Synonyms of the New Testament

§ vi. SYNONYMS OF THE NEW TESTAMENT 23
Holy Ghost,’ as we have rendered it; rather ‘getrieben,’

as De Wette (cf. Knapp, Script. Var. Argum. p. 33); he is

qeo (Cyril of Alexandria); and we must not go so

far in our opposition to heathen and Montanist error as

to deny this, which some, above all those engaged in

controversy with the Montanists, St. Jerome for example,

have done (sea the masterly discussion on this subject in

Hengstenberg’s Christologie, 2nd ed., vol. iii. part 2, pp.

158-188). But then he is lifted above, not set beside, his

every-day self. It is not discord and disorder, but a higher

harmony and a diviner order, which are introduced into

his soul; so that he is not as one overborne in the region

of his lower life by forces stronger than his own, by an

insurrection from beneath: but his spirit is lifted out of

that region into a clearer atmosphere, a diviner day, than

any in which at other times it is permitted him to breathe.

All that he before had still remains his, only purged,

exalted, quickened by a power higher than his own, but

yet not alien to his own; for man is most truly man when

he is most filled with the fulness of God.¹ Even within

the sphere of heathenism itself, the superior dignity of the

profh to the ma was recognized; and recognized

on these very grounds. Thus there is a well-known

passage in the Timaeus of Plato (71 e, 72 a, b), where

exactly for this reason, that the profh is one in whom

all discourse of reason is suspended, who, as the word

itself implies, lore or less rages, the line is drawn broadly

and distinctly between him and the profh, the former

being subordinated to the latter, and his utterances only

allowed to pass after they have received the seal and

approbation o the other. Often as it has been cited, it

may be yet worth while to cite it, at least in part, once

more: to> tw?n profh toi?j e]nqe

¹ See John Snith, the Cambridge Platonist, On Prophecy: ch. 4,

The Difference o the true prophetical Spirit from all Enthusiastical

Imposture.

24 SYNONIMS OF THE NEW TESTAMENT. § VII.

krita>j e]pikaqista

to> pa?n h]gnohko

fanta kai> ou@ti ma tw?n

manteuome. The truth which

the best heathen philosophy had a glimpse of here, was

permanently embodied by the Christian Church in the

fact that, while it assumed the profhteu to itself, it

relegated the manteu to that heathenism which it was

about to displace and overthrow.

§ vii. timwri.
OF these words the former occurs but once in the N. T.

(Heb. x. 29; cf. Acts xxii. 5; xxvi. 11), and the latter only

twice (Matt. xiv. 46; i John iv. 18): but the verb timw-

rein twice (Acts xxii. 5; xxvi. 11); and kola as often

(Acts iv. 21; 2 Pet. ii. 9). In timwri, according to its

classical use, the vindicative character of the punishment

is the predominant thought; it is the Latin ‘vindicatio,’

by Cicero (Inv. ii. 22) explained as that act ‘per quam vim

et contumeliain defendendo aut ulciscendo propulsamus a

nobis, et a nostris; et per quam peccata punimus;' punish-

ment as satisfying the inflicter's sense of outraged justice,

as defending his own honour, or that of the violated law.

Herein its meaning agrees with its etymology, being from

timh<, and ou#roj, o[ra, the guardianship or protectorate of

honour; ‘Ehrenstrafe’ it has been rendered in German,

or better, ‘Ehrenrettung, die der Ehre der verletzten

Ordnung geleistete Genugthuung’ (Delitzsch). In ko

sij, on the other hand, is more the notion of punishment

as it has reference to the correction and bettering of the

offender (see Philo, Leg. ad Cai. i; Josephus, Antt. ii.

6. 8); it is ‘castigatio,’ and naturally has for the most

part a milder use than timwri. Thus Plato (Protag.

