to put something into the order that suits it, so that it also looks right: to arrange, adorn, or dress.
TranslatabilityPartialCertaintySettled
Greek did not split order and beauty the way English does. The noun behind this verb (κόσμος) means both the ordered universe and the finery a woman puts on, and the verb keeps the same double edge: to arrange something properly is, in the same breath, to make it look as it should. One word therefore covers young women trimming their lamps, a temple faced with costly stone, and a bride dressed for her wedding.
The range moves outward from the plain act of setting a thing right:
putting something into working order, as with the lamps in the parable
fitting out a building with fine materials, as with the temple's costly stones
dressing a person, so that the clothing matches the one wearing it
doing credit to something you cannot see, as when honest work makes a teaching attractive
That last step is the surprising one. In Titus the thing being adorned is a teaching: household servants who do not pilfer and can be trusted are said to put the message about God their Savior in good order, so that it looks worth having. The move is not a stretch in Greek, since anything at all can be brought into the shape that suits it. It also explains why the word itself is neutral about ornament. Where 1 Timothy and 1 Peter speak of how women should be adorned, they use this very verb to steer the instinct rather than to forbid it: the question is what a person is adorned with, not whether.
Nuances
1ato get a thing into working order: to tidy or set it up so it is ready to be used.
Mat 12:44*Mat 25:7Luk 11:25*
1bto adorn an object: to make a building or a thing beautiful by the fine materials put on it.
TranslatabilityDirect
Mat 23:29Luk 21:5Rev 21:19
1cto dress or deck out a person, so that what is worn suits the one wearing it.
1Ti 2:91Pe 3:5Rev 21:2*
1dto do credit to something you cannot see or touch, making a teaching look as good as it is.
the Greek verb also covers plain tidying and preparing, so it is used of a house swept out and of lamps made ready, where English would never reach for "adorn".Mat 12:44Mat 25:7
the Greek verb can take something you cannot see as its object, so a way of living is said to adorn a teaching.Tit 2:10
Both
both describe making something more beautiful by what is added to it.Luk 21:5Rev 21:19
Only adorn
in current English "adorn" is a formal, decorative word, suggesting jewelry or trimming added to something already finished, with no hint of putting a thing into working order.
the Greek word carries beauty along with order, so the same verb describes a city wall faced with precious stones.Rev 21:19Luk 21:5
Both
both describe bringing something into the condition it ought to be in before it is used.Mat 25:7Mat 12:44
Only put in order
the English phrase is purely practical, suggesting furniture straightened or papers filed, and says nothing at all about how the result looks.
“decorate”
Comparison data is not available for this English gloss yet.
“trim”
Comparison data is not available for this English gloss yet.
“garnish”
Comparison data is not available for this English gloss yet.
“do credit to”
Comparison data is not available for this English gloss yet.
How kosmeō differs from similar Greek words
κόσμοςthe noun of the same family: the ordered whole itself, the universe or the world of people, and now and then the finery someone wears. It names the order; this verb is the act of bringing something into it.
Names an act that somebody performs, so the verse can say who did the arranging and what got worked on: the young women trimmed their lamps, the builders faced the temple with fine stone and gifts, the religious leaders decorated the tombs of the prophets.Mat 25:7Luk 21:5Mat 23:29
Covers plain tidying with no beauty in view at all: a house found swept and set in order, ready to be lived in again.Mat 12:44Luk 11:25
Reaches past objects to something you cannot see or touch: slaves who serve honestly are said to make the teaching about God look as good as it is.Tit 2:10
Both
Both are used of outward adornment, what is put on a person to make her look right. Peter names the jewelry, braided hair, and fine clothing with the noun, then in the next breath uses the verb for how the holy women of old dressed themselves.1Pe 3:51Ti 2:91Pe 3:3
Names the whole created universe as one made thing, founded by God and held by him, a total that existed before anyone was born into it.Act 17:24Jhn 17:5Rom 1:20
Names the human race, everybody alive, as the object of God's love and the audience of the gospel.Jhn 3:16Mrk 16:15Rom 3:19
Carries a moral charge that no act of arranging could carry: human life organized against God, something that can be loved, hated, judged, and overcome.1Jn 2:15Jhn 15:19Jhn 16:33
Works as a fixed marker of scope in time: things settled before the founding of it, and people who come into it at birth.Eph 1:4Mat 25:34Jhn 16:21
κόσμιοςthe matching adjective, describing a person or a manner as orderly and fitting. It names the settled quality, where this verb names the act that produces it.
