Bible Strands
Luke 16:24
So he cried out, ‘Father Abraham, have mercy on me and send Lazarus to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue. For I am in agony in this fire.’
Berean Standard Bible
Follow its threads on the canvas →
Study note
Setting — The rich man, dead and in Hades, cries out to Abraham across an unbridgeable distance. He is in torment, and Lazarus is by Abraham's side.
The words — φωνήσας (phōnēsas), "having cried out," frames the entire plea as a desperate shout rather than a request. ἐλέησον (eleēson), "have mercy," is a bare imperative — the man has no leverage, no argument, only need.
The thread — The man asks for the smallest possible measure of water to cool his tongue; elsewhere Scripture presents water as the thing that fully quenches thirst (John 4:10, 14; Revelation 22:1). The contrast is between a finger-tip and a river.
Why it lands — The request is minimal and the answer is no. The verse forces the reader to see that the window for relief is the present, not a future negotiation.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Greek words
King James Version
And he cried and said, Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus, that he may dip the tip of his finger in water, and cool my tongue; for I am tormented in this flame.
Cross-references
- Revelation 22:1 Then the angel showed me a river of the water of life, as clear as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb
- John 4:10 Jesus answered, “If you knew the gift of God and who is asking you for a drink, you would have asked Him, and He would have given you living water.”
- John 4:14 But whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a fount of water springing up to eternal life.”
- Revelation 7:16 ‘Never again will they hunger, and never will they thirst; nor will the sun beat down upon them, nor any scorching heat.’
- Matthew 25:41 Then He will say to those on His left, ‘Depart from Me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.
- James 3:6 The tongue also is a fire, a world of wickedness among the parts of the body. It pollutes the whole person, sets the course of his life on fire, and is itself set on fire by hell.
- Isaiah 66:24 “As they go forth, they will see the corpses of the men who have rebelled against Me; for their worm will never die, their fire will never be quenched, and they will be a horror to all mankind.”
- Luke 3:8 Produce fruit, then, in keeping with repentance. And do not begin to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our father.’ For I tell you that out of these stones God can raise up children for Abraham.
- Luke 16:30 ‘No, father Abraham,’ he said, ‘but if someone is sent to them from the dead, they will repent.’
- Revelation 20:15 And if anyone was found whose name was not written in the Book of Life, he was thrown into the lake of fire.