The Meaning of Luke 2:19 Explained

Luke 2:19

KJV: But Mary kept all these things, and pondered them in her heart.

YLT: and Mary was preserving all these things, pondering in her heart;

Darby: But Mary kept all these things in her mind, pondering them in her heart.

ASV: But Mary kept all these sayings, pondering them in her heart.

KJV Reverse Interlinear

But  Mary  kept  all  these things,  and pondered  [them] in  her  heart. 

What does Luke 2:19 Mean?

Context Summary

Luke 2:15-24 - Welcomed Named Presented
From April till the autumn the flocks pastured at night in the open fields, from which it seems probable that our Lord must have been born earlier or later than December. No doubt these shepherds were, like Simeon, "waiting for the consolation of Israel," and their purity of life and simplicity of soul well qualified them to receive the blessed tidings of the angels. First simplicity and afterward science, Matthew 2:1-23, found their way into the presence of Jesus.
In the act of circumcision, our Lord admitted His obligation to fulfill the whole Law, Galatians 5:3. He was "made under the law, to redeem them that were under the law," Galatians 4:4-5. Mary could afford only the gift of the poor, Leviticus 12:6-8; Leviticus 5:7-11; 2 Corinthians 8:9. The precious name of Jesus-Savior-is the name above every name, Acts 4:10-12. [source]

Chapter Summary: Luke 2

1  Augustus taxes all the Roman empire
6  The nativity of Jesus
8  An angel relates it to the shepherds, and many sing praises to God for it
15  The shepherds glorify God
21  Jesus is circumcised
22  Mary purified
25  Simeon and Anna prophesy of Jesus,
39  who increases in wisdom,
41  questions in the temple with the teachers,
51  and is obedient to his parents

Greek Commentary for Luke 2:19

Kept [συνετηρει]
Imperfect active. She kept on keeping together (συν — sun -) all these things. They were meat and drink to her. She was not astonished, but filled with holy awe. The verb occurs from Aristotle on. She could not forget. But did not Mary keep also a Baby Book? And may not Luke have seen it? [source]
Pondering [συνβαλλουσα]
An old Greek word. Placing together for comparison. Mary would go over each detail in the words of Gabriel and of the shepherds and compare the sayings with the facts so far developed and brood over it all with a mother‘s high hopes and joy. [source]
Kept [συνετήρει]
See on the simple verb τηρέω , on 1 Peter 1:4. The word signifies not merely to guard, but to keep, as the result of guarding. Hence the compound verb is very expressive: kept, σύν ,with or within herself: closely. Note the imperfect tense: was keeping all the while. [source]
Pondered [συμβάλλουσα]
The present participle, ponderi ng. Lit., bringing together: comparing and weighing facts. Wyc., bearing together in her heart. Vulg., conferens. Compare Sophocles, “Oedipus Coloneus,” 1472-4.“Oedipus. My children, the heaven-ordained end of life has come upon him who stands here, and there is no avoiding it.“Antigone. How dost thou know, and with what (fact) having compared ( συμβαλὼν ) thine opinion hast thou this?” [source]

