StrongerBible

potērion

ποτήριον

GreekG4221cup

Appears 33 times · tap a cell to see the verses

Mat 10:42Mat 20:22Mat 20:23Mat 23:25Mat 23:26Mat 26:27Mat 26:39Mat 26:42Mrk 7:4Mrk 7:8Mrk 9:41Mrk 10:38Mrk 10:39Mrk 14:23Mrk 14:36Luk 11:39Luk 22:17Luk 22:20 (2×)Luk 22:42Jhn 18:111Co 10:161Co 11:251Co 11:28Rev 14:10Rev 18:6
Root family
Word studypo-TAY-ree-onnoun

What potērion means

cup: a vessel for drinking, and by extension the portion it holds that a person must drink

TranslatabilityApproximateCertaintySettled

At its simplest this word names an ordinary drinking vessel, the kind you rinse out or fill with cold water. The New Testament writers use it that plainly, but they also lean on a rich picture that runs through the Hebrew Scriptures, where the cup handed to a person stands for the lot God has measured out to them. What is in the cup can be gladness and blessing, or it can be suffering and judgment, but either way it is theirs to drink.

That image gives the word most of its weight. Jesus speaks of a cup he must drink and asks whether it can pass from him, meaning the suffering appointed to him. In Revelation the cup is filled with the wine of God's anger, poured out on the guilty. And at the Last Supper the shared cup becomes the sign of the new covenant sealed in his blood.

All of these are the same word doing the same basic work: a vessel, and the drink inside it that a person takes to themselves. The four uses are not different words but one picture applied to blessing, to judgment, and to an appointed fate.

Nuances

1aa literal drinking vessel: an ordinary cup, whether given a drink of water or washed and cleaned
Mat 10:42Mat 23:25Mat 23:26Mrk 7:4Mrk 7:8Mrk 9:41Luk 11:39Rev 17:4
1bthe shared cup of the Lord's Supper: the cup of blessing that signifies the new covenant in Christ's blood
Mat 26:27Mrk 14:23Luk 22:17Luk 22:20 (2×)1Co 10:161Co 10:211Co 11:251Co 11:261Co 11:271Co 11:28
1cthe cup as one's appointed lot, especially of suffering: the fate Jesus is given to drink
Mat 20:22Mat 20:23Mat 26:39Mat 26:42Mrk 10:38Mrk 10:39Mrk 14:36Luk 22:42Jhn 18:11
1dthe cup of God's wrath: the drink of judgment poured out and given to the guilty
Rev 14:10Rev 16:19Rev 18:6

What scholars say about potērion

The lexical sense is uncontested: BDAG glosses the word as a drinking vessel, cup, with an established metonymic extension to the cup's contents and, through the Septuagint, to the cup as a figure for one's divinely apportioned lot. Goppelt's TDNT article traces the figurative range to the Hebrew kos: the cup of salvation and blessing (Psalm 116:13), and above all the cup of God's wrath that the nations and Jerusalem are given to drink (Psalm 75:8; Isaiah 51:17-22; Jeremiah 25:15-28). The New Testament draws directly on this background for the eschatological cup of wrath in Revelation and for the cup Jesus must drink in Gethsemane, while the Last Supper accounts and Paul develop the cup of the new covenant as a distinct cultic usage.

Sources

  • BDAG, s.v. ποτήριονlexicon
  • L. Goppelt, "ποτήριον," in Theological Dictionary of the New Testament (TDNT) 6:148-158dictionary
  • C. Brown, ed., "Cup," in New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology (NIDNTT) 1:521-522dictionary

All attested forms of ποτήριον

accusative n s

ποτήριον, ποτήριόν

Mat 10:42, Mat 20:22, Mat 26:27, Mrk 9:41, Mrk 10:38, Mrk 10:39, Mrk 14:23, Mrk 14:36

nominative n s

ποτήριον

Mat 26:39, Mat 26:42, Luk 22:20, 1Co 10:16, 1Co 11:25

genitive n s

ποτηρίου

Mat 23:25, Mat 23:26, Luk 11:39, 1Co 11:28

dative n s

ποτηρίῳ

Rev 14:10, Rev 18:6

genitive n p

ποτηρίων

Mrk 7:4, Mrk 7:8