of many kinds: describing something that comes not in a single form but in an assortment of different sorts.
The picture behind this word is a surface of many colors. In older Greek it described a dappled animal, an embroidered cloth, a piece of inlaid work, a mottled stone. By the time of the New Testament the color has faded almost entirely, and what is left is the idea of variety itself: whatever this word describes does not come in one form but in an assortment of kinds.
It never stands on its own. It always describes something else, and what is striking is how evenly it falls on trouble and on gift:
- the illnesses Jesus healed as crowds brought their sick to him
- the cravings and pleasures that once ran people's lives
- the strange teachings that pull a congregation off course
- the trials that come at believers and test their faith
- the powerful acts by which God confirmed the message
- the grace God hands out through every believer's gift
That last one, in 1 Peter 4:10, is the only place the word describes a single thing rather than a set of things, and English versions usually mark the shift by choosing "manifold" instead of "various". Peter had already told these readers they were suffering "various trials" in 1 Peter 1:6, and here he answers them with a grace just as varied: whatever kind of trouble arrives, there is a matching kind of grace for it. The same word stands in both verses, which is what makes the answer land.
A strengthened form of it (πολυποίκιλος, "many-sided") appears once, in Ephesians 3:10, for the wisdom of God that the church puts on display.