Reverse Greek Commentary Search for Luke 2:19

Mark 6:20 Observed him [συνετήρει]
A mistranslation. Rev., kept him safe. Peculiar to Mark. Compare Matthew 9:17, are preserved; Luke 2:19, kept; σύν , closely; τηρεῖν , to preserve or keep, as the result of guarding. See on John 17:12, and reserved, 1 Peter 1:4. [source]
Luke 1:37 With God nothing shall be impossible [σὐκ ἀδυνατήσει παρὰ τοῦ Θεοῦ πᾶν ῥῆμα]
Ῥῆμα ,word, as distinguished from λόγος , word, in classical Greek, signifies a constituent part of a speech or writing, as distinguished from the contents as a whole. Thus it may be either a word or a saying. Sometimes a phrase, as opposed to ὄνομα ,a single word. The distinction in the New Testament is not sharp throughout. It is maintained that ῥῆμα in the New Testament, like the Hebrew gabarstands sometimes for the subject-matter of the word; the thing, as in this passage. But there are only two other passages in the New Testament where this meaning is at all admissible, though the word occurs seventy times. These are Luke 2:15; Acts 5:32. “Kept all these things ” (Luke 2:19), should clearly be sayings, as the A. V. itself has rendered it in the almost identical passage, Luke 2:51. In Acts 5:32, Rev. gives sayings in margin. In Luke 2:15, though A. V. and Rev. render thing, the sense is evidently saying, as appears both from the connection with the angelic message and from the following words, which has come to pass: the saying which has become a fact. The Rev. rendering of this passage is, therefore, right, though a little stilted: No word of God shall be void of power; for the A. V. errs in joining οὐκ and πᾶν , not every, and translating nothing. The two do not belong together. The statement is, Every ( πᾶν ) word of God shall not ( οὐκ )be powerless. The A. V. also follows the reading, παρὰ τῷ Θεῷ ,with God; but all the later texts read παρὰ τοῦ Θεοῦ ,from God, which fixes the meaning beyond question. [source]
Luke 2:51 Kept [διετηρει]
Imperfect active. Ancient Greek word In Luke 2:19 συνετηρει — sunetērei is the word used of Mary after the shepherds left. These she kept pondering and comparing all the things. Surely she has a full heart now. Could she foresee how destiny would take Jesus out beyond her mother‘s reach? [source]
John 2:3 When the wine failed [υστερησαντος οινου]
Genitive absolute with first aorist active participle of υστερεω — hustereō old verb from υστερος — husteros late or lacking. See same use in Mark 10:21. A longer Western paraphrase occurs in some manuscripts. It was an embarrassing circumstance, especially to Mary, if partly due to the arrival of the seven guests. They have no wine The statement of the fact was in itself a hint and a request. But why made by the mother of Jesus and why to Jesus? She would not, of course, make it to the host. Mary feels some kind of responsibility and exercises some kind of authority for reasons not known to us. Mary had treasured in her heart the wonders connected with the birth of Jesus (Luke 2:19, Luke 2:51). The ministry of the Baptist had stirred her hopes afresh. Had she not told Jesus all that she knew before he went to the Jordan to be baptized of John? This group of disciples meant to her that Jesus had begun his Messianic work. So she dares propose the miracle to him. [source]
Acts 4:15 Conferred [συνέβαλον]
See on pondered, Luke 2:19. [source]
Acts 18:27 Helped [συνεβάλετο]
The radical sense of the word is to throw together: hence, to contribute; to help; to be useful to. He threw himself into the work along with them. On different senses of the word, see notes on Luke 2:19; and see on Luke 14:31; and compare Acts 4:15; Acts 17:18; Acts 18:27; Acts 20:14. [source]
Acts 17:18 And certain also of the Epicurean and Stoic philosophers encountered him [τινες δε και των Επικουριων και Στωικων πιλοσοπων συνεβαλλον αυτωι]
Imperfect active of συνβαλλω — sunballō old verb, in the N.T. only by Luke, to bring or put together in one‘s mind (Luke 2:19), to meet together (Acts 20:14), to bring together aid (Acts 18:27), to confer or converse or dispute as here and already Acts 4:15 which see. These professional philosophers were always ready for an argument and so they frequented the agora for that purpose. Luke uses one article and so groups the two sects together in their attitude toward Paul, but they were very different in fact. Both sects were eager for argument and both had disdain for Paul, but they were the two rival practical philosophies of the day, succeeding the more abstruse theories of Plato and Aristotle. Socrates had turned men‘s thought inward Aristotle with his cyclopaedic grasp sought to unify and relate both physics and metaphysics. Both Zeno and Epicurus (340-272 b.c.) took a more practical turn in all this intellectual turmoil and raised the issues of everyday life. Zeno (360-260 b.c.) taught in the Στοα — Stoa (Porch) and so his teaching was called Stoicism. He advanced many noble ideas that found their chief illustration in the Roman philosophers (Seneca, Epictetus, Marcus Aurelius). He taught self-mastery and hardness with an austerity that ministered to pride or suicide in case of failure, a distinctly selfish and unloving view of life and with a pantheistic philosophy. Epicurus considered practical atheism the true view of the universe and denied a future life and claimed pleasure as the chief thing to be gotten out of life. He did not deny the existence of gods, but regarded them as unconcerned with the life of men. The Stoics called Epicurus an atheist. Lucretius and Horace give the Epicurean view of life in their great poems. This low view of life led to sensualism and does today, for both Stoicism and Epicureanism are widely influential with people now. “Eat and drink for tomorrow we die,” they preached. Paul had doubtless become acquainted with both of these philosophies for they were widely prevalent over the world. Here he confronts them in their very home. He is challenged by past-masters in the art of appealing to the senses, men as skilled in their dialectic as the Pharisaic rabbis with whom Paul had been trained and whose subtleties he had learned how to expose. But, so far as we know, this is a new experience for Paul to have a public dispute with these philosophical experts who had a natural contempt for all Jews and for rabbis in particular, though they found Paul a new type at any rate and so with some interest in him. “In Epicureanism, it was man‘s sensual nature which arrayed itself against the claims of the gospel; in Stoicism it was his self-righteousness and pride of intellect” (Hackett). Knowling calls the Stoic the Pharisee of philosophy and the Epicurean the Sadducee of philosophy. Socrates in this very agora used to try to interest the passers-by in some desire for better things. That was 450 years before Paul is challenged by these superficial sophistical Epicureans and Stoics. It is doubtful if Paul had ever met a more difficult situation. [source]

What do the individual words in Luke 2:19 mean?

- But Mary all was treasuring up - matters these pondering [them] in the heart of her
δὲ Μαρία πάντα συνετήρει τὰ ῥήματα ταῦτα συμβάλλουσα ἐν τῇ καρδίᾳ αὐτῆς

  - 
Parse: Article, Nominative Feminine Singular
Root:  
Sense: this, that, these, etc.
Μαρία  Mary 
Parse: Noun, Nominative Feminine Singular
Root: Μαρία 
Sense: Mary the mother of Jesus.
συνετήρει  was  treasuring  up 
Parse: Verb, Imperfect Indicative Active, 3rd Person Singular
Root: συντηρέω  
Sense: to preserve (a thing from perishing or being lost).
τὰ  - 
Parse: Article, Accusative Neuter Plural
Root:  
Sense: this, that, these, etc.
ῥήματα  matters 
Parse: Noun, Accusative Neuter Plural
Root: ῥῆμα  
Sense: that which is or has been uttered by the living voice, thing spoken, word.
ταῦτα  these 
Parse: Demonstrative Pronoun, Accusative Neuter Plural
Root: οὗτος  
Sense: this.
συμβάλλουσα  pondering  [them] 
Parse: Verb, Present Participle Active, Nominative Feminine Singular
Root: συμβάλλω  
Sense: to throw together, to bring together.
καρδίᾳ  heart 
Parse: Noun, Dative Feminine Singular
Root: καρδία  
Sense: the heart.
αὐτῆς  of  her 
Parse: Personal / Possessive Pronoun, Genitive Feminine 3rd Person Singular
Root: αὐτός  
Sense: himself, herself, themselves, itself.