323 e) joins kola and nouqeth together: and the

whole passage to the end of the chapter is eminently

instructive as to the distinction between the words:

§ VII. SYNONYMS OF THE NEW TESTAMENT. 25
ou]dei>j kolaj a]dikou?ntaj o!ti h]di

w!sper qhri tou?

me au#qij a]dikh; the same change

in the words which he employs, occurring again twice or

thrice in the sentence; with all which may be compared

what Clement of Alexandria has said, Strom. iv. 24; and

again vii. 16 here he defines kola as merikai> paidei?ai,

and timwri as kakou? a]ntapo. And this is Aristotle's

distinction (Rhet. i. 10): diafe timwri ko

h[ me>n ga>r ko timwri

tou? poiou?ntoj, i!na a]poplhrwq^: cf Ethic. Nic. iv. 5:

timwrin a]nti> th?j lu

It is to these and similar definition that Aulus Gellius

refers when he says (Noct. Att. vi. 14): ‘Puniendis pec-

catis tres ess debere causas existi atum est. Una est

quae nouqesi vel ko, vel parai dicitur; cum

poena adhibetur castigandi atque emendandi gratia; ut is

qui fortuito deliquit, attentior fiat, correctiorque. Altera

est quam ii, qui vocabula ista, curiosius diviserunt,

timwri appellant. Ea causa animadvertendi est, cum

dignitas auctoritasque ejus, in quem st peccatum, tuenda

est, ne praetermissa animadversio contemtum ejus pariat,

et honorem levet: idcircoque id ei vocabulum a conserva-

tione honoris factum putant.' There is a profound com-

mentary on these words in Goschel's Zerstreute Blatter,

part 2, p. 343-360; compare too a instructive note in

Wyttenbach's Animadd. in Plutarch. vol. xii. p. 776.

It would a very serious error, however, to attempt

to transfer this distinction in its entireness to the words

as employed in the N. T. The ko of Matt.

xxv. 46, as it is plain, is no merely corrective, and there-

fore temporary, discipline ; cannot be any other than the

a]qa, (Josephus, B. J. ii. 8. 11; cf. Antt. xviii.

I. 3, ei]rgmo>j a]i~dioj), the a]i*di (Plato, Ax. 372 a),

with which the Lord elsewhere threatens finally im-

penitent men (Mark ix. 43-48); for in proof that ko

26 SYNONYMS OF THE NEW TESTAMENT. § viii.
with kola had acquired in Hellenistic Greek this

severer sense, and was used simply as 'punishment' or

'torment,' with no necessary underthought of the better-

ing through it of him who endured it, we have only to

refer to such passages as the following: Josephus, Antt.

xv. 2. 2; Philo, De Agric. 9; Mart. Polycar. 2; 2 Macc.

iv. 38; Wisd. xix. 4; and indeed to the words of St. Peter

himself (2.Ep. ii. 9). This much, indeed, of Aristotle's

distinction still remains, and may be recognized in the

scriptural usage of the words, that in ko the relation

of the punishment to the punished, in timwri to the

punisher, is predominant.

§ viii. a]lhqh.
THE Latin 'verax' and 'verus' would severally represent

a]lhqh, and a]lhqino, and in the main reproduce the dis-

tinctions existing between them; indeed, the Vulgate does

commonly by aid of these indicate whether of the two

stands in the original; but we having lost, or nearly lost,

'very' (vrai) as an adjective, retaining it only as an adverb,

have 'true' lone whereby to render them both. It follows

that the difference between the two disappears in our

Version: and this by no fault of our Translators—unless,

indeed, they erred in not recovering 'very,' which was

Wiclif's common translation of 'verus' (thus John xv. 1,

"I am the verri vine"), and which to recover would not

have been easy in their time (indeed they actually so use

it at Gen. x vii. 21, 24); as it would not be impossible in

ours. We in fact do retain it in the Nicene Creed, where

it does excellent service—'very God of very God' (qeo>n

a]lhqino>n e]k qeou? a]lhqinou?). It would have been worth

while to make the attempt, for the differences which we

now efface are most real. Thus God is a]lhqh, and He is

also a]lhqino: but very different attributes are ascribed to

Him by the one epithet, and by the other. He is a]lhqh

(John iii. 33; Rom. iii. 4; = 'verax'), inasmuch as He

§ VIII. SYNONYMS OF THE NEW TESTAMENT. 27
cannot lie, as He is a]yeudh (Tit. i. 2) the truth-speaking,

and the truth-loving God (cf. Euripides, Ion, 1554). But

He is a]lhqino. (1 Thess. 9; John xvii. 3; Isai. lxv. 16;

= ‘verus’), very God, as distinguishes from idols and all

other false goes, the dreams of the diseased fancy of man,

with no substantial existence in the world of realities (cf.

