StrongerBible

ektinassō

ἐκτινάσσω

GreekG1621“shake off, shake out”

Appears 4 times · tap a cell to see the verses

Mat 10:14Mrk 6:11Act 13:51Act 18:6
Word studyResearch-gradeek-tee-NAHS-soverb

What ektinassō means

to shake off or shake out: to fling dust, dirt, or cloth free with a brisk shake

TranslatabilityApproximateCertaintySettled

At its plainest this is a physical, everyday verb: to shake something out or shake it off with a brisk motion. In ordinary Greek of the period it was the word for beating dust out of wool or a cloak, knocking olives from a tree, or turning a house upside down in a search. The weight it carries in the New Testament comes not from the word itself but from the pointed gesture it names.

All four New Testament uses describe one deliberate act. Three shake the dust off the feet: the instruction to the traveling disciples in Matthew 10:14 and Mark 6:11, and Paul and Barnabas at Pisidian Antioch in Acts 13:51. The fourth shakes out the garment, Paul at Corinth in Acts 18:6. This is not a peevish flick of frustration but a formal, public sign, done before witnesses to mark a decisive break.

The gesture speaks the language of the Greek Old Testament, which a first-century audience would have caught. There God "shakes" the Egyptians into the sea (Exodus 14:27), and Nehemiah shakes out the fold of his robe as a self-binding oath that God will likewise shake out anyone who breaks his promise (Nehemiah 5:13). Against that backdrop the messenger who has delivered his warning and been refused shakes the dust away to disown the rejection, hand back the responsibility, and leave the dust behind as evidence to be produced on the day of judgment. Luke reports the same act with a close relative of this verb (ἀποτινάσσω) and, for the seventy, with a separate verb for wiping off (ἀπομάσσω).

Mat 10:14Mrk 6:11Act 13:51Act 18:6

What scholars say about ektinassō

The compound is ἐκ- ("out, off") + τινάσσω ("shake, brandish"), denoting violent dislodging; LSJ groups its range under shaking out, shaking off, and searching thoroughly, and Moulton-Milligan document it as mundane papyrus vocabulary for cleaning garments, harvesting olives, and ransacking houses. Neither TDNT nor EDNT treats the word group as independently weighty, locating the interpretive interest in the gesture rather than the lexeme. The Septuagint supplies the theological trajectory: ἐκτινάσσω renders Hebrew נָעַר for divine expulsion (Exodus 14:27), for Nehemiah's imprecatory sign-act with his garment (Nehemiah 5:13, where the verb clusters three times), and for the psalmist cast off "like a locust" (Psalm 108:23 LXX). Major critical commentators (Davies-Allison, Yarbro Collins, Marcus, Bovon, Fitzmyer, Barrett) read the four New Testament occurrences as a prophetic sign-act of covenantal disavowal and eschatological witness anchored in Nehemiah 5:13, the middle-voice forms in Acts 13:51 and 18:6 echoing Nehemiah's ἐξετίναξα. The εἰς μαρτύριον / ἐπ' αὐτούς phrase is widely taken as legal-forensic, the shaken dust preserved as evidence for the prosecution at the final judgment.

Where scholars disagree about ektinassō

What cultural frame the dust-shaking gesture named by this verb draws on: a Jewish purity rite, a breach of hospitality obligations, or a Septuagint prophetic sign-act. The lexical meaning of the verb ("shake off") is not in dispute; the disagreement is over the gesture's background and force.

  • majorityA prophetic sign-act of covenantal disavowal and eschatological witness, anchored in Nehemiah 5:13 LXX and the Septuagint's language of divine expulsion (Exodus 14:27), by which the messenger transfers responsibility to those who rejected him and leaves the dust as evidence for the final judgment.; Joel Marcus, Mark 1-8 (Anchor Yale Bible 27), 388-90; Adela Yarbro Collins, Mark (Hermeneia), 299-301; W. D. Davies and D. C. Allison, Matthew (ICC), vol. 2, 176-77
  • minorityAn inversion of a Jewish purity rite in which pious Jews shook off Gentile dust when re-entering the land, so that unbelieving Jewish towns are declared as unclean as pagan territory.; H. L. Strack and P. Billerbeck, Kommentar zum Neuen Testament aus Talmud und Midrasch, vol. 1, 571
  • minorityA public testimony that hospitality was refused: the disciples' feet are dusty because their would-be hosts failed the obligation to wash them, and the gesture hands the offenders over to God as patron of his messengers, with the appeal to Gentile dust judged a later anachronism.; T. J. Rogers, "Shaking the Dust off the Markan Mission Discourse," JSNT 27.2 (2004): 169-192; Christine Hayes, Gentile Impurities and Jewish Identities (Oxford, 2002), 115-16, 199-204
In-depth research

This is a research paper, so it may be hard to read without scholarly background. It is useful if you want to dig even deeper into this word.

Sources

  • BDAG, s.v. ἐκτινάσσωlexicon
  • LSJ, s.v. τινάσσωlexicon
  • Moulton-Milligan, The Vocabulary of the Greek Testament, s.v. ἐκτινάσσωlexicon
  • W. D. Davies and D. C. Allison, Matthew (ICC), vol. 2, 176-77commentary
  • Joel Marcus, Mark 1-8 (Anchor Yale Bible 27), 388-90commentary
  • Adela Yarbro Collins, Mark (Hermeneia), 299-301commentary
  • Christine Hayes, Gentile Impurities and Jewish Identities (Oxford, 2002), 115-16, 199-204monograph
  • T. J. Rogers, "Shaking the Dust off the Markan Mission Discourse," JSNT 27.2 (2004): 169-192article

AI-generated word study · claude-opus-4-8

All attested forms of ἐκτινάσσω

aorist active imperative 2p

ἐκτινάξατε

Mat 10:14, Mrk 6:11

aorist middle participle nominative m p

ἐκτιναξάμενοι

Act 13:51

aorist middle participle nominative m s

ἐκτιναξάμενος

Act 18:6