StrongerBible

thlibō

θλίβω

GreekG2346“afflict, hard pressed, ...”

Appears 10 times · tap a cell to see the verses

Mat 7:14Mrk 3:92Co 1:62Co 4:82Co 7:51Th 3:42Th 1:62Th 1:71Ti 5:10Heb 11:37
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What thlibō means

1

to press physically: to squeeze or crowd something so that it is pinched tight

TranslatabilityDirectCertaintySettled

Underneath every use of this word is the feel of something bearing down. Greek writers reached for it when armor chafed a soldier, when a beggar rubbed his shoulders past a doorway, and for the spot where a shoe pinches. Two places in the New Testament keep that plain bodily sense.

In Mark the crowd around Jesus grows so thick that the disciples keep a boat ready so he will not be squeezed by the press of people. In Matthew it is not a person but a road: the way that leads to life has been pinched narrow, and the sentence sets this word beside another one meaning "narrow" (στενός) so that the gate and the road reinforce each other.

Greek could sharpen the picture by building on this verb. One such word describes a crowd squeezing in from every side (συνθλίβω); another describes the hard shoving Peter complains about when Jesus asks who touched him (ἀποθλίβω). This is the plain word they are built on, and this physical picture is what the rest of the New Testament borrows when it speaks about suffering.

Nuances

1ato crowd and crush a person: to press in on someone with the sheer weight of bodies
Mrk 3:9
1bto be squeezed narrow: of a road or space pinched in from both sides so that passage is tight
TranslatabilityApproximate
Mat 7:14
2

to afflict: to bear down on someone with hardship, trouble, or persecution, like a weight pressing from outside

TranslatabilityPartialCertaintyStrong

The Greek Old Testament used this word again and again for Israel hemmed in by enemies, in Egypt and later in exile, and it carried the weight of that story into the New Testament. So when these writers say a believer is afflicted, they are not describing a mood. They are describing pressure applied from outside: the squeeze of hostility, poverty, danger, or grief.

Paul uses the word more than anyone else, and always to overturn the assumption that pressure means God is displeased.

  • Being pressed is the appointed lot of anyone who follows Christ, foretold so that it would not come as a shock.
  • The pressure works for other people, since what the apostle suffers turns into their comfort and their endurance.
  • The pressure is real but bounded: hard on every side, yet never sealed off with no way to turn.
  • The pressure will be answered, since God repays those who bear down on his people and gives relief to the ones bearing it.

The range runs from state violence to a widow's empty cupboard. Sometimes the word names outright persecution, sometimes ordinary hardship, and in one sentence it names both at once, describing what one group of people does to another and what the others are going through because of it. The suffering itself has its own noun in Greek (θλῖψις), while this word keeps the reader's eye on the pressing.

Nuances

2ato be hard pressed: to be under trouble that squeezes from every side, whether from conflict outside or worry within
2Co 1:62Co 4:82Co 7:5
2Co 4:8

How sharply to distinguish this verb from the word Paul contrasts it with in 2 Corinthians 4:8, and which of the two is the stronger term.

  • contestedThe two words describe the same trouble under different pictures, pressure against narrowness of room, with the cornered word the stronger of the pair; later interpreters sharpened this into pressure from outside against the inner anguish it produces.; R. C. Trench, Synonyms of the New Testament, §lv
  • contestedThis verb is simply the broader, more general term of the pair, which is why it leads the list; drawing a technical line between two near-synonyms reads precision into what is rhetorical pairing.; Murray J. Harris, The Second Epistle to the Corinthians, NIGTC, on 2 Corinthians 4:8
2bto be persecuted: to be afflicted by hostile people because of faith in Christ
TranslatabilityApproximate
1Th 3:42Th 1:7Heb 11:37
2cto afflict someone: to be the one bearing down on another with hard treatment
2Th 1:6
2dto be in hardship: of people whose circumstances press on them and who need practical help
1Ti 5:10

