StrongerBible

eleutheros

ἐλεύθερος

GreekG1658“free, free woman, ...”

Appears 23 times · tap a cell to see the verses

Mat 17:26Jhn 8:33Jhn 8:36Rom 6:20Rom 7:31Co 7:211Co 7:221Co 7:391Co 9:11Co 9:191Co 12:13Gal 3:28Gal 4:22Gal 4:23Gal 4:26Gal 4:30Gal 4:31Eph 6:8Col 3:111Pe 2:16Rev 6:15Rev 13:16Rev 19:18
Root family
Names & words formed with this
Word studyeh-LEU-theh-rosadjective

What eleutheros means

free: belonging to no master and bound by no claim, whether in legal standing (not a slave) or in relation to a law, tie, or power

TranslatabilityApproximateCertaintySettled

In the world of the New Testament, being free was first of all a social fact. A person was either free or a slave, and everyone knew which. So the word usually appears paired with its opposite, slave or free, over and over, as a way of naming every kind of person without exception.

The New Testament then stretches that everyday word. It can narrow to a single tie a person is released from: a son exempt from a tax, a widow free to remarry, a teacher who owes no one. Paul even builds a whole picture on it, casting Sarah as the free woman and Hagar as the slave, so that being free stands for the promise while slavery stands for bondage.

Deepest of all is the freedom that has nothing to do with legal status. A person can be legally free and still enslaved to sin, or legally a slave and yet truly free in Christ. When the Son sets someone free, they are free indeed, and that is a freedom no earthly master can grant or take away.

Nuances

1aa person who is not a slave: free by birth or by release, the legal and social opposite of a bondservant
1Co 7:211Co 7:221Co 12:13Gal 3:28Eph 6:8Col 3:11Rev 6:15Rev 13:16Rev 19:18
1bthe freeborn woman in Paul's picture of Sarah and Hagar, and the free Jerusalem above: being free as the mark of the promise rather than of bondage
Gal 4:22Gal 4:23Gal 4:26Gal 4:30Gal 4:31
1creleased from a specific tie or obligation: exempt from a duty, or no longer bound by a law or a marriage
Mat 17:26Rom 7:31Co 7:391Co 9:11Co 9:19
1dfree in the deeper sense: set loose from sin's mastery, or standing outside a claim in the moral realm
Jhn 8:33Jhn 8:36Rom 6:201Pe 2:16

What scholars say about eleutheros

In classical and Hellenistic Greek ἐλεύθερος denotes the free person as opposed to the slave (δοῦλος), a fundamental social and legal category; LSJ and BDAG document both this status sense and the extended sense of being free from something (construed with ἀπό or a genitive). The New Testament inherits the category and develops it theologically. Schlier's TDNT article traces the movement from the Greek civic ideal of freedom to the Pauline claim that true freedom is deliverance from sin, law, and death, realized in Christ and expressed in service to God rather than in autonomy. In Galatians 4:21-31 Paul reads the free woman (Sarah) and the slave woman (Hagar) allegorically as two covenants, so that ἐλευθέρα marks the covenant of promise. The Johannine material (John 8:31-36) sets mere legal freedom against the deeper bondage of sin, from which only the Son liberates.

Sources

  • BDAG, s.v. ἐλεύθεροςlexicon
  • LSJ, s.v. ἐλεύθεροςlexicon
  • H. Schlier, 'ἐλεύθερος, ἐλευθερόω, ἐλευθερία, ἀπελεύθερος', TDNT 2:487-502theological-dictionary

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

All attested forms of ἐλεύθερος

nominative m s

ἐλεύθερος, Ἐλεύθερος

1Co 7:21, 1Co 7:22, 1Co 9:1, Gal 3:28, Eph 6:8, Col 3:11, Rev 6:15, 1Co 9:19

nominative m p

ἐλεύθεροι, ἐλεύθεροί

Jhn 8:33, Jhn 8:36, Rom 6:20, 1Co 12:13, 1Pe 2:16, Mat 17:26

genitive f s

ἐλευθέρας

Gal 4:22, Gal 4:23, Gal 4:30, Gal 4:31

nominative f s

ἐλευθέρα

Rom 7:3, 1Co 7:39, Gal 4:26

accusative m p

ἐλευθέρους

Rev 13:16

genitive m p

ἐλευθέρων

Rev 19:18