to seize: to lay hold of and capture a person or a catch
TranslatabilityDirectCertaintySettled
At its root this word means to take hold of something and bring it under control, from the parts that mean "together" and "take." The picture is hands closing around a target so it cannot get away.
In the Gospels this is the standard word for an arrest: soldiers and officers lay hold of Jesus, and later Herod does the same to Peter. It carries the force of an official, often hostile, capture, and the person seized is a prisoner from that moment on.
The same grasping applies to a haul of fish pulled in by the net. Whether the object is a wanted man or a catch of fish, the core action is one: to close a grip on something and hold it fast. It is the intensified cousin of the ordinary verb for taking, λαμβάνω, which simply means to take or receive.
Nuances
1ato arrest, take into custody: to lay hold of a person and hold them prisoner
Mat 26:55Mrk 14:48Luk 22:54Jhn 18:12Act 1:16Act 12:3Act 23:27Act 26:21
1bto catch: to take a haul of fish in the net
Luk 5:9
2
to conceive: to become pregnant with a child
TranslatabilityDirectCertaintySettled
Applied to the womb, the same idea of taking hold gives the ordinary word for becoming pregnant. Luke uses it repeatedly in the birth narratives: Elizabeth conceives John, and Mary is told she will conceive Jesus.
James turns the picture into a warning. Desire, treated as a mother, conceives and then gives birth to sin, and sin grown up brings death. The word is the literal one for pregnancy, used here as a vivid image of how an inner craving takes root and produces something deadly.
Nuances
2ato conceive a child: to become pregnant
Luk 1:24Luk 1:31Luk 1:36Luk 2:21
2bto conceive figuratively: desire pictured as becoming pregnant and giving birth to sin
Jas 1:15
3
to help: to take hold alongside someone and share their work
TranslatabilityApproximateCertaintySettled
When the word is used of joining with another person rather than capturing them, it means to lend a hand. The image is two sets of hands on the same load: to grasp the task together with someone and carry it with them.
Fishermen call their partners to come and help haul in a net too heavy for one boat, and Paul asks a fellow worker to help two women who had labored beside him in the gospel. The help in view is not distant sympathy but shouldering the same burden as a partner. It overlaps with the ordinary word for coming to someone's aid, βοηθέω, but keeps its own flavor of taking hold of the work together.
The word for a party closing in and taking someone together: an armed crowd comes out with swords and clubs, a detachment of soldiers and temple officers takes Jesus and ties him up, Judas leads the men who take him, and a temple mob gets hold of Paul.Mat 26:55Mrk 14:48Jhn 18:12Act 1:16Act 26:21Act 23:27
Covers conceiving a child, the one taking hold that happens inside a woman's body: Elizabeth and Mary each conceive, and James turns the picture into a warning that desire conceives and gives birth to sin.Luk 1:24Luk 1:31Luk 1:36Jas 1:15
Means lending a hand in someone else's job, with no grip on a body involved: the fishermen wave their partners over to help with the overloaded nets, and Paul asks a friend to help the women who worked beside him.Luk 5:7Php 4:3
Both
Both are ordinary words for arresting a person, so one story can use either: Herod took Peter and then, having arrested him, put him in prison, and John reports officers sent to arrest Jesus early on and the squad that finally takes him in the garden.Jhn 7:32Act 12:4Act 12:3Jhn 18:12
Neither is limited to people: each is used of hauling in a netful of fish, so both can mean simply "take" whatever has been landed.Jhn 21:10Luk 5:9
Names the reach for someone whether or not the hand ever closes: John keeps reporting that people tried to take Jesus and came away with nothing, Paul remembers a governor watching Damascus for him who lost him anyway, and the fishermen work all night and take nothing.Jhn 7:30Jhn 8:20Jhn 10:392Co 11:32Jhn 21:3
Can be one person's hand closing on another with no hostility in it at all: Peter takes the crippled beggar by the right hand and pulls him up onto his feet.Act 3:7
