above, upward: the higher position or direction, and so the world overhead where God is
TranslatabilityApproximateCertaintySettled
Greek had a small set of everyday direction words, and this is the plain one for "up" or "above." It can mark how far something reaches (the water jars at Cana were filled up to the top), the direction of a movement (Jesus raising his eyes, a root pushing up through the soil), or simply the region overhead, as when Peter quotes the promise of wonders in the sky above and signs on the earth below.
The New Testament writers then put that ordinary word to a striking use. Because God is pictured as being above, "the above" becomes a name for God's own world: Jesus says he is from above while his opponents are from below, Paul writes of the Jerusalem that is above, and Colossians tells believers to seek and to set their minds on the things above. Nothing in the word itself carries that theology. Context supplies it, and the word keeps its plain, everyday feel while doing the work.
Three relatives divide the same ground:
ἄνωθεν covers motion or origin from above, and can also mean "from the start" or "again"
ἐπάνω means above or on top of some named thing, so it needs an object to sit over
κάτω is the opposite, "below," and the two are set side by side to sketch the whole world in a single breath
Nuances
1aup, upward: the direction something moves or the height it reaches
Jhn 2:7Jhn 11:41Heb 12:15
1babove, overhead: the sky as the upper level of the world, named alongside the earth below
Act 2:19Rev 5:3
1cabove as God's own realm: the place things and people can come from, belong to, and be aimed at
Names a place or position that is up high, the region above, without saying anything about where something comes from. It answers where, not from where.Col 3:1Gal 4:26Act 2:19
Marks direction of movement toward a higher point: raising the eyes upward, filling a jar up to the top, pressing on toward a goal that lies ahead and above.Jhn 11:41Jhn 2:7Php 3:14
Both
Both point heavenward and can describe the realm of God set over against the earthly realm below, so each can name the higher, divine sphere.Jhn 8:23Jas 3:17
Names a source or starting point, the origin something proceeds from. With heaven as that source it means coming down from God, the mark of true wisdom and rightful authority.Jas 1:17Jhn 3:31Jhn 19:11
Points to a physical starting edge, the top from which something tears or is woven all the way down.Mat 27:51Jhn 19:23
Extends to time and repetition: from the very beginning, or over again from the start, a sense the plain location word never carries.Luk 1:3Act 26:5Jhn 3:3
ἐπάνωabove or on top of some named thing, so it always has an object under it; this word stands alone and needs none
It points upward on its own, without naming anything for the higher thing to sit on. It can mark how far up a container is filled, the lifting of the eyes, or a plant pushing up from the ground.Jhn 2:7Jhn 11:41Heb 12:15
It names the upper world as a whole place, the realm a person can come from, belong to, or aim at, rather than a spot above some particular object.Jhn 8:23Gal 4:26Col 3:1Col 3:2Php 3:14
Both
Both mark the upper half of a two-level picture of reality, the heavenly side set against the earthly one below.Act 2:19Rev 5:3Jhn 3:31
It sets one thing physically on top of, or hovering directly over, a named thing: a star over a house, a rider on cloaks, a charge over a head, an angel on the stone, feet walking over unmarked graves.Mat 2:9Mat 21:7Mat 27:37Mat 28:2Luk 11:44
It marks authority held over people, creatures, or territory, where the higher position is rank rather than height.Luk 10:19Luk 19:17Luk 19:19Rev 6:8
Put in front of a number, it simply means "more than" that amount, with no sense of height at all.Mrk 14:51Co 15:6
κάτωthe opposite direction, below or downward; the two are paired in one sentence to describe the whole world at once
Names a whole world above as somewhere to belong and to aim at. Paul calls the free city "the Jerusalem above", tells readers to seek and to think about "the things above", and speaks of God's "upward call". The matching word for "below" is never used this way, because the lower place is never held out as something to reach for.Gal 4:26Col 3:1Col 3:2Php 3:14
In ordinary scenes it marks a rise or a reach: water filled to the top of the stone jars, eyes lifted before a prayer, a bitter root pushing up into view. The motion it describes always goes away from the ground.Jhn 2:7Jhn 11:41Heb 12:15
Used of the sky as the upper story of creation, the place searched when no one anywhere can be found to open the scroll.Rev 5:3
Both
