Matthew 5:13 (King James Version)
13 Ye are the salt of the earth: but if the salt have lost his savour, wherewith shall it be salted? it is thenceforth good for nothing, but to be cast out, and to be trodden under foot of men.
Matthew 5:13 (New International Version)
“You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled underfoot.
| 13 | “ | You | are | the | salt | of | the | earth | . | But | if | the | salt | ||||||||||||
| Ὑμεῖς1 | ἐστε2 | τὸ3 | ἅλας4 | ►6 | τῆς5 | γῆς6 | δὲ8 | ἐὰν7 | τὸ9 | ἅλας10 |
| loses its saltiness | , | how | can | it | be | made | salty | again | ? | It | is | no | |||||||||
| μωρανθῇ11 | ἐν12 τίνι13 | → | → | → | → | ἁλισθήσεται14 | • | → | ►17 | οὐδὲν16 |
| longer | good | for | anything | , | except | to | be | thrown | out | and | |||||||||
| ἔτι18 | ἰσχύει17 | εἰς15 | ◄16 | εἰ19 μὴ20 | → | → | βληθὲν21 | ἔξω22 | ◄21 |
| trampled | underfoot | . | |||
| καταπατεῖσθαι23 | ὑπὸ24 τῶν25 ἀνθρώπων26 |
Matthew 5:13 presents a striking grammatical oddity where the KJV renders salt as “if the salt have lost his savour,” employing the masculine possessive pronoun for an inanimate object. This reflects a fundamental linguistic gap in seventeenth-century English.
The Historical Context of “Its”
In older forms of English the possessive pronoun “its” did not exist; instead “his” was used for both masculine and neuter forms, with “his” functioning as “semi-generic” for both masculine and neuter genders.[1] At the beginning of the seventeenth century “its” was beginning to come into common use, but had not yet become normative.[1] The KJV translators faced a dilemma: adopting the emerging “its” would violate their instruction to minimize changes from earlier versions, yet retaining “his” for neuter nouns created confusion.
The KJV’s Awkward Solution
The translators’ solution was to rephrase neuter possessive forms using “thereof.”[1] However, this approach was applied inconsistently. The KJV uses “its” only once (Leviticus 25:5, “that which groweth of its own accord”).[1] Occasionally the neuter use of “his” was retained, resulting in very odd statements such as “if the salt have lost his savour” (Matthew 5:13).[1]
The Problem This Creates
The phrase “salt have lost his savour” personifies salt as masculine, creating cognitive dissonance for modern readers. The grammatical construction suggests salt possesses masculine characteristics when the passage simply describes salt losing its flavor—a purely functional property. Similar constructions appear throughout: “Hew down the tree, and cut off his branches” (Daniel 4:14) and “learn a parable of the fig tree; When his branch is yet tender” (Matthew 24:32).[2] These renderings force readers to navigate archaic pronouns rather than focus on the theological meaning—that salt losing its preservative power becomes worthless, just as disciples losing their spiritual distinctiveness become ineffective.
[2] Martin H. Manser, Natasha B. Fleming, et al., I Never Knew That Was in the Bible! (Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers, 2000), 218.
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