Athenaeus, vi. 62, where one records how the Athenians

received Demetrius with divine honours: w[j ei@h moj

a]lhqino).

"The adjectives in -i-noj express the material out of which

anything is made, or rather they imply a mixed relation,

of quality and origin, to the object denoted by the substan-

tive from which they are derived. Thus cu means

‘of wood,’ ‘wooden;’ [o]stra, ‘of earth,’ ‘earthen;’

u[a, 'of glass,' ‘glassen;’] and a]lhq-i-no signifies

‘genuine,' made up of that which is true [that which, in

chemical language, has truth for its stuff and base]. This

last adjective s particularly applied t express that which

is all that it pretends to be; for instance, pure gold as

opposed to ad iterated metal" (Donaldson, New Cratylus,

p. 426).

It will be seen from this last remark that it does not of

necessity follow that whatever may be contrasted with the

a]lhqino must thereby be concluded to have no substantial

existence, to be altogether false and fraudulent. Inferior

and subordinate realizations, partial and imperfect antici-

pations, of the truth, may be set over against the truth in

its highest form, in its ripest and completest development;

and then to this last alone the title a]lhqino will be vouch-

safed. Kahnis has said well (Abendmahl, p. 119): ‘ ]Alh-

qh schliesst as Unwahre and Unwirkliche, a]lhqino das

seiner Idee nicht Entsprechende auf. Das Mass des

a]lhqh ist die Wirklichkeit, das des a]lhqino die Idee.

Bei a]lhqh entspricht die Idee der Sache, bei a]lhqino die

Sache der Idee.' Thus Xenophon affirms of Cyrus (Anab.

i. 9. 17), that he commanded a]lhqino>n stra, an army

28 SYNONYMS OF THE NEW TESTAMENT. § viii
indeed, an army deserving the name; but he would not

have altogether refused this name of ‘army’ to inferior

hosts; and Plato (Tim. 25 a), calling the sea beyond the

Straits of Hercules, pej po, would

say that it alone realized to the full the idea of the great

ocean deep ; cf. Rep. i.347 d: o[ t&? o@nti a]lhqino>j a@rxwn;

and again vi. 499 c: a]lhqinh?j filosofij e@rwj. We

should frequently miss the exact force of the word, we

might find ourselves entangled in serious embarrassments,

if we understood a]lhqino as necessarily the true opposed

to the false. Rather it is very often the substantial as

opposed to the shadowy and outlinear; as Origen (in Joan.

tom. ii. § 4) has well expressed it: a]lhqinoj a]nti-

diastolh>n skia?j kai> tu
ei]ko. Thus at Heb. viii. 2,

mention is made of the skhnh> a]lhqinh< into which our great

High Priest entered; which, of course, does not imply

that the tabernacle in the wilderness was not also most

truly pitched at God's bidding, and according to the pat-

tern which He had shown (Exod. xxv.); but only that it,

and all things in it, were weak earthly copies of heavenly

realities (a]nti); the passing of the Jewish

High Priest into the Holy of Holies, with all else pertain-

ing to the worldly sanctuary, being but the skia> tw?n mel-

lo, while the sw?ma, the so filling up of these

outlines that they should be bulk and body, and not

shadow any more, was of Christ (Col. ii. 17).¹

So, too, when the Baptist announces, "The law was

given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ "
¹ This F. Spanbeim (Dub. Evang. 106) has well put: ]Alh in

Scripture Sacra interdum sumitur ethice, et opponitur falsitati et men-

dacio; interdum mystice, et opponitur typis et umbris, ut ei]kw illis re-

spondens, quae veritas alio modo etiam sw?ma vocatur a Spiritu S. opposita

t^? ski%?: Cf. Deyling, Obss. Sac. vol. iii. p. 317; vol. iv. pp. 548, 627 ;

and Delitzsch: 'Es ist Beiname dessen was seinem Namen und Begriffe

im vollsten, tiefsten, uneingeschranktesten Sinne entspricht, dessen was

das was es heisst nicht blos relativ ist, sondern absolut; nicht blos mate-

riell, sondern geistig und geistlich; nicht blos zeitlich, sondern ewig;

nicht blos bildlich, d. h. vorbildlich, abbildlich, nachbildlicb, sondern

gegenbildlich und urbildlich.’

