How Not to Use Greek in Bible Study

(The post formerly known as "Nice Means Nice," a title which told the reader absolutely nothing.)

Have any of you ACE homeschool kids ever studied the PACES called "Etymology"? I did. Etymology deals with the 'roots' of words--where a word originally came from way back in the foggy mists of time. Etymology is a valuable area to study, and nothing in the following excerpt is meant to suggest otherwise (i.e. contrary to what you might think, your Etymology PACES were not a waste of time). 

Nevertheless, a problem arises when people mistakenly think that a word's etymology tells them "what it really means." We can see the fallacy of this notion clearly in our native English language. For example, the word "nice" comes from the Latin root 'nescius,' meaning 'ignorant.' But no one but a fool would respond to your calling them 'nice' by saying 'Oh, I see what you really mean! You're saying I'm ignorant! I'm onto your veiled Latin insults!' No one does this in their native language, but many Christians do this very thing when studying the Bible. They look up Greek words in their Strong's Concordance, find the original Greek root, and conclude that they have found the word's 'real' meaning.

Here's the point: roots and etymology are good. They can sometimes give you an interesting backstory on why a particular word came to be used to describe a particular thing. They can even help you win the national spelling bee. But they don't tell you the 'real meaning' of a word. Here’s why: because a word's meaning is not determined by its etymology, but by its usage. If you proposed to your girlfriend and she said "No," and yet you could somehow prove that "No" came from a Latin root meaning "Yes," it still wouldn't do you any good. Sadly, meaning is determined by usage, not etymology. “No” means what your girlfriend (and practically everyone else in our culture) means by it, not what it might have meant 1,000 years ago in an ancestor language. The reason no one today would take 'nice' as an insult is that no one today uses 'nice' as an insult. If you want to know what a word means today, you must find out how it's used today. That's what an up-to-date dictionary will tell you. Contrary to what is sometimes believed, dictionary writers do not determine word-meanings; they simply tell you how words are currently being used. Rather than prescribing they are simply describing. 

Incidentally, this is also why it is counterproductive to be an "1828 Noah Webster-Onlyist." Webster's 1828 Dictionary (which I, along with many homeschooling families, own) is a valuable resource for finding out how words were used in 1828, and as such can be used profitably to discover the meanings of unfamiliar words you might find in pre-19th century works like Robinson Crusoe, Gulliver's Travels, Shakespeare's plays, and the King James Version of the Bible. In fact, it contains thousands of definitions that are still accurate. But it can't serve as your only dictionary, because word usage has changed significantly in the last 200 years. Some words have lost old meanings ('let' no longer means 'hinder'), others have gained new ones ('cell' is now also used to describe a phone), and others have simply come into existence (babysitter, internet, etc.). Living, spoken languages are not frozen in time, nor are they constrained by etymology.       

When it comes to Bible study, many Christians think that knowing Greek is like a magic bullet that will unlock all the secrets of biblical meaning. This is simply not the case. Come to find out, Greek scholars have disagreements, too. The truth is, the main thing I learned in the first couple of weeks of Greek class was that most of what I thought I knew about Greek was malarky. Turns out that 'agapao' and 'phileo' weren't really different kinds of love after all, and the gospel wasn't really the 'dynamite' of God. In many ways, Greek was much more mundane than I had thought. 

I'm not trying to discourage anyone from studying Greek. In fact, I would encourage people to learn as much as they can. But the hard truth is that most people don't have time to learn it. The good news, however, is that God never intended all (or even most) of his people to have to learn Hebrew and Greek in order to understand his word. There is a happy division of labor in the body of Christ, just as there is in society in general. God is merciful--some people become experts in Greek and Hebrew so the rest of us don't have to. As my hermeneutics prof Rob Plummer has said, 

"Never before in the history of Christianity has there been less need for word studies than today. With the multiplicity of many excellent English Bible translations, readers of the Bible have the fruit of scholars' painstaking research."

And as 19th century Baptist theologian John Dagg put it:

"Translations, though made with uninspired human skill, are sufficient for those who have not access to the inspired original. Unlearned men will not be held accountable for a degree of light beyond what is granted to them; and the benevolence of God in making revelation has not endowed all with the gift of interpreting tongues...God has seen it wiser and better to leave the  members of Christ to feel the necessity of mutual sympathy and dependence, than to bestow every gift on every individual. He has bestowed the knowledge necessary for the translation of his word on a sufficient number of faithful men to answer the purpose of his benevolence. And the least accurate of the translations with which the common people are favored is full of divine truth and able to make wise to salvation."

If Dagg is right, and I think he is, then the impulse that says "I don't want to be dependent on scholars" may be a latent form of pride. It may be the hand saying to the foot 'I have no need of you.' I'm not trying to turn scholar-translators into an infallible high priestly class. I'm just saying that unless God expects us all to become experts in Hebrew, Greek, and Aramaic, then he must have willed for there to be a division of labor in this area. We are dependent on experts whether we like it or not. Pride will chafe at this, and paranoia will invent conspiracy theories. But until we become self-sufficient and omniscient, nothing will change it. Even the King James Onlyist is dependent on experts (namely, the King James translators). 

