew not] i.e. They took no knowledge of Noah’s predictions, or their own peril. Their wits they had buried in their guts, their brains in their bellies (as of the ass fish it is said (Arist. de Anim.) that contrary to all other living creatures, he hath his heart in his belly); "whoredom, wine, and new wine take away the heart," Hos 4:11. Carnal sins disable nature, and so set men in a greater distance from grace, which is seated in the powers of nature. I read of some desperate wretches that drinking together, when one of them had drunk himself stark dead, the other, no wit warned by that fearful example of God’s wrath, poured his part of drink into the dead man’s belly, in quodam episcopatu potaverunt aliqui, &c. in which a certain bishop drank some. (John Manl.)

And took them all away] Men are never less safe than when they are most secure. Babylon bore itself bold upon the twenty years’ provision laid up beforehand, to stand out at siege. When it was nevertheless taken by Cyrus, some part of the city would not know or believe of three days after, that there was any such matter. (Herodot. lib. 1; Arist. Polit. lib. 3.)

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.

Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible

They knew not - That is, they knew not the exact time until it came upon them. So, says he, it shall be when the Son of man shall come. They shall not know “the precise time” until he comes, and then they will be found engaged in the ordinary business of life unconcerned.

Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary

And they thought not of the deluge, though preached and predicted by Noe, (which rendered their ignorance and incredulity inexcusable) till it came and swept them all away. So shall it be at the coming of the Son of man. St. Luke adds, (chap. xvii, ver. 28,) likewise as it was in the days of Lot; they shall be eating and drinking, buying and selling, planting and building, i.e. totally immersed in worldly pursuits. Hence the apostle; when they shall say peace, viz. from past evils, and security, viz. from future, then shall destruction come upon them on a sudden. But some one may ask, how can there possibly be all this peace, all this security, when the evils mentioned above, famines, wars, plagues, earthquakes, and particularly the darkness of the sun, &c. &c. are presages calculated to strike with panic and consternation minds the most thoughtless and giddy? I answer, that the wicked are chiefly designed here, who in the midst of the afflictions and alarms of the good, will still indulge in their pleasures and luxuries, like cruel soldiers, whilst the peaceable inhabitants are plundered. St. Jerome adds, that the world for some time before its final dissolution, will be freed from all those calamities. As to what is said (ver. 29,) of the darkness of the sun and moon, these are circumstances that refer to the very coming of the judge. (Jansenius)

George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).

The Pulpit Commentary

Knew not. They would not comprehend the signs of the coming judgment, or, at any rate, refused to profit by them, preferring their own carnal pleasures to the care of their souls and the amendment of their lives. The Lord assures us that similar recklessness and unbelief will be found at his coming. Doubtless anguish and fear will fill many hearts, but the general feeling will be incredulity, and a false security which refuses to take warning. Sadler compares it to Belshazzar"s feast at the very moment of danger, and the Athenians" insensibility at the time of the great plague, when the people seemed to be exemplifying the maxim, "Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die". (Isa_22:18) "For like as when the ark was making, they believed not; but while it was set in the midst of them, proclaiming beforehand the evils that are to come, they, when they saw it, lived in pleasure... so also now, antichrist, indeed, shall appear, after whom is the end, and the punishments at the end, and vengeance intolerable; but they that are held by the intoxication of wickedness (comp. RAPC Wis 4:12) shall not so much as perceive the dreadful nature of the things that are on the point of being done. Wherefore also Paul saith, "as travail upon a woman with child", (1Th_5:8) even so shall those fearful and incurable evils come upon them" (Chrysostom, "Hom.," in loc. ). Morisen considers that Christ is not blaming the antediluvians, but simply referring to the fact that up to the last moment they were ignorant of the impending catastrophe. But this seems inadequate.

The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Scofield Reference Notes

C. I. Scofield

Son of man

(See Scofield "Mat 8:20")

The Scofield Reference Bible (1917 edition), notes by C. I. Scofield — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword 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.

Matthew, in the Gospels, opens this verse with 19 words (14 distinct Greek lemmas). Its most distinctive word is kataklysmós (“deluge”). A historical commentator’s framing appears above. Read the whole chapter for the surrounding context.

Discussion questions

The word kataklysmós carries the sense “deluge.” How does it shape the verse?
Matthew 24:38 shares the word «deluge» with this verse. How do the two illuminate each other?
“the” occurs 4× in this one verse. What is the effect of the repetition?
These translations render this verse differently; the difference is in the English rendering, not the original. What questions does that raise?
Reading how Bengel's Gnomon and Expositor's Greek Testament read this verse, where do the two commentators agree and where do they part?

Things to notice

These translations choose different wording for 8 words in this verse.
“the” occurs 4× in this single verse.
14 distinct Greek lemmas span 19 words in this verse.