κανών,
κανόνος,
ὁ (
κάννα, Hebrew
קָנֶה a cane, reed; Arabic: a reed, and a spear, and a straight stick or staff (cf.
Vanicek, Fremdwörter etc., p. 21)), properly, a rod or straight piece of rounded wood to which anything is fastened to keep it straight; used for various purposes (see
Passow (or Liddell and Scott), under the word); a measuring rod, rule; a carpenter's line or measuring tape, Schol. on
Euripides, Hippolytus, 468; hence, equivalent to
τό μέτρον τοῦ πηδηματος (
Pollux, Onom. 3, 30, 151), the measure of a leap, as in the Olympic games; accordingly in the N. T.
1. "a definitely bounded or fixed space within the limits of which one's power or influence is confined; the province assigned one; one's sphere of activity":
2 Corinthians 10:13,
15f.
2. Metaphorically,
any rule or standard, a principle or law of investigating, judging, living, acting (often so in classical Greek, as
τοῦ καλοῦ,
Euripides, Hec. 602;
ὁροι τῶν ἀγαθῶν καί κανονες,
Demosthenes, pro cor., p. 324, 27):
Galatians 6:16;
Philippians 3:16 Rec. Cf. Credner, Zur Gesch. des Kanons (Hal., 1847), pp. 6ff; (especially Westcott, The Canon of the N. T., Appendix A; briefly in
B. D. under the word
Canon of Scripture; for examples of later usage see
Sophocles' Lexicon, under the word).
THAYER’S GREEK LEXICON, Electronic Database.
Copyright © 2002, 2003, 2006, 2011 by Biblesoft, Inc.
All rights reserved. Used by permission. BibleSoft.com
BLB Scripture Index of Thayer's