The Greek verb antapokrinomai (ἀνταποκρίνομαι) means to answer back, to reply against, to contradict — combining anti (against), apo (away/from), and krino (to judge/answer). It appears twice in the New Testament (Luke 14:6; Romans 9:20), in very different but equally significant contexts.
In Luke 14:6, the Pharisees could not antapokrinomai Jesus — they had no answer back to give to His question about whether it was lawful to heal on the Sabbath. In Romans 9:20, Paul asks the most sobering rhetorical question in all his letters: "But who are you, a human being, to talk back (antapokrinomai) to God? Shall what is formed say to the one who formed it, 'Why did you make me like this?'" The image is the potter and the clay. The silence before God — whether silenced by His wisdom (Luke 14) or silenced by His sovereignty (Romans 9) — is the beginning of reverence. The one who stops answering back to God has learned the beginning of wisdom.