StrongerBible

euschēmosunē

εὐσχημοσύνη

GreekG2157modesty, comeliness, ...

Appears 1 time · tap a cell to see the verses

1Co 12:23
Root family
Word studyResearch-gradeyoo-skay-mo-SOO-naynoun

What euschēmosunē means

the presentable dignity a private part is given by being covered: seemliness, modest decorum

TranslatabilityPartialCertaintyStrong

This word appears only once in the New Testament, in Paul's picture of the church as a single body with many parts (1 Corinthians 12:23). He says the parts we treat as "less honorable" are the very ones we dress with the greater honor, and "our unpresentable parts" are given the greater seemliness. Nearly all scholars read this as tactful language for the private parts of the body: the honor they receive is precisely the dignity of being clothed and kept from view. The word names that conferred presentableness, not a modest attitude in the person.

Paul is building a play on words that English cannot copy. He pairs this noun with its opposite in the same breath: the "unpresentable" parts (ἀσχήμων) are the ones given extra "presentableness." The whole family of related words stretches between two ideas: on one end, graceful, fitting, decent appearance; on the other, the social standing of a well-regarded, prominent person. The adjective in this family (εὐσχήμων) can mean either "presentable" or "of high rank," and the adverb (εὐσχημόνως) means acting "decently" and in good order.

That double range is the point of the passage. Paul talks about the honor and shame of body parts while thinking about the honor and shame of people in the church. Just as the body gives its greatest care to the parts it hides, so God gives the greater honor to the members the community counts as weaker or less impressive, so that there would be no division in the body.

1Co 12:23

What scholars say about euschēmosunē

εὐσχημοσύνη is a New Testament hapax legomenon (1 Cor 12:23), so its meaning is reconstructed from cognates, the Septuagint and Jewish Greek, and classical usage. The lexica agree the family derives from σχῆμα ("form, outward appearance") but weight its nuances differently: LSJ and Thayer lead with the aesthetic sense ("gracefulness, comeliness, decorum"); Spicq's Theological Lexicon presses the social-respectability sense grounded in the papyri; and BDAG and Louw-Nida formally separate presentable appearance from high social standing, which attaches mainly to the adjective εὐσχήμων (Mark 15:43; Acts 13:50; 17:12). For the noun in 1 Cor 12:23 the consensus (Greeven in TDNT, Silva in NIDNTTE, and the major commentators) is the aesthetic/decorum sense: the seemliness conferred on τὰ ἀσχήμονα by covering them, read as a euphemism for the genitals and reinforced by the Septuagint, where the antonym ἀσχημοσύνη renders Hebrew עֶרְוָה ("nakedness") in Leviticus 18 and 20. The live scholarly debate concerns Paul's rhetoric rather than the dictionary meaning: Dale Martin (The Corinthian Body) argues Paul inverts the elite body-politic commonplace to reverse worldly honor in favor of the lowly, while Margaret Mitchell (Paul and the Rhetoric of Reconciliation) reads a more conventional appeal for unity and concord; most full-scale commentators (Thiselton, Fee, Garland, Fitzmyer) hold both together.

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

  • Liddell-Scott-Jones, A Greek-English Lexicon, s.v. εὐσχημοσύνηlexicon
  • BDAG, A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament, 3rd ed., pp. 414-415, s.v. εὐσχημοσύνη, εὐσχήμωνlexicon
  • J. H. Thayer, A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament, s.v. εὐσχημοσύνηlexicon
  • Louw and Nida, Greek-English Lexicon Based on Semantic Domains, domains 79 and 87lexicon
  • C. Spicq, Theological Lexicon of the New Testament, vol. 2, s.v. εὐσχήμωνtheological-dictionary
  • H. Greeven, "σχῆμα κτλ.," in Theological Dictionary of the New Testament, vol. 7theological-dictionary
  • M. Silva, ed., New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology and Exegesistheological-dictionary
  • Dale B. Martin, The Corinthian Body (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1995)monograph
  • Margaret M. Mitchell, Paul and the Rhetoric of Reconciliation (Tubingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1991)monograph
  • Anthony C. Thiselton, The First Epistle to the Corinthians (NIGTC)commentary
  • Gordon D. Fee, The First Epistle to the Corinthians (NICNT)commentary
  • David E. Garland, 1 Corinthians (BECNT)commentary

All attested forms of εὐσχημοσύνη

accusative f s

εὐσχημοσύνην

1Co 12:23