Exploring the Meaning of Antapokrinomai in Greek

Antapokrinomai means “to contradict.” It appears in two New Testament settings: a public exchange in Luke’s account of Jesus’ table teaching, and Paul’s pointed question to an objector in Romans.

Root and Related Words

Antapokrinomai is formed from anti (ἀντί), “for,” and apokrinomai (ἀποκρίνω), “to answer.” The compound shape naturally places the verb in the realm of verbal response, with the added force of a response set “against” what has just been spoken.

Occurrences

Luke 14:6: “They couldn’t answer him regarding these things.”

In this scene, the verb is framed by inability: “They couldn’t answer him.” The context supplied by the verse itself is that an exchange has been initiated by “him,” and a reply is expected “regarding these things.” Antapokrinomai marks the kind of reply that would meet his words with opposition rather than mere participation in conversation. The line does not present an offered counterargument; instead, it highlights a silence where contradiction might have been attempted. The result is a rhetorical imbalance: one party speaks with enough weight that the other side cannot mount an opposing answer on the specific matters at hand.

Even in this brief sentence, the verb contributes social and discursive texture. The group (“They”) is positioned collectively, and their failure to respond is not merely a pause but an incapacity “regarding these things”—the concrete points under discussion. Antapokrinomai therefore functions as a measure of how contestable the speaker’s claims appear to the hearers in that moment: the expected “contradiction” never materializes, and the lack of an opposing answer becomes part of the narrative force.

Romans 9:20: “But indeed, O man, who are you to reply against God? Will the thing formed ask him who formed it, “Why did you make me like this?””

Here the verb is placed in a direct challenge: “who are you to reply against God?” Antapokrinomai expresses not just speaking back, but speaking back in opposition. The question targets the posture implied by such a response—an answer that sets itself against God rather than receiving God’s standing as God. The verse immediately deepens the point with an illustration: “Will the thing formed ask him who formed it, ‘Why did you make me like this?’” Antapokrinomai fits that imagined dialogue as the kind of utterance that contests the maker’s action.

The wording “reply against” sets a clear directional sense to the speech act: the reply is not neutral; it is adversarial toward its object. The address “O man” makes the confrontation personal and categorical at once, locating the would-be contradictor in the human position. The maker/formed comparison then gives the contradiction an unmistakable shape: it is the created thing speaking as if it can interrogate or dispute the creator’s formative decision (“Why did you make me like this?”). In this setting, antapokrinomai names an opposing response that would invert appropriate roles in the relationship described by the verse.

Sense and Usage

Across these two passages, “to contradict” is shown as a particular kind of answering—answering that contests, resists, or challenges what has been said or done. Luke 14:6 depicts contradiction as something expected in a contested exchange but absent because the hearers “couldn’t answer him regarding these things.” The verb there gains its color from the social moment: a question or claim stands, and the opposing side lacks the capacity to answer back in a way that pushes against it. Contradiction is therefore treated as a real possibility within public argumentation, and the narrative emphasizes its failure.

Romans 9:20 shows contradiction not as an inability but as a moral and relational impropriety: “who are you to reply against God?” Here antapokrinomai is not merely a description of debate technique; it is a label for an adversarial reply aimed at the wrong target. The maker/formed picture clarifies the kind of contradiction envisioned: the formed thing’s question “Why did you make me like this?” is a direct challenge to the maker’s decision. Antapokrinomai thus captures a reply that does more than seek information; it presses back against authority, disputing the rightness of what the superior party has done.

Put together, these uses show contradiction operating on two planes. On the human plane (Luke), it is the counter-answer that might be offered in response to a strong claim, and the story notes when such opposition cannot be voiced. On the divine–human plane (Romans), it is the very act of setting oneself in opposition through speech, framed as an audacious reversal of roles. In both, the verb sits close to the idea of “answering,” yet it is the answering of resistance—the reply that positions itself against, whether it succeeds (in being attempted) or collapses into silence.

Imagery

The two verses attach vivid relational images to contradiction. Luke 14:6 leaves the reader with a picture of a group at a loss for words, facing a line of reasoning they cannot oppose “regarding these things.” Romans 9:20 supplies a more explicit picture: a formed object questioning its former—“Why did you make me like this?”—so that contradiction is imagined as the created thing raising its voice against the creator who shaped it.

Sources: Lexical data from Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance and the Translators Brief Lexicon of Extended Strongs for Greek (STEPBible, CC BY). Occurrence data from the Translators Amalgamated Greek New Testament (STEPBible, CC BY). Scripture quotations from the World English Bible (public domain).