But humility will see this as good news, and will be relieved at God's way of dividing the labor. The sad news is that many Christians spend too much time looking up Greek words and coming to misguided conclusions because they don't really understand how the language works (they often know just enough to be dangerous). But for those who think they can't understand the Bible unless they can understand Greek, the good news is that 9 times out of 10 you will gain a better understanding of what a word means simply by reading it in its context. 

Here's what I mean by 'reading it in its context:' don't just zero in on one word, read the entire sentence. Then read the entire paragraph. As Paul Baker once wisely told us in one of his parable lessons, "Words shouldn't be read with blinders on." The reason for this is obvious when you think about it. There is a sense in which an individual word doesn't even have a meaning at all--rather, it has a range of possible meanings (often called a 'semantic range'). That's why a dictionary will usually list several possible options. It's only when a word is used in a context that the precise meaning becomes clear. Context usually narrows the possible meanings to one (an exception would be those wonderful things called "puns"). So for example, if you want to know what John means by the word "sin" in 1 John 3:4, instead of zeroing in on the word "sin" and doing a word study of 'hamartia' and trying to find out what 'hamarita' 'really' means based on its root, read the entire sentence: "Sin is lawlessness." Then read the surrounding context: "Everyone who sins breaks the law; in fact, sin is lawlessness. But you know that he appeared so that he might take away our sins. And in him is no sin." It's not as flashy a study method, and it probably won't make you look as smart, but it'll save you a lot of time and give you much more accurate results. :-) 

More Greek--To Agapao or to Phileo? That is the Question

Anyone who has listened to sermons for very long has probably heard that the Greek language has different words to describe love. For example, C.S. Lewis, in his book The Four Loves, discusses four Greek words for love.Only two of these words, agapao and phileo, are used in the Greek New Testament. Before we go any further, let’s make sure we understand our terms:

agapao (pronounced  ah ga PAH oh) - I love (verb)
phileo (pronounced phil EH oh)- I love (verb)
agape (pronounced ah GAH pay)- love (noun)

What we are usually told is that agape refers to a sacrificial, selfless, undeserved, giving love that doesn’t expect anything in return. It’s the kind of love God has for his people (John 3:16), and the kind of love a husband should have for his wife (Eph. 5:25). On the other hand, we are usually told that phileo refers to a more chummy, friendly, buddy-buddy type of love. This distinction between agape and phileo is often said to be important in understanding the conversation between Peter and the Lord Jesus in John 21:15-17, in which Jesus asks Peter “Do you love (agapao) me, Peter?” and Peter responds “Yes, Lord, I love (phileo) you.”

Now let me be clear in saying that no one denies that Greek has different words to describe love. But is the oft-repeated distinction in meaning between agapao and phileo actually true? Is it really better to agapao than to phileo?

The surprising answer is, that while many popular preachers still repeat this distinction, most conservative commentators and Greek scholars no longer believe it is significant. Here’s why.

1.      It is simply not true that agape always refers to a sacrificial, giving love. For example, in 2 Samuel 13, the LXX (i.e. the Greek translation of the Old Testament) describes Amnon’s “love” for his half-sister Tamar as both agapao and phileo. In fact, it was this agapao-phileo love that led him to rape her! You don’t get much farther from a selfless, sacrificial, giving love than rape, and yet the author still used the word agape to describe it. In the same way, when Paul says that “Demas has forsaken me, having loved this present age” (2 Tim. 4:10), he uses the word agapao, though Demas’ love was hardly selfless or sacrificial. This doesn’t mean that agape never means a special, sacrificial, selfless kind of love, it just means that it doesn’t necessarily mean that. 

2.      The words agape and phileo share a large amount of what is called “semantic overlap.” Semantic overlap is just a fancy way of saying that in many cases the two words are used interchangeably—as synonyms for each other. Let me illustrate it like this:

Notice that one circle is labeled agapao and the other phileo. Notice also the two circles overlap with each other. The shaded area of overlap represent the cases in which the words are used as synonyms--i.e. the semantic overlap.

  

When we look at the Greek New Testament, we can see cases where the words agapao or phileo are used interchangeably. For example, we find these two statements in John's Gospel:

“The Father loves (agapao) the Son...” (John 3:35)
“The Father loves (phileo) the Son...” (John 5:20)

In these contexts, there is no discernible difference between the two words. In these two contexts, the two words overlap in meaning—they are synonyms.

Again, five times in John's Gospel we read of "the disciple whom Jesus loved" (13:23, 19:26, 20:2, 21:7. 21:10). In four out of those five cases the author uses the word agapao, while in one of them he  uses phileo (20:2). This means that in 19:26 John is referred to as "the disciple whom Jesus agapaoed," while only a few verses later in 20:2 he is referred to as "the disciple whom Jesus phileoed." Again, there is nothing in the context to suggest that there is any difference in these two phrases. They are simply being used as synonyms. The only reason we would think otherwise is if we wrongly assume that 'different word equals different meaning.'

