StrongerBible

chitōn

χιτών

GreekG5509“coat, tunic, ...”

Appears 11 times · tap a cell to see the verses

Mat 5:40Mat 10:10Mrk 6:9Mrk 14:63Luk 3:11Luk 6:29Luk 9:3Jhn 19:23 (2×)Act 9:39Jud 1:23
Word studyResearch-gradekhee-TOHNnoun

What chitōn means

the tunic: the plain inner garment worn next to the skin, under the outer cloak

TranslatabilityApproximateCertaintySettled

The tunic was the shirt of the ancient Mediterranean world, the simple garment worn directly against the skin. Over it a person put on the cloak, the heavier outer wrap. Together the two made up an ordinary outfit, and the pair turns up again and again, in a laundry list, a dowry, or a plain description of what someone had on. A person of modest means owned two tunics, one to wear and one in reserve; the very poor had only one.

Because it is the everyday layer worn close to the body, the word does quiet work throughout the New Testament. When Jesus tells a disciple who is sued in court to hand over the tunic and then the cloak as well (Matthew 5:40), the force of the saying is that the cloak was legally protected as a poor person's covering for the night, so giving up both leaves the person with nothing. When John the Baptist tells whoever has two tunics to share with someone who has none (Luke 3:11), the spare tunic stands for the smallest surplus a person can give away. When Jesus sends the disciples out with no spare tunic (Mark 6:9; Matthew 10:10; Luke 9:3), he strips them of the traveler's normal kit and leaves them dependent on the hospitality of others.

In the plural the word can widen to mean clothing in general. That is how most scholars read the moment when the high priest tears his tunics at Jesus' trial (Mark 14:63): these are his ordinary clothes at a night hearing, not the sacred robes kept in the temple. And because the tunic is what touches the skin, Jude can speak of hating even the tunic stained by the flesh (Jude 1:23), an image of defilement so intimate it reaches the innermost layer.

The most discussed tunic in the New Testament is the seamless one the soldiers refused to tear at the cross (John 19:23). Woven in one piece rather than sewn together, it was a costly item, and readers from the earliest centuries on have wondered whether John wants us to hear an echo of the high priest's robe, or to see a picture of a people that cannot be divided. Those readings are old and appealing, but they remain far from settled.

Nuances

1athe inner garment worn next to the skin, the plain layer under the outer cloak
Mat 5:40Mat 10:10Mrk 6:9Luk 3:11Luk 6:29Luk 9:3Jhn 19:23 (2×)Act 9:39Jud 1:23
Jhn 19:23

Whether the seamless, one-piece tunic of John 19:23 is meant to carry symbolic weight, and if so what kind.

  • contestedThe detail is a narrative mechanism: it explains why the soldiers cast lots for this garment instead of dividing it, so that the scene fulfills Psalm 22:18, and it carries no further symbolism, since the Gospel of John presents no high-priestly picture of Jesus anywhere else.; C. K. Barrett, The Gospel According to St. John, 2nd ed. (SPCK/Westminster, 1978); A. T. Lincoln, The Gospel According to Saint John (BNTC; Continuum, 2005), 476; D. A. Carson, The Gospel According to John (Pillar NTC; Eerdmans, 1991)
  • minorityThe one-piece woven tunic deliberately echoes the high priest's robe, which Josephus (Antiquities 3.161) describes as woven of a single piece rather than stitched, so that Jesus dies clothed as the true high priest.; J. P. Heil, 'Jesus as the Unique High Priest in the Gospel of John,' CBQ 57 (1995): 729-745; A. R. Kerr, The Temple of Jesus' Body (LNTS 220; T&T Clark, 2002), 314-370
  • minorityThe undivided tunic pictures the indivisible people of God, a unity that its enemies cannot tear apart.; I. de la Potterie, 'La tunique sans couture, symbole du Christ grand pretre?' Biblica 60 (1979): 255-269; Augustine, Tractatus in Joannem 118
1bclothing in general (in the plural): the garments a person is wearing
Mrk 14:63