§ viii. SYNONYMS OF THE NEW TESTAMENT. 29

(John i. 17), the antithesis cannot lie between the false and

the true, but only between the imperfect and the perfect,

the shadowy and the substantial. In like manner, the

Eternal Word is declared to be to> fw?j to> a]lhqino(John

i. 9), not denying thereby that the Baptist was also "a

burning and a shining light" (John v. 35), or that the

faithful are "lights in the world" (Phil. ii. 15; Matt. v. 14),

but only claiming for a greater than all to be "the Light

which lighteth every man that cometh into the world."¹

Christ proclaims Himself o[ a@rtoj o[ a]lhqino (John vi. 32),

not suggesting thereby that the bread which Moses gave

was not also "bread of heaven" (Ps. cv. 40), but only that

it was such in a secondary inferior degree; it was not

food in the highest sense, inasmuch as it did not nourish

up unto eternal life those that ate it (John vi. 49). He is

h[ a@mpeloj h[ a]lhqinh< (John xv. I), not thereby denying that

Israel also was God's vine (Ps. lxxx. 8; Jer. 21), but

affirming that none except Himself realized this name, and

all which this name implied, to the full (Hos. x. I; Deut.

xxxii. 32).² It would be easy to follow this up further;

but these examples, which the thoughtful student will

observe are drawn chiefly from St. John, may suffice. The

fact that in Hie writings of this Evangelist a]lhqino is

used two and twenty times as against five times in all the

rest of the N. T., he will scarcely esteem accidental.

To sum up then, as briefly as possible, the differences

between these two words, we may affirm of the (a]lhqh,

¹ Lampe (in loc.): ‘Innuitur ergo hic oprositio tum luminarium

naturalium, qualia fuere lux creationis, lux Israelitarum in AEgrpto, lux

columnae in deserto, lux gemmarum in pectorali, quae non nisi umbrae

fuere hujus verae lucis; turn eorum, qui falso se esse lumen hominum

gloriantur, quales sirillatim fuere Sol et Luna Ecelesiae Judaicae, qui cum

oirtu hujus Lucis obscurandi, Joel ii. 31; tum denique verorum quoque

luminarium, sed in minore gradu, quaeque omne strum lumen ab hoc

Lumine mutuantur qualia sunt onmes Sancti, Doctores, Angeli lucis, ipse

denique Joannes Baptista.'

² Lampe: ‘Christus est Vitis vera, . . . et la talis praeponi, quip et

opponi, potest omnibus aliis qui etiam sub hoc symbolo in scriptis pro-

pheticis pinguntur.'

30 SYNONYMS OF THE NEW TESTAMENT. § IX.

that he fulfils the promise of his lips, but the a]lhqino the

wider promise of his name. Whatever that name imports,

taken in its highest, deepest, widest sense, whatever ac-

cording to that he ought to be, that he is to the full.

This, let me further add, holds equally good of things as

of persons; pistoi<, and a]lhqinoi< are therefore at Rev. xxi. 5

justly found together.
ix. qera
.
THE only passage in the N. T. in which qera
occurs is

Heb. iii. 5: "And Moses verily was faithful in all his

house, as a servant" (w[j qera
). The allusion here to

Num. xii. 7 is manifest, where the Septuagint has given

qera
as its rendering of db,f,; it has done the same

elsewhere (Exod. iv. 10; Deut. iii. 24; Josh. i. 2), yet has

not made this its constant rule, frequently rendering

it not by qera

, but by dou?loj, out of which latter

rendering, no doubt, we have at Rev. xv. 3, the phrase,

Mwu*sh?j o[ dou?loj tou? qeou?. It will not follow that there

is no difference between dou?loj and qera

; nor yet that

there may not be occasions when the one word would be

far more fitly employed than the other; but only that

there are frequent occasions which do not require the

bringing out into prominence of that which constitutes

the difference between them. And such real difference

there is. The dou?loj, opposed to e]leu (1 Cor. xii. 13;