What scholars say about thlibō

LSJ roots θλίβω in physical pressure ("press, squeeze, pinch"), illustrating it from chafing armor (Aristophanes, Peace 1239), the shoulders of a beggar (Odyssey 17.221), and the proverbial pinching shoe in Plutarch; a second sense covers compression (Plato, Timaeus 60c, 91a), and only a third, later group of citations gives the metaphorical "oppress, afflict." Beekes marks the etymology unknown and reports the older proposal of a blend of θλάω with φλίβω. Thayer records the noun θλῖψις as a technical term for pressure in Strabo and Galen, treating the inward sense as a development of biblical and ecclesiastical Greek; Moulton and Milligan, however, assemble documentary papyri in which the verb is already figurative (P Petr II.4(1).7; P Par 26.22; P Oxy VI.898.33; P Ryl II.116.9, of a woman oppressed by conscience; P Oxy I.123.8), while noting that the metaphorical sense of θλῖψις "is generally thought to be confined to Bibl. and eccles. Greek." In the Septuagint θλίβω and θλῖψις render forms of צרר, צר, צרה and לחץ, so the Hebrew spatial metaphor of constriction passes directly into Greek; Schlier (TDNT 3:139-148) argues that the resulting vocabulary carries Israel's distress in Egypt and exile and, in Paul, an eschatological and christological charge. On Matthew 7:14 Davies and Allison (ICC) read τεθλιμμένη as a confined road and therefore a source of difficulty, with persecution as an overtone, and note the source-critical question of whether the clause is a Matthean expansion. On 2 Corinthians 4:8 Trench (Synonyms of the New Testament §lv) treats θλῖψις and στενοχωρία as the same trouble under different images and judges στενοχωρία the stronger, a contrast later sharpened into outward pressure versus inner anguish, whereas Harris (NIGTC) reads θλίβω as the more general term heading the list and cautions against over-precise distinctions between near-synonyms used rhetorically. Frame (ICC) on 1 Thessalonians 3:3-4 stresses that affliction is the appointed lot of Christians rather than an accident.

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

  • LSJ (Liddell-Scott-Jones), A Greek-English Lexicon, s.v. θλίβωlexicon
  • BDAG, A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature, s.v. θλίβωlexicon
  • Robert Beekes, Etymological Dictionary of Greek, s.v. θλίβωlexicon
  • Thayer's Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament, s.v. θλίβω, θλῖψιςlexicon
  • G. Abbott-Smith, A Manual Greek Lexicon of the New Testament, s.v. θλίβω, θλῖψιςlexicon
  • J. H. Moulton and G. Milligan, The Vocabulary of the Greek Testament, s.v. θλίβω, θλῖψιςlexicon
  • Heinrich Schlier, "θλίβω, θλῖψις," in Theological Dictionary of the New Testament, ed. Gerhard Kittel, 3:139-148theological-dictionary
  • R. C. Trench, Synonyms of the New Testament, §lvmonograph
  • Murray J. Harris, The Second Epistle to the Corinthians, NIGTC, on 2 Corinthians 4:8commentary
  • W. D. Davies and Dale C. Allison, The Gospel According to Saint Matthew, ICC, on Matthew 7:13-14commentary
  • J. E. Frame, A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the Epistles of St. Paul to the Thessalonians, ICC, on 1 Thessalonians 3:3-4commentary

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

All attested forms of θλίβω

present passive participle nominative m p

θλιβόμενοι

2Co 4:8, 2Co 7:5, Heb 11:37

present passive participle dative m p

θλιβομένοις

2Th 1:7, 1Ti 5:10

perfect passive participle nominative f s

τεθλιμμένη

Mat 7:14

present active participle dative m p

θλίβουσιν

2Th 1:6

present active subjunctive 3p

θλίβωσιν

Mrk 3:9

present passive indicative 1p

θλιβόμεθα

2Co 1:6

present passive infinitive

θλίβεσθαι

1Th 3:4