Names an action someone performs: putting back in order what was in disarray, as with a house swept and set right, or lamps trimmed and made ready for the wedding party.Mat 12:44Luk 11:25Mat 25:7
Takes buildings and objects as its object, so it covers decorating a structure until it looks splendid: the temple faced with fine stones and gifts, tombs done up in honor of the prophets, city foundations set with precious stones.Luk 21:5Mat 23:29Rev 21:19
Stretches to things that cannot be dressed at all: a servant's honest life is said to make the teaching about God attractive, rendered "adorn the doctrine", and a bride is made ready for her husband as the picture of a whole city.Tit 2:10Rev 21:2
Both
The two are used side by side in the same instruction about how women should present themselves at prayer, the verb calling for the act of dressing and the adjective naming the orderly, fitting quality the clothing must have.1Ti 2:9
Both are applied to people whose visible life should look well ordered and be worth respect, not only to objects: the holy women of old who made themselves beautiful by hoping in God, and the overseer whose bearing must be orderly.1Pe 3:51Ti 3:2
Describes a settled quality a person already has rather than anything a person does, so it can stand in a list of character requirements for a church leader beside self controlled and hospitable, rendered "respectable" or "of good behaviour".1Ti 3:2
ἑτοιμάζωto make ready, to prepare something for what is coming. It is only about being fit for use and says nothing about how the result looks, which is what this verb adds. The two stand side by side in Revelation 21:2.
Beautifying something with costly material so that it draws the eye, which is about how the thing looks and not whether it works.Mat 23:29Luk 21:5Rev 21:19
How a person dresses and presents herself, where the New Testament turns the word into a question of what kind of beauty is worth having.1Ti 2:91Pe 3:5
Making a truth look attractive and believable by the way one lives, a use with no counterpart in language about getting ready.Tit 2:10
Both
Both are used of putting a dwelling into the state its occupant requires before he arrives.Mrk 14:15Luk 22:12Mat 12:44Luk 11:25
Both describe bringing something to the condition a great occasion calls for, and they stand side by side of the same city, which is at once made ready and dressed like a bride.Rev 21:2
Clearing the road ahead of someone who is coming, where the point is access rather than appearance.Mat 3:3Mrk 1:3Luk 1:76
God getting a place or a destiny ready long in advance, so that it stands waiting for the people it was made for.Mat 25:34Mat 25:411Co 2:9Heb 11:16Jhn 14:2
Everyday practical arrangements: getting a meal, spices, lodging, or an armed escort ready for use at a set time.Mat 26:19Luk 17:8Luk 23:56Phm 1:22Act 23:23
τάσσωto place or appoint someone into an assigned position or rank. It orders people and things by putting them where they belong, with no thought of making them beautiful.
The ordering is meant to be looked at: what comes out of it is something that appears beautiful, finished, or fitting to the eye.Luk 21:5Rev 21:19Rev 21:2
It covers how people dress and present themselves, where the arranging is personal adornment and the question is what kind of beauty a believer should aim at.1Ti 2:91Pe 3:5
It stretches from things to ideas: a life can make a teaching look attractive, the way good stonework makes a building look attractive.Tit 2:10
Both
Both name a deliberate putting in order, the opposite of leaving things as they happen to fall.Mat 12:44Rom 13:1
Both can describe getting something ready ahead of time so it is fit for the moment it is needed.Mat 25:7Act 28:23
The arranging puts a person at a place in a chain of command, with someone above them whose orders they take.Mat 8:9Luk 7:8Rom 13:1
It fixes a place, a time, or a course of action by a decision that others are then expected to keep.Mat 28:16Act 15:2
It is used of God assigning people to a destiny or a task, so that what happens to them was settled before they got there.Act 13:48Act 22:10
People can also assign themselves to a duty, taking up a post that nobody imposed on them.1Co 16:15
kosmeō in the other biblical languages
עָדָהHebrew“to adorn”the Hebrew verb for decking oneself out with ornaments, used of a bride putting on her jewels. It stays with personal adornment, where the Greek verb also reaches back to tidying and preparing.
