StrongerBible

odous

ὀδούς

GreekG3599“tooth”

Appears 12 times · tap a cell to see the verses

Mat 5:38 (2×)Mat 8:12Mat 13:42Mat 13:50Mat 22:13Mat 24:51Mat 25:30Mrk 9:18Luk 13:28Act 7:54Rev 9:8
Root family
Word studyoh-DOOSnoun

What odous means

tooth: one of the teeth in the mouth, whether of a person or of an animal

TranslatabilityDirectCertaintySettled

This word means "tooth" and nothing else. There is no second sense to untangle, no hidden theological freight in the noun itself. What is worth noticing is not the range of the word but where it turns up: of its twelve appearances in the New Testament, nine describe teeth being ground or clenched together.

Seven of those nine are a single fixed phrase, "weeping and grinding of teeth," which Jesus uses for people shut out of God's kingdom. It is a set expression, always the same words, and the teeth in it are not really the subject. They are the sound of a reaction, dropped in where a plainer writer might simply have said "misery."

The remaining appearances are ordinary and easy to picture:

  • a tooth counted as an injury under the old rule of "a tooth for a tooth"
  • a crowd baring its teeth at Stephen in open hatred as they close in on him
  • a boy's teeth grinding together while his body is seized by a fit
  • the teeth of the locust creatures in a vision, said to be like a lion's

The Hebrew word standing behind "a tooth for a tooth" (שֵׁן) covers rather more ground than the Greek does: besides the tooth in the mouth it can mean ivory, or a jutting crag of rock shaped like a tooth. The Greek stays with the tooth.

Nuances

1aa tooth spoken of plainly, as a part of a body
Mat 5:38 (2×)Rev 9:8
1bthe teeth in the repeated phrase "weeping and grinding of teeth," the reaction of those shut out of God's kingdom
Mat 8:12Mat 13:42Mat 13:50Mat 22:13Mat 24:51Mat 25:30Luk 13:28
1cteeth bared and ground at a particular person, the old gesture of open hatred
Act 7:54
1dteeth grinding together as a symptom of a body in a violent fit
Mrk 9:18

What scholars say about odous

The lexica are unanimous: ὀδούς is the common Greek noun for a tooth, and the New Testament shows no semantic development beyond that (BDAG; LSJ). Classical and Hellenistic Greek extend the word to tooth-shaped objects, the prong of a fork or the teeth of a saw, but no such extension occurs in the New Testament, where all twelve instances denote actual teeth. The distribution is dominated by the stereotyped formula ὁ κλαυθμὸς καὶ ὁ βρυγμὸς τῶν ὀδόντων (Matt 8:12; 13:42, 50; 22:13; 24:51; 25:30; Luke 13:28), a fixed eschatological tag rather than an independent use of the noun. Its Septuagintal background is the idiom of grinding the teeth in rage against the righteous (Ps 34:16 LXX; 36:12 LXX; Job 16:9; Lam 2:16), which suggests the formula combines grief with impotent fury rather than sorrow alone; commentators on Matthew 8:12 make this connection. Acts 7:54 preserves the hostile gesture directly, ἔβρυχον τοὺς ὀδόντας ἐπ᾽ αὐτόν, with the same verb and construction as the psalms. Mark 9:18 instead uses τρίζω in a near-clinical description of a seizure. Matthew 5:38 cites the talion rule of Exod 21:24, where the Greek noun renders Hebrew שֵׁן, a broader term that also covers ivory and a rocky crag (HALOT, s.v. שֵׁן).

Sources

  • BDAG, s.v. ὀδούςlexicon
  • LSJ, s.v. ὀδούςlexicon
  • HALOT, s.v. שֵׁןlexicon
  • W. D. Davies and Dale C. Allison, A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the Gospel According to Saint Matthew, ICC, on Matthew 8:12commentary
  • Joseph A. Fitzmyer, The Acts of the Apostles, Anchor Bible, on Acts 7:54commentary

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

All attested forms of ὀδούς

genitive m p

ὀδόντων

Mat 8:12, Mat 13:42, Mat 13:50, Mat 22:13, Mat 24:51, Mat 25:30, Luk 13:28

accusative m p

ὀδόντας

Mrk 9:18, Act 7:54

accusative m s

ὀδόντα

Mat 5:38

genitive m s

ὀδόντος

Mat 5:38

nominative m p

ὀδόντες

Rev 9:8