Keeps the spotlight on the one caught rather than on the party that closed in: Herod's move against Peter is told as a single act that lands him in prison under guard, and the beast is simply taken and thrown into the fire, with no group named.Act 12:4Rev 19:20
κρατέωto grip or take hold of firmly, stressing the strength of the hold rather than the act of capture
λαμβάνωthe plain verb to take or receive, without the added force of laying hold of and capturing
ἀντιλαμβάνομαιto take hold in order to help or support, close to the assisting sense but framed as coming to someone's aid
Its whole range is coming to someone's aid: to take hold of a person in order to support or rescue them. It never turns hostile, and God is often the one who helps.Luk 1:54Act 20:35
It can face the other direction, naming the person who receives the help: to partake of or benefit from a kindness done to you.1Ti 6:2
βοηθέωto help or come to the rescue, focused on relief given rather than on grasping the same task together
It commonly means to seize or arrest, physically laying hold of a person to take them into custody, a sense the Hebrew word never carries.Mat 26:55Jhn 18:12Act 12:3
It can also mean to help or assist, joining with someone to lend a hand in a task, which is entirely outside the range of the Hebrew word.Luk 5:7Php 4:3
Both
Both are the ordinary word for conceiving a child, describing a woman becoming pregnant, and the New Testament birth announcements echo the wording of the Old Testament birth narratives.Gen 4:1Luk 1:31
Both extend the image of conception to the birth of evil: the heart conceives wrongdoing and then gives birth to sin.Isa 59:4Jas 1:15
Its most common New Testament use has nothing to do with childbearing: it means to seize or arrest, to take a person into custody by force.Mat 26:55Act 12:3
It also carries the sense of coming alongside to help or lend a hand, whether hauling in a catch of fish or supporting fellow workers.Luk 5:7Php 4:3
Both
Both belong to the language of conceiving a child: the Greek verb is the ordinary word for a woman becoming pregnant, and the Hebrew noun names that same conception.Luk 1:31Rut 4:13
It is the ordinary word for seizing a person by force, the arrest of Jesus by an armed crowd and the later arrests of the apostles.Mat 26:55Mrk 14:48Jhn 18:12Act 12:3
It can mean the opposite of grabbing someone: taking hold alongside another person to help with a job too big for one, whether hauling in nets or standing with fellow workers.Luk 5:7Php 4:3
It is used of catching fish, a haul taken in rather than a life begun.Luk 5:9
It carries a figure of speech in which something other than a woman conceives: desire conceives and gives birth to sin.Jas 1:15
Both
Both are used for conceiving a child, the point where a pregnancy begins.Luk 1:31Luk 1:36Psa 51:5
Both mark the beginning of a life as a moment of its own, kept distinct from the birth that follows it.Luk 2:21Psa 51:5
Nearly all its uses are about livestock breeding, Jacob's flocks mating at the watering troughs and in his dream.Gen 30:38Gen 30:39Gen 30:41Gen 31:10
It names the heat of the mating drive itself, the animals coming into season, and not merely the pregnancy that follows, which is why it fits the moment the stronger animals pair off at the troughs.Gen 30:41Gen 31:10
Its one use of a human mother looks backward at the speaker's own origin as the root of a lifelong condition, rather than announcing a child who is coming.Psa 51:5
What scholars say about sullambanō
BDAG groups the uses under four heads that reduce to three semantic domains: to take into custody or seize (with hunting and fishing as a related capture use), to become pregnant or conceive, and, in the middle voice, to assist or support. The compound joins the prefix meaning "with, together" to the common verb lambano "take," and the shared notion is a taking-hold that the context specializes. Louw-Nida and Moulton-Milligan document the same range in the wider Koine, including the fishing use in Luke 5:9 and the assisting use in Luke 5:7 and Philippians 4:3. The pregnancy use is standard Septuagint and medical-writer idiom for conception.
Sources
BDAG, s.v. συλλαμβάνωlexicon
Louw and Nida, Greek-English Lexicon Based on Semantic Domains, s.v. συλλαμβάνωlexicon
Moulton and Milligan, The Vocabulary of the Greek Testament, s.v. συλλαμβάνωlexicon