Rev. xiii. 16; xix. 18; Plato, Gorg. 502 d), having despo

(Tit. ii. 9), or in the N. T. more commonly ku (Luke

xii. 46), as its antithesis, is properly the ‘bond-man,’ from

de, ‘ligo,’ one that is in a permanent relation of servitude

to another, his will altogether swallowed up in the will of

the other; Xenophon (Cyrop. viii. 1. 4): oi[ me>n dou?loi

a@kontej toi?j despo. He is this, altogether

apart from any ministration to that other at any one

moment rendered; the qera
, on the other hand, is the

§ IX. SYNONYMS OF THE NEW TESTAMENT. 31

performer of present services, with no respect to the fact

whether as a freeman or slave he renders them; as

bound by duty, or impelled by love; and thus, as will neces-

sarily follow, there goes habitually with, the word the sense

of one whose services are tenderer, nobler, freer than those

of the dou?loj. Thus Achilles styles Patroclus his qera

,

(Homer, Il. xvi. 2,4), one whose service was not con-

strained, but the officious ministration of love; very much

like that of the squire or page of the Middle Ages.

Meriones is qera
to Idomeneus (xxiii. 113), Sthenelus

to Diomed, while all the Greeks are qera

(ii. 110 and often; cf. Nagelsbach, Homer. Theologie, p.

280). Hesiod in like manner claims to be Mousa

qera
: not otherwise in Plato (Symp. 203 c) Eros is

styled the a]ko qera

of Aphrodite; cf. Pin-

dar, Pyth. iv. 287, where the qera

is contrasted with

the dra. With all which agrees the of Hesy-

chius (oi[ e]n deute), of Amnionius (oi[ u[po-

tetagme), and of Eustathius (tw?n fi

kw). In the verb qreapeu (=’curare’), as distin-

guished from douleu, and connected with ‘faveo,’ ‘foveo;’

qa, the nobler and tenderer character of the service

comes still more strongly out. It may be used of the

physician's watchful tendance of the sick, man's service

of God, and is beautifully applied by Xenophon (Mem. iv.

3. 9) to the care which the gods have of men.

It will follow that the author of the Epistle to the

Hebrews, calling Moses a qera
in the house of God

(iii. 5), implies that he occupied a more confidential posi-

tion, that a freer service, a higher dignity was his, than

that merely of a dou?loj, approaching more closely to that

of an oi]kono in God's house; and, referring Num. xii.

6-8, we find, confirming this view, that a exceptional

dignity is there ascribed to Moses, lifting hire above other

dou?loi, of God; ‘egregins domesticus fidei tuae' Augustine

(Conf. xii. 23) calls him; cf. Deut. xxiv. 5, where he is

32 SYNONYMS OF THE NEW TESTAMENT. § IX.
oi]ke. In agreement with this we find the title

qera
given to Moses (Wisd. x. 16), but to no

other of the worthies of the old Covenant mentioned in

the chapter; to Aaron indeed at xviii. 21. It would have

been well if our Translators had seen some way to indicate

the exceptional and more honourable title here given to

him who "was faithful in all God's house." The Vulgate,

which has ‘famulae,’ has at least made the attempt (so

Cicero, ‘famulae Idaeae matris’); Tyndal, too, and Cranmer,

who have ‘minister,’ perhaps as adequate a word as the

language affords.

Neither ought the distinction between dia and

dou?loj to be suffered to escape in an English Version of

the N. T. There is no difficulty in preserving it. Dia,

not from dia< and ko, one who in his haste runs through

the dust—a mere fanciful derivation, and forbidden by the

quantity of the antepenultima in diakonoj—is probably

from the same root as has given us diw, ‘to hasten

after,’ or ‘pursue,’ and thus indeed means ‘a runner’ still

(so Buttmann, Lexil. 2/9; but see Doderlein, Lat. Syn.

vol. v. p. 135). The difference between dia on one

side, and dou?loj, and qera
on the other, is this—that

dia represents the servant in his activity for the work

(diakonei?n ti Eph. iii. 7; dia, Col. i. 23:

2 Cor. iii. 6); not in his relation, either servile, as that of the

dou?loj, or more voluntary, as in the case of the qera
,

to a person. The attendants at a feast, and this with no

respect to their condition as free or servile, are dia

(John ii. 5; Matt. xxii. 13; cf. John xii. 2). The import-

ance of preserving the distinction between dou?loj, and

dia may be illustrated from the parable of the Mar-

riage Supper (Matt. xxii. 2-14). In our Version the

king's "servants" bring in the invited guests (ver. 3, 4, 8,

10), and his "servants" are bidden to cast out that guest

who was without a wedding garment (ver. 13); but in the

Greek, those, the bringers-in of the guests, are dou?loi:

§ ix. SYNONYMS OF THE NEW TESTAMENT. 33
these, the fulfillers of the king's sentence, are dia

this distinction being a most real one, and belonging to

the essentials of the parable; the dou?loi being men, the

ambassadors of Christ, who invite their fellow-men into

his kingdom now, the dia angels, who in all the judg-

ment acts at the end of the world evermore appear as the

executors of the Lord's will. The parable, it is true, does

not turn on this distinction, yet these ought not any more

to be confounded than the dou?loi and qeristai<, of Matt.

xiii. 27, 30; cf. Luke xix. 24.

Oi]ke is often used as equivalent to dou?loj. It cer-

tainly is so at 1 Pet. ii. 18; and hardly otherwise on the

three remaining occasions on which it occurs in the N. T.

(Luke xvi. 13; Acts x. 7; Rom. xiv. 4); nor does the

Septuagint (Exod. xxi. 27; Deut. vi. 21; Prov. xvii. 2)

appear to recognize any distinction between them; the

Apocrypha as little (Eccles. x. 25). At the same time

oi]ke (=’domesticus’) does not bring out and emphasize

the servile relation so strongly as dou?loj does; rather con-

templates that relation from a point of view calculated to

mitigate, and whit actually did tend very much to miti-

gate, its extremes verity. He is one of the household, of

the 'family,' in the older sense of this word; not indeed

necessarily one born in the house; oi]kogenhis the word

for this in the Septuagint (Gen. xiv. 14; Eccles. ii. 7);

‘verna,’ identical with the Gothic ‘bairn,’ in the Latin;

compare ‘criado’ in the Spanish; but one, as I have said,

of the family; oi]ken o[ kata> th>n oi]ki

e]leu (Athenaeus, vi. 93); the word being used

in the best times of the language with so wide a reach as

to include wife and children; so in Herodotus (viii. 106,

and often); while in Sophocles (Trach. 894) by the oi]ke

the children of Deianira, can alone be intended. On the

different names given to slaves and servants of various

classes and degrees see Athenmus, as quoted above.

[Uphre, which only remains to be considered, is a

34 SYNONYMS OF THE NEW TESTAMENT. § x.

word drawn from military matters; he was originally the

rower (from e]re, ‘remigo’), as distinguished from the

soldier, on board a war-galley; then the performer of any

strong and hard labour; then the subordinate official who

waited to accomplish the behests of his superior, as the

orderly who attends a commander in war (Xenophon,

Cyrop. vi. 2, 13); the herald who carries solemn messages

(Euripides, Hec. 503). Thus Prometheus, as I cannot

doubt, intends a taunt when he characterizes Hermes as

qew?n u[phre (AEschylus, Prom. Vinct. 99o), one who runs

the errands of the other gods. In this sense, as an in-

ferior minister to perform certain defined functions for

Paul and Barnabas, Mark was their u[phre (Acts xiii. 5);

and in this official sense of lictor, apparitor, and the like,

we find the word constantly, indeed predominantly used

in the N. T. (Matt. v. 25; Luke iv. 20; John vii. 32;

xviii. 18; Acts v. 22). The mention by St. John of dou?loi

and u[phre together (xviii. 18) is alone sufficient to indi-

cate that a difference is by him observed between them;

from which difference it will follow that he who struck the

Lord on the face (John xviii. 22) could not be, as some

suggest, the same whose ear the Lord had just healed

(Luke xxii. 51), seeing that this was a dou?loj, that profane

and petulant striker a u[phre, of the High Priest. The

meanings of dia and u[phre are much more nearly

allied; they do in fact continually run into one another,

and there are innumerable occasions on which the words

might be indifferently used; the more official character

and functions of the u[phre is the point in which the

distinction between them resides. See Vitringa, De Syno-

yoga Vetere, pp. 916-919, and the Dictionary of the Bible, art.

Minister.