---
title: Luke 12:51
url: https://jw-apologetics.app/verses/luke-12-51/
markdown: https://jw-apologetics.app/verses/luke-12-51.md
type: verse
perspective: Protestant (historic Nicene) response to Jehovah's Witness teaching
reference: Luke 12:51
testament: NT
section: Gospels
index: https://jw-apologetics.app/llms.txt
---

# Luke 12:51

## Text (Berean Standard Bible)

> Do you think that I have come to bring peace to the earth? No, I tell you, but division.

## NWT Wording of the Key Phrase

- NWT (1984 edition): "Do you imagine I came to give peace on the earth? No, indeed, I tell you, but rather division."
- NWT (2013 revision): "Do you think I came to give peace on the earth? No, I tell you, but rather division."

## JW Usage

JWs read Luke 12:51 as Jesus' candid acknowledgement that the truth about Jehovah will divide families — and the verse is sometimes cited to explain why becoming a Witness can produce family tension. Within the Watchtower framework the division usually flows from worldly relatives opposing the convert's new faith; the same principle is rarely turned the other way to consider what happens when a Witness leaves the organisation because of conscientious conviction.

## Protestant Usage

Luke 12:51 records Jesus saying he came to bring division, not peace. The dividing line is Christ himself — following him cuts through the closest relationships when those relationships stand between the disciple and the Master. Pair this verse with Matthew 19:29 ("Everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or lands for the sake of my name will receive a hundred times as much and will inherit everlasting life") and Mark 10:29-30 (the same promise with the hundredfold reward named "now in this period of time"). The promise is to those cut off from family because of Christ. On the doorstep — particularly with a Witness who is privately wavering or with someone who has left and now grieves the loss — this verse names the cost honestly and locates it in Christ's own teaching. The pain of family rupture is real; Jesus said it would happen. And the reimbursement Jesus names is not symbolic — it is family of God in this life and everlasting life in the coming age.

## Arguments Using This Verse

- [Christ's Promise to Those Their Family Cuts Off](https://jw-apologetics.app/arguments/matthew19-leave-father-mother.md) — Matthew 19:29 / Mark 8:36 / Mark 10:29-30 [Practice]