Bible Strands
Luke 3:17
His winnowing fork is in His hand to clear His threshing floor and to gather the wheat into His barn; but He will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire.”
Berean Standard Bible
Follow its threads on the canvas →
Study note
Setting — John the Baptist addresses the crowds at the Jordan River, contrasting his water baptism with the imminent ministry of the coming Messiah. He declares that this One will execute a decisive separation between the faithful and the unfaithful.
The words — The Greek πτύον (ptuon) refers to the winnowing fork used to toss harvested grain into the wind. This agricultural tool provides the concrete mechanism for the verse’s imagery of clearing a threshing floor.
The thread — The winnowing metaphor appears in Jeremiah 15:7 as a symbol of divine scattering and in Matthew 13:30 as part of the harvest separation. Both passages use the same agricultural process to describe final judgment.
Why it lands — The text requires readers to recognize that the coming One will actively gather the faithful and destroy the worthless with unquenchable fire. It demands immediate preparation, as the separation is certain and irreversible.
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
Whose fan is in his hand, and he will throughly purge his floor, and will gather the wheat into his garner; but the chaff he will burn with fire unquenchable.
Cross-references
- Jeremiah 15:7 I will scatter them with a winnowing fork at the gates of the land. I will bereave and destroy My people who have not turned from their ways.
- Micah 4:12 But they do not know the thoughts of the LORD or understand His plan, for He has gathered them like sheaves to the threshing floor.
- Matthew 13:30 Let both grow together until the harvest. At that time I will tell the harvesters: First collect the weeds and tie them in bundles to be burned; then gather the wheat into my barn.’”
- Psalms 1:4 Not so the wicked! For they are like chaff driven off by the wind.
- Psalms 21:9 You will place them in a fiery furnace at the time of Your appearing. In His wrath the LORD will engulf them, and the fire will consume them.
- Isaiah 30:24 The oxen and donkeys that work the ground will eat salted fodder, winnowed with shovel and pitchfork.
- Matthew 3:12 His winnowing fork is in His hand to clear His threshing floor and to gather His wheat into the barn; but He will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire.”
- Mark 9:43 If your hand causes you to sin, cut it off. It is better for you to enter life crippled than to have two hands and go into hell, into the unquenchable fire.