---
title: Luke 23:46
url: https://jw-apologetics.app/verses/luke-23-46/
markdown: https://jw-apologetics.app/verses/luke-23-46.md
type: verse
perspective: Protestant (historic Nicene) response to Jehovah's Witness teaching
reference: Luke 23:46
testament: NT
section: Gospels
index: https://jw-apologetics.app/llms.txt
---

# Luke 23:46

## Text (Berean Standard Bible)

> Then Jesus called out in a loud voice, “Father, into Your hands I commit My Spirit.” And when He had said this, He breathed His last.

## JW Usage

The Watchtower reads Jesus' dying commitment of his spirit to the Father as a statement about his "life-force" returning to God — consistent with the JW soul-sleep doctrine where pneuma is breath / life-force rather than a conscious soul. The personal-handoff language ("into your hands") is treated as idiomatic rather than as a statement about an active conscious entity being entrusted. Jesus is understood to cease existing until his Father raises him three days later.

## Protestant Usage

Jesus addresses the Father directly and entrusts his spirit to him at the moment of death. Stephen mirrors this prayer in Acts 7:59 ("Lord Jesus, receive my spirit") — the exact same verb applied to Jesus. Two data points at once: (1) the consciousness argument — Jesus expects his conscious self to be received by the Father in that moment, not to go into non-existence until resurrection; (2) the deity argument — Stephen does to Jesus exactly what Jesus did to the Father. If this is only life-force language, both Jesus and Stephen are using the most personal vocabulary imaginable — "into your hands I commit my spirit" — to describe something impersonal. At the door: "Jesus says 'Father, into your hands.' Stephen says 'Lord Jesus, receive.' Both are personal addresses at the moment of death. If this is life-force returning, who is the 'Father' receiving it, and why does Stephen then pray to Jesus the same way?"

## Arguments Using This Verse

- [Prayer to Jesus in the New Testament](https://jw-apologetics.app/arguments/prayer-to-jesus.md) — Acts 7:59, Revelation 22:20, 2 Corinthians 12:8 [Deity of Christ]
- [Lord Jesus, Receive My Spirit](https://jw-apologetics.app/arguments/stephen-receive-my-spirit.md) — Acts 7:59–60 [Soul & Hell]
- [If Jesus Is God, Who Raised Him?](https://jw-apologetics.app/arguments/god-cannot-die-jw-closing.md) — Acts 20:28 / 1 Corinthians 2:8 — the two natures of the one Person [Deity of Christ]