What scholars say about chitōn

The lexica are unanimous (BDAG; LSJ; Louw-Nida section 6.176; EDNT; Spicq; Moulton-Milligan): the word denotes the inner tunic worn next to the skin, the counterpart of the outer himation (cloak). It is a Semitic loanword cognate with Hebrew kuttonet, which it renders throughout the Septuagint (Joseph's ornamented tunic in Genesis 37; the priestly linen tunic of Exodus 28 and Leviticus 16). Josephus notes the etymology and its link to linen (Antiquities 3.153). The Synoptic sayings turn on the garment's ordinariness. Trench, Davies and Allison, Luz, France, Fitzmyer, Bock and Bovon explain the reversed order in Matthew 5:40 (inner then outer) and Luke 6:29 (outer then inner) as two scenarios: a lawsuit, in which the less valuable tunic is sued for first because the cloak was protected by Exodus 22 and Deuteronomy 24 as the poor person's night covering, versus a robbery, in which the more valuable cloak is snatched first. Marcus, France, Yarbro Collins, Evans and Gundry read the high priest's torn tunics in Mark 14:63 as ordinary clothing rather than sacral vestments. Bauckham, followed by Green and Davids, argues that Jude 23 chooses this word deliberately because the garment touching the skin sharpens the image of intimate defilement. The seamless tunic of John 19:23 is the contested case: the priestly reading (Heil, Kerr, Coloe), resting on the verbal parallel with Josephus, Antiquities 3.161, competes with the ecclesial-unity reading (Cyprian, Augustine, de la Potterie) and with the minimalist view that the detail merely motivates the citation of Psalm 22:18 (Barrett, Bultmann, Carson, Lincoln, Morris, Koestenberger). Brown and Keener treat the symbolism as real but plural and uncertain; Taylor and Lincoln object that John's Gospel shows no high-priestly Christology elsewhere and that Josephus's "tunic" is in any case the wrong garment.

In-depth research

This is a research paper, so it may be hard to read without scholarly background. It is useful if you want to dig even deeper into this word.

Sources

  • BDAG, A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament, 3rd ed. (Chicago, 2000), s.v. χιτώνlexicon
  • LSJ, A Greek-English Lexicon, 9th ed. with Revised Supplement (Oxford, 1996), s.v. χιτώνlexicon
  • Louw and Nida, Greek-English Lexicon of the NT Based on Semantic Domains, section 6.176lexicon
  • EDNT (Balz and Schneider, eds.), vol. 3 (Eerdmans, 1993), s.v. χιτώνtheological-dictionary
  • C. Spicq, Theological Lexicon of the New Testament (Hendrickson, 1994), s.v. χιτώνtheological-dictionary
  • Moulton and Milligan, The Vocabulary of the Greek Testament (London, 1930), s.v. χιτώνlexicon
  • Josephus, Antiquities 3.153, 3.161 (Loeb, trans. Thackeray)primary-source
  • U. Luz, Matthew 1-7 (Hermeneia; Fortress, rev. ed. 2007), on 5:38-42commentary
  • R. T. France, The Gospel of Matthew (NICNT; Eerdmans, 2007), on 5:40commentary
  • J. A. Fitzmyer, The Gospel According to Luke I-IX (AB 28; Doubleday, 1981), 637-640commentary
  • J. Marcus, Mark 8-16 (AB 27A; Yale, 2009), on 14:63commentary
  • R. Bauckham, Jude, 2 Peter (WBC 50; Word, 1983), 116commentary
  • C. S. Keener, The Gospel of John: A Commentary (Hendrickson, 2003), 2:1138-1140commentary
  • R. E. Brown, The Death of the Messiah (Doubleday, 1994), 2:955-958commentary
  • J. E. Taylor, What Did Jesus Look Like? (T&T Clark, 2018), 186monograph

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

All attested forms of χιτών

accusative m p

χιτῶνας

Mat 10:10, Mrk 6:9, Mrk 14:63, Luk 3:11, Luk 9:3, Act 9:39

accusative m s

χιτῶνα, χιτῶνά

Luk 6:29, Jhn 19:23, Jud 1:23, Mat 5:40

nominative m s

χιτὼν

Jhn 19:23