Can mean simply putting a place in order with no ornament involved at all: a house standing swept and tidy, or lamps trimmed so they will burn properly.Mat 12:44Luk 11:25Mat 25:7
Regularly decorates buildings and objects rather than people: the temple set off with fine stones and gifts, tombs done up for the prophets, a city wall's foundations set with precious stones.Luk 21:5Mat 23:29Rev 21:19
Stretches to something you cannot decorate at all, so that an honest life makes a teaching look attractive to outsiders.Tit 2:10
Both
Both words describe a person putting on finery, and both reach for the picture of a bride dressed for her wedding. The Hebrew word has a bride decking herself with her jewels and a rescued girl fitted out with ornaments; the Greek word dresses the new Jerusalem as a bride ready for her husband and tells women how to present themselves.Isa 61:10Ezk 16:11Rev 21:21Ti 2:9
For both words the dressing up carries moral weight rather than being a matter of taste. The Hebrew word turns up where prophets condemn a woman who decks herself out to chase other lovers; the Greek word turns up where a letter redirects how women adorn themselves, tying it to modesty and good works.Hos 2:13Ezk 23:401Ti 2:9
Both can put something invisible on a person as if it were jewelry. God challenges Job to clothe himself with majesty and splendor, and Peter says the holy women of old adorned themselves by trusting God and yielding to their husbands.Job 40:101Pe 3:5
Pictures finery worn on the body, and the text usually names the items: gold jewelry, rings and bracelets, earrings, even tambourines for a festival.Ezk 16:11Jer 4:30Hos 2:13Jer 31:4
The same Hebrew spelling also does duty for moving past something and for stripping something off, uses with no link to finery: no lion has crossed a hidden path, and a foolish song is like pulling off someone's coat in the cold.Job 28:8Pro 25:20
It can mean plain tidying, with no beauty in view at all. A house is swept and put back in order (Matthew 12:44,Luke 11:25), and lamps are trimmed and made ready for use (Matthew 25:7). The Hebrew word never covers simple neatness like this.Mat 12:44Luk 11:25Mat 25:7
It can be aimed at something you cannot dress up at all. A servant's honest, trustworthy behavior is said to make the teaching of God look good (Titus 2:10), so that a way of life becomes the ornament rather than the thing wearing one.Tit 2:10
Both
Both describe a woman making herself striking with gold and fine clothes, and both sit in a setting that is wary of it. Jerusalem decks herself in gold for lovers who now want her dead (Jeremiah 4:30), and the New Testament letters point women away from gold, pearls and elaborate hair toward what is inward instead (1 Timothy 2:9,1 Peter 3:5).Jer 4:301Ti 2:91Pe 3:5
Both can be used of covering an object in costly material so that it looks splendid: an idol finished off with silver and gold (Jeremiah 10:4), the temple fitted out with fine stones and gifts (Luke 21:5), city foundations set with every kind of jewel (Revelation 21:19).Jer 10:4Luk 21:5Rev 21:19
In most of its verses it names beauty as something a person or thing simply has, with nobody doing anything to it: a king finer to look at than other men (Psalm 45:2), a towering cedar (Ezekiel 31:7), a girl who grew into a striking woman (Ezekiel 16:13). The Greek word never describes a quality someone possesses, only work done to something.Psa 45:2Ezk 31:7Ezk 16:13
It is a word of love poetry, spoken straight to the person being praised: how beautiful your love is (Song of Songs 4:10), how beautiful your feet are (Song of Songs 7:1), how lovely and how pleasant you are (Song of Songs 7:6).Sng 4:10Sng 7:1Sng 7:6
What scholars say about kosmeō
The lexicons treat κοσμέω as one verb with a graded range rather than as homonyms. BDAG divides it three ways: to put in order or make preparations (Matt 25:7), to cause something to have an attractive appearance through decoration (Luke 21:5;Rev 21:19), and figuratively to do credit to something (Titus 2:10). LSJ traces the same movement from the older Homeric use of marshalling troops into their ranks, through arranging and equipping, to adorning. Sasse's TDNT treatment of the κόσμος word group makes the unity explicit: the root idea is imposed order, and in Greek thought beauty is what ordered arrangement looks like, which is why the same family yields both "universe" and "ornament". On Titus 2:10 the Pastoral Epistles commentators (Marshall) read the abstract object as an extension of that idea, the trustworthy conduct of slaves putting the teaching about God in a favorable light before outsiders; the construction has close parallels in Hellenistic honorific inscriptions praising benefactors for adorning their city. Standard commentary on Revelation 21 (Aune) reads the adorning of the jeweled foundations and of the bride as one picture of the city's ordered splendor. The one verse-level question scholarship discusses is Matt 12:44 and Luke 11:25, where translators divide between "put in order" and "decorated"; BDAG places both under the ordering sense.
Sources
BDAG, s.v. κοσμέωlexicon
LSJ, s.v. κοσμέωlexicon
Hermann Sasse, "κοσμέω, κόσμος, κόσμιος, κοσμικός", TDNT 3:867-898theological-dictionary
Moisés Silva, ed., New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology and Exegesis, 2nd ed., s.v. κόσμοςtheological-dictionary
I. Howard Marshall, The Pastoral Epistles, ICC (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1999)commentary
David E. Aune, Revelation 17-22, WBC 52C (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 1998)commentary
John Nolland, Luke 18:35-24:53, WBC 35C (Dallas: Word, 1993)commentary