In a careful article which treats of these words, Schmidt expresses in German the ultimate conclusions about them whereat he has arrived; which it may be worth while to repeat, as some instruction may be gotten from them. Βραδύς, he states, would best be represented in German by ‘langsam,’ with ταχύς, or else with ὠκύς (Homer, Odys. viii. 329), or with ἀγχίνους for its antithesis; νωθρός by ‘träge,’ with ὀξύς for its proper opposite; while he morally identifies ἀργός with the German ‘faul,’ or with ‘unthätig,’ and finds in ἐνεργός the proper antithesis of this. Let us examine these words a little closer.
Βραδύς differs from the words with which it is here brought info comparison, that no moral fault or blame is necessarily involved in it; so far indeed from this, that of the three occasions on which it is used in the N. T., two are in honour; for to be ‘slow’ to evil things, to rash speaking, or to anger (
Of νωθρός, which is only found twice in the N. T., and both times in the Epistle to the Hebrews (5:11; 6:12), the etymology is uncertain; that from νη and ὠθεῖν, which found favour once, failing to do so now. We meet the word in good Attic Greek; thus in Plato (Theoetet. 144 b); the form νωθὴς being the favourite in the classical periods of the language, and νωθρός not coming into common use till the times of the κοινὴ διάλεκτος. It occurs but once in the Septuagint (
There is a deeper, more inborn sluggishness implied in νωθρός, and this bound up as it were in the very life, than in either of the other words of this group. The βραδὺς of to-day might become the ὠκὺς of to-morrow; the ἀργὸς might grow to ἐνεργός; but the very constitution of the νωθρός unfits him for activities of the mind or spirit; he is νωθρός ἐν ταῖς ἐπίνοιαις (Polybius, iv. 8. 5). The word is joined by Dionysius of Halicarnassus with ἀναίσθητος, ἀκίνητος, and ἀπαθής; by Hippocrates, cited by Schmidt, with βαρύς; by Plutarch (De Orac. Def.) with δυσκίνητος, this last epithet expressing clearly what in others just named is only suggested, namely, a certain awkwardness and unwieldliness of gait and demeanour, representing to the outward world a slowness and inaptitude for activities of the mind which is within. On its second appearance,
Ἀργός (== ἀεργός), used of persons (
‘Slow’ (or ‘tardy’), ‘sluggish,’ and ‘idle’ would severally represent the words of this group.
[The following Strong's numbers apply to this section:G1021,G3576,G692.]
The Blue Letter Bible ministry and the BLB Institute hold to the historical, conservative Christian faith, which includes a firm belief in the inerrancy of Scripture. Since the text and audio content provided by BLB represent a range of evangelical traditions, all of the ideas and principles conveyed in the resource materials are not necessarily affirmed, in total, by this ministry.
Loading
Loading
Interlinear |
Bibles |
Cross-Refs |
Commentaries |
Dictionaries |
Miscellaneous |