Another example. In John 11:3 we read that Jesus loved Lazarus. "Lord, the one whom you love is sick." Two verses later, in verse 5, John says "Jesus loved Martha and her sister Mary and her brother Lazarus." You guessed it: in verse 3 the word is phileo, and in verse 5 it's agapao. Again, the context indicates that these two words are being used as synonyms. Both are being used in close proximity to one another to describe the same reality: Jesus's love for Lazarus (and his sisters). To assume that they must have different meanings simply because they are different words ignores the existence of synonyms. 

At the risk of being tedious, let me give one more example. In Matthew 23:6, Jesus says that the Pharisees "love the place of honor at feasts and the best seats in the synagogues." In Luke 11:43 he says that the Pharisees "love the best seats in the synagogues and greetings in the marketplaces." Right again. Matthew uses phileo, and Luke uses agapao. Again, there is no discernible difference in meaning. 

So let me beat a dead horse and reiterate the point so far: agapao and phileo are often synonyms.

However, this doesn’t mean that agapao and phileo are always synonyms. For example, the word phileo can also mean “to kiss,” while agape is never used that way. When the gospel writers say that Judas kissed Jesus, the verb for kiss is phileo (see Matt. 26:48; Mark 14:44; Luke 22:47). In the diagram above, the non-shaded, non-overlapping area of the word phileo would represent the meaning "kiss." In other words, the meanings of agapao and phileo do not completely overlap. Phileo can mean things that agapao can't. They are synonyms sometimes, but not always. How do you know when? You guessed it: context. Context always. And again I say, context! 

Let me give an example from our own language that might help. Take the words yard and lawn . Do they mean the same thing? Well, sometimes they do. For example, take these two sentences:

“Donny told Stuart to mow the yard.”

“Donny told Stuart to mow the lawn .”

In those two sentences, the words lawn and yard are used interchangeably. No native English speaker would see any difference in meaning between the two sentences. At the same time, these two words are not always interchangeable. For example:

“Jane bought a yard of fabric."

“Jane bought a lawn of fabric."

We automatically realize that there's something wrong with that second sentence. We never use lawn as a synonym for yard in the context of fabric measurements, because unlike yard, lawn is never used to describe a unit of three feet. Yard can mean things that lawn can't. So rather than saying yard and lawn are synonyms, it would be more accurate to say they are synonyms in certain contexts (like the context of mowing). Again, we could draw two overlapping circles representing the words yard and lawn and the overlapping shaded portion would represent the contexts in which lawn and yard are synonyms (e.g. mowing), while the non-shaded, non-overlapping portions would represent the contexts in which they are not synonyms (e.g. measurements). 

Rather than saying that a given word has a meaning, it is more accurate to say that a word has a range of potential meanings. This is what a dictionary gives you: a list of potential meanings for each word. Greek is no different from English in this regard. Greek contains words whose meanings overlap with one another as synonyms. Forgetting this simple fact, people often make the mistake of thinking that 'different word equals different meaning.' They assume that if John used agapao instead of phileo, he must have had two different meanings in mind. But this is not necessarily the case. For example, a German speaker who was just learning English might think that "Donny told Stuart to mow the yard" must mean something slightly different from "Donny told Stuart to mow the lawn," simply because the second sentence uses a different word. But we native English speakers know that this is not the case. Different word does not equal different meaning, because different words can overlap in their meaning.

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So let me summarize. First, contrary to popular belief, the word agape is not a special kind of love that is better than phileo. Agape can be used to refer to selfless love and selfish love, to God's love of his people and an apostate's love of the world. And second, much of the time, agapao and phileo function as synonyms, although phileo can also mean "I kiss." Any difference between the two must be determined by the context, not by the word itself.

So, am I saying that God doesn't love us with a sacrificial, giving, special love? No, I am not saying that at all. I am simply saying that you can't get all of that from the mere word agape. To see how God loves us, we don't just zero in on the single word agapao, we zero out to entire sentences like: 

"For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son;" (John 3:16)

"In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him. In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. (1 John 4:9-10)

"Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her..." (Ephesians 5:25)

"For one will scarcely die for a righteous person—though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die—but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us." (Romans 5:7-8)

"Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends. (John 15:13)

"See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are." (1 John 3:1)

(All of the verses above use agape/agapao.)

So which is better? To agapao or to phileo? I'll take either one. Just don't kiss me. 

-Justin Dillehay

(The Venn Diagram was borrowed from the very helpful article called "Language," by Robert I. Bradshaw, http://www.biblicalstudies.org.uk/article_language.html. In many ways, this post is simply a condensing of works like Bradshaw's, as well as D. A. Carson's Exegetical Fallacies and Moises Silva's God, Language, and Scripture. Nothing original, just as advertised.) 

Did Jesus Speak Greek?

Link to a helpful article by Mark D. Roberts. (Spoiler: his answer is 'Probably.')

http://blog.beliefnet.com/markdroberts/2010/07/did-jesus-speak-greek.html