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He has shown strength with his arm. He has scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts.
Luke 1:51 · World English Bible
Parallel translations
  • KJV He hath shewed strength with his arm; he hath scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts.
  • BSB He has performed mighty deeds with His arm; He has scattered those who are proud in the thoughts of their hearts.
  • NKJV He has shown strength with His arm; He has scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts.
  • NASB “He has done mighty deeds with His arm; He has scattered those who were proud in the thoughts of their hearts.
  • NLT His mighty arm has done tremendous things! He has scattered the proud and haughty ones.

Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org

Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.

Quick answer

God has shown mighty strength and scattered the proud. He overturns human arrogance.

Overview

Mary describes God's powerful acts in reversing the arrogant and self-exalting. The proud are scattered in the very schemes of their hearts. This theme of God humbling the haughty runs throughout Scripture and the gospel.

Cross-references & the web

Cross-references · 30

  • Ps 98:1A Psalm. Sing to Yahweh a new song, for he has done marvelous things! His right hand, and his holy arm, have worked salvation for him.
  • Isa 52:10Yahweh has made bare his holy arm in the eyes of all the nations; and all the ends of the earth have seen the salvation of our God.
  • 1 Sam 2:3–4“Don’t keep talking so exceedingly proudly. Don’t let arrogance come out of your mouth, For Yahweh is a God of knowledge. By him actions are weighed.
  • Isa 51:9Awake, awake, put on strength, arm of Yahweh! Awake, as in the days of old, the generations of ancient times. Isn’t it you who cut Rahab in pieces, who pierced the monster?
  • Rom 1:21Because, knowing God, they didn’t glorify him as God, neither gave thanks, but became vain in their reasoning, and their senseless heart was darkened.
  • Dan 4:37Now I, Nebuchadnezzar, praise and extol and honor the King of heaven; for all his works are truth, and his ways justice; and those who walk in pride he is able to abase.
  • Exod 15:6–7Your right hand, Yahweh, is glorious in power. Your right hand, Yahweh, dashes the enemy in pieces.
  • Isa 40:10Behold, the Lord Yahweh will come as a mighty one, and his arm will rule for him. Behold, his reward is with him, and his recompense before him.
  • Isa 63:12Who caused his glorious arm to be at Moses’ right hand? Who divided the waters before them, to make himself an everlasting name?
  • Job 40:9–12Or do you have an arm like God? Can you thunder with a voice like him?
  • Jer 48:29–30“We have heard of the pride of Moab. He is very proud; his loftiness, and his pride, and his arrogance, and the haughtiness of his heart.
  • Exod 18:11Now I know that Yahweh is greater than all gods because of the thing in which they dealt arrogantly against them.”
  • Ps 89:13You have a mighty arm. Your hand is strong, and your right hand is exalted.
  • Ps 89:10You have broken Rahab in pieces, like one of the slain. You have scattered your enemies with your mighty arm.
  • Ps 2:1–6Why do the nations rage, and the peoples plot a vain thing?
  • Ps 118:15The voice of rejoicing and salvation is in the tents of the righteous. “The right hand of Yahweh does valiantly.
  • 1 Sam 2:9–10He will keep the feet of his holy ones, but the wicked shall be put to silence in darkness; for no man shall prevail by strength.
  • Isa 10:12–19Therefore it will happen that, when the Lord has performed his whole work on Mount Zion and on Jerusalem, I will punish the fruit of the willful proud heart of the king of Assyria, and the insolence of his haughty looks.
  • Rev 18:8Therefore in one day her plagues will come: death, mourning, and famine; and she will be utterly burned with fire; for the Lord God who has judged her is strong.
  • Exod 15:9–13The enemy said, ‘I will pursue. I will overtake. I will divide the plunder. My desire shall be satisfied on them. I will draw my sword, my hand shall destroy them.’
  • Deut 29:19–20and it happen, when he hears the words of this curse, that he bless himself in his heart, saying, “I shall have peace, though I walk in the stubbornness of my heart, to destroy the moist with the dry.”
  • 2 Cor 10:5throwing down imaginations and every high thing that is exalted against the knowledge of God, and bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ;
  • Gen 8:21Yahweh smelled the pleasant aroma. Yahweh said in his heart, “I will not again curse the ground any more for man’s sake because the imagination of man’s heart is evil from his youth. I will never again strike every living thing, as I have done.
  • Gen 6:5Yahweh saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of man’s heart was continually only evil.
  • Ps 63:5My soul shall be satisfied as with the richest food. My mouth shall praise you with joyful lips,
  • Ps 52:9I will give you thanks forever, because you have done it. I will hope in your name, for it is good, in the presence of your saints.
  • 1 Pet 5:5Likewise, you younger ones, be subject to the elder. Yes, all of you clothe yourselves with humility, to subject yourselves to one another; for “God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble.”
  • Dan 5:25–31This is the writing that was inscribed: MENE, MENE, TEKEL, UPHARSIN.
  • Deut 4:34Or has God tried to go and take a nation for himself from among another nation, by trials, by signs, by wonders, by war, by a mighty hand, by an outstretched arm, and by great terrors, according to all that Yahweh your God did for you in Egypt before your eyes?
  • Ps 33:10Yahweh brings the counsel of the nations to nothing. He makes the thoughts of the peoples to be of no effect.

Themes, concepts, people & topics

Topics (9)

Resources, by level

Commentaries & study tools

  • VideoBibleProject — Luke videosBibleProject · Lay · Free · evangelical

    Free animated overview and word-study videos for this book.

  • VideoWatch teaching on Luke 1:51YouTube · Lay · Free

    Sermons and teaching on this passage from across YouTube.

  • CommentaryEnduring Word — verse-by-verseDavid Guzik · Lay · Free · evangelical

    Clear, readable, conservative exposition — the best free place to start on any passage.

  • CommentaryClassic commentaries for this verseBibleHub (20+ works) · Pastoral · Free

    Matthew Henry, Barnes, Gill, the Pulpit Commentary, Ellicott, Cambridge, and more — stacked on one page for this exact verse.

  • CommentaryMatthew Henry on LukeMatthew Henry · Pastoral · Free · evangelical

    The beloved Puritan exposition of this whole book — warm, devotional, and verse by verse (free, CCEL).

  • ReferenceInterlinear, lexicon & Strong'sBlue Letter Bible · Seminary · Free

    Hebrew/Greek interlinear, word definitions, and cross-references for this verse.

Christ at the center

Luke shows Jesus the Savior for all — outsiders, the poor, the nations — the one who, on the Emmaus road, opened all the Scriptures to show they were about himself.

How Luke 1:51 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.

Original language

Each word below is tagged with its Strong’s number — tap one to see the underlying Greek word, its meaning, and every verse that uses it.