Both are plain place words for the two halves of the visible world, and they are set side by side so that each one defines the other: wonders in the sky above and signs on the earth beneath.Act 2:19
Both can say where a person comes from rather than where they are standing, so that belonging rather than height is the point: Jesus says he is from the world above while his hearers are from the world beneath.Jhn 8:23
Carries the sense of something dropping or being driven downward: an invitation to throw yourself off the temple, a young man falling from a third story window, the temple curtain splitting from its top all the way down.Mat 4:6Luk 4:9Act 20:9Mat 27:51Mrk 15:38
Also fixes where a person already is, low and close to the ground: Jesus bending down twice to write in the dust, Peter waiting in the courtyard while the questioning went on above him.Jhn 8:6Jhn 8:8Mrk 14:66
anō in the other biblical languages
מַעַלHebrew“above”the everyday Hebrew word for what is above or upward, usually attached to a preposition ("from above," "upward"), where the Greek word can stand bare
Names a whole realm a person can come from and belong to, not just a spot overhead: Jesus says he is "from above" while his hearers are "from below", and the free "Jerusalem above" is the mother of believers.Jhn 8:23Gal 4:26
Sets the direction of a whole life: readers are told to seek and to think about "the things above", and Paul runs toward the "upward" call of God.Col 3:1Col 3:2Php 3:14
Both
Both hold up one half of the standard way of naming the whole world, the sky "above" set against the earth "beneath". Peter's quotation of Joel keeps that Hebrew split intact in Greek.Exo 20:4Deu 4:39Jos 2:11Act 2:19Rev 5:3
Both do plain physical direction, whether water rising, a level reaching the top, or eyes turned up.Gen 7:20Ecc 3:21Jhn 2:7Jhn 11:41
Both describe growth pushing up out of the ground, a root that bears fruit upward and a bitter root springing up.Isa 37:31Heb 12:15
Does counting work that the Greek word never does, marking the open end of a range: "from twenty years old and upward", "from thirty years old and upward", "from sixty years old and above".Num 1:3Num 4:3Lev 27:7Ezr 3:8
Runs forward in time as well as up in space: "from that day forward", "from this day onward".1Sa 16:131Sa 30:25Hag 2:15Hag 2:18
Turns into a word for degree, "exceedingly" or "beyond measure", when the writer says a king or a building was great past the usual limit.1Ch 22:51Ch 29:252Ch 1:12Ch 17:12
Measures rank and dominance: Israel will be "above only" and never underneath, the foreigner rises higher and higher over her, a proud king plans a throne above the stars, an exiled king gets a seat above the other kings.Deu 28:13Deu 28:43Isa 14:13Jer 52:32
Names what sits on top of something else, which makes it the ordinary word for describing how a structure or a vision is stacked: wood on the altar, wings spread over the cover, seraphim standing over the throne, a shining expanse over the creatures' heads.Gen 22:9Exo 25:20Isa 6:2Ezk 1:22
What scholars say about anō
The lexica treat ἄνω as a straightforward adverb of place and direction. BDAG distinguishes the directional use, "upward" (John 11:41;Hebrews 12:15), from the locative "above" (John 2:7 ἕως ἄνω; Acts 2:19;Revelation 5:3), and gathers under the locative heading the extended references to the heavenly sphere (John 8:23 ἐκ τῶν ἄνω; Galatians 4:26 ἡ ἄνω Ἰερουσαλήμ; Colossians 3:1, 2 τὰ ἄνω; Philippians 3:14 ἡ ἄνω κλῆσις). LSJ documents the same range across classical usage, where ἄνω is the standard term for the upper world over against the world below, so the Johannine ἄνω/κάτω antithesis draws on ordinary spatial idiom rather than on a specialized vocabulary. The theological dictionaries accordingly spend little effort on the lexical sense, which is uncontested, and concentrate on the cosmology the Fourth Gospel, Galatians, and Colossians construct with the word, and on whether that vertical framework is best read against Hellenistic-Jewish apocalyptic expectation of a heavenly Jerusalem or against a more Platonizing two-level cosmos. In Philippians 3:14 the genitive phrase τῆς ἄνω κλήσεως is read either as a call issued from above or as a call directed upward; commentators generally note that the two readings converge on a heavenly referent.
Sources
BDAG, s.v. ἄνωlexicon
LSJ, s.v. ἄνωlexicon
EDNT, s.v. ἄνωtheological-dictionary
Peter T. O'Brien, The Epistle to the Philippians (NIGTC; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1991)commentary
James D. G. Dunn, The Epistles to the Colossians and to Philemon (NIGTC; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1996)commentary