StrongerBible

aitia

αἰτία

GreekG0156“charge, cause, ...”

Appears 20 times · tap a cell to see the verses

Mat 19:3Mat 19:10Mat 27:37Mrk 15:26Luk 8:47Jhn 18:38Jhn 19:4Jhn 19:6Act 10:21Act 13:28Act 22:24Act 23:28Act 25:18Act 25:27Act 28:18Act 28:20
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Word studyResearch-gradeai-TEE-ahnoun

What aitia means

1

a charge: the stated ground on which someone is accused, found guilty, or condemned

TranslatabilityApproximateCertaintySettled

This is the courtroom face of the word. A charge is the specific wrongdoing laid to a person's account, the thing written down as the reason they are on trial or under sentence. The word can name:

  • the placard fixed above a condemned man that announces what he is dying for
  • the accusation an official lodges before a higher court
  • the recognized grounds a law allows for an action

The senses gathered here all answer one legal question: what is this person held responsible for? They differ only in the stage of the process:

  • One verse states the convicted ground that justifies punishment
  • another names an accusation still being weighed
  • another asks what acceptable basis a rule provides

In each case the charge is something that must be named, written, or proven, and it can be found wanting: the strongest theological use is the repeated verdict over Jesus that no such ground can be found in him.

The Gospel writers press this sense for irony. The notice nailed over Jesus reads as the Roman authorities' official reason for executing him, yet the same accounts show that no real ground of guilt was ever established.

Nuances

1athe ground of guilt or conviction: the stated reason a person is punished, including the charge written above the condemned
Mat 27:37Mrk 15:26Jhn 18:38Jhn 19:4Jhn 19:6Act 13:28Act 28:18
1ban accusation formally brought against someone and reported to a court
Act 23:28Act 25:18Act 25:27
1ca recognized ground that a law allows for an action, here for divorce
Mat 19:3Mat 19:10
2

a reason: the ground or cause that answers why something is so or is done

TranslatabilityDirectCertaintySettled

This is the everyday face of the word, with no hint of a courtroom. It names the reason behind an action or a state of affairs, the answer to the question why.

  • A woman explains the reason she touched Jesus
  • Peter asks the men at his door the reason they have come
  • Paul tells the believers in Rome the reason he is in chains

Most of these verses sit inside a single polished phrase that the more literary New Testament writers favor, best translated "for which reason" or "that is why". It links one statement to the next as its grounds, the way a careful writer connects a result back to its cause. The phrase is a mark of elevated style rather than added meaning: the sense it carries is simply "this is the reason".

What ties this meaning to the legal one is a shared idea of accounting for something. A charge accounts for why a person stands condemned; a reason accounts for why anything at all is the case. Greek used one word for both because both answer the same underlying question of what something is to be credited to.

Luk 8:47Act 10:21Act 22:24Act 28:202Ti 1:62Ti 1:12Tit 1:13Heb 2:11

What scholars say about aitia

BDAG groups the NT occurrences under two headings that match the distribution: (1) cause/reason (Matt 19:3; Acts 10:21; 22:24; 28:20; 2 Tim 1:6, 12; Titus 1:13; Heb 2:11), and (2) a basis for legal action, charge, ground for punishment (Matt 27:37; Mark 15:26; John 18:38; 19:4, 6; Acts 13:28; 23:28; 25:18, 27; 28:18). LSJ orders the classical entry with the forensic sense (responsibility, guilt, blame, accusation) first and cause second, and notes that the neuter αἴτιον substitutes for αἰτία only in the causal sense, never the accusatory one, which explains why Luke writes αἴτιον at Pilate's verdict (Luke 23:4, 14, 22) where John writes αἰτία (18:38; 19:4, 6). Louw-Nida distributes the lexeme across the domains of reason/cause (89.15), legal accusation (56.4-5), and guilt (88.315). The two senses are specializations of one concept of imputed responsibility, what is charged or credited to a person's account, as Frede (1980) and Natali (2013) argue for the philosophical history of the term and Aristotle's four causes. Brown (Death of the Messiah 2:962-68) shows that αἰτία in the titulus passages renders the Roman causa damnationis. Keener (BBR 22.2, 2012) reads the recurring no-charge formula across Luke-Acts as a deliberate apologetic for the political innocence of Jesus and Paul.

Where scholars disagree about aitia

Which sense the word carries in Matthew 19:10, where the disciples respond to Jesus' teaching on divorce. The choice affects whether the following saying about those who renounce marriage is about voluntary celibacy in general or about not remarrying after an illegitimate divorce.

  • majorityA general case, situation, or relationship of a man with his wife, treated as a Latinizing use found only here in the NT.; Davies & Allison, Matthew (ICC), 3:19; U. Luz, Matthew (Hermeneia), 2:499-500
  • minorityThe charge or ground at issue, resuming the legal-sounding ground-for-divorce question of 19:3, so the word stays within its well-attested charge sense.; R. Jarrett Van Tine, JBL 137.2 (2018): 399-418; David Instone-Brewer, Divorce and Remarriage in the Bible (2002), 110-32
In-depth research

This is a research paper, so it may be hard to read without scholarly background. It is useful if you want to dig even deeper into this word.

Sources

  • BDAG, 3rd ed. (2000), s.v. αἰτία, p. 31lexicon
  • LSJ, s.v. αἰτίαlexicon
  • Louw-Nida, Greek-English Lexicon of the NT Based on Semantic Domains, 89.15; 56.4-5; 88.315lexicon
  • Moulton-Milligan, The Vocabulary of the Greek Testament (1930), s.v. αἰτίαlexicon
  • Raymond E. Brown, The Death of the Messiah (1994), 2:962-68commentary
  • Craig S. Keener, "Paul and Sedition," Bulletin for Biblical Research 22.2 (2012)article
  • R. Jarrett Van Tine, "Castration for the Kingdom and Avoiding the αἰτία of Adultery (Matthew 19:10-12)," JBL 137.2 (2018): 399-418article
  • David Instone-Brewer, Divorce and Remarriage in the Bible (Eerdmans, 2002), 110-32monograph
  • Michael Frede, "The Original Notion of Cause," in Doubt and Dogmatism (1980)article

AI-generated word study · claude-opus-4-8

All attested forms of αἰτία

accusative f s

αἰτίαν

Mat 19:3, Mat 27:37, Luk 8:47, Jhn 18:38, Jhn 19:4, Jhn 19:6, Act 13:28, Act 22:24

nominative f s

αἰτία

Mat 19:10, Act 10:21

accusative f p

αἰτίας

Act 25:27

genitive f s

αἰτίας

Mrk 15:26