As mentioned in my introduction to faith post, I was in Sunday School class a while back and had the opportunity to discuss Christian maturity with the teacher, and as you may have guessed, we wandered off into the subject of faith.
Faith
He had told me there are a number of Greek words in the New Testament that are translated “faith” in our English Bible, and I let him know I thought otherwise.
So I came home and did a quick study, using Blue Letter Bible web site. The following table gives a summary of the New Testament Greek words used when describing our English word “faith”.
| Strongs # |
Greek |
Transliterated |
English Equivalent |
| New Testament (Greek) for “faith” |
| G571 |
ἄπιστος |
apistos |
that believe not, unbelieving, faithless, unbeliever, infidel, thing incredible, which believe not |
| G1680 |
ἐλπίς |
elpis |
hope, faith |
| G3640 |
ὀλιγόπιστος |
oligopistos |
of little faith |
| G4102 |
πίστις |
pistis |
faith, assurance, believe, belief, them that believe, fidelity |
| G4103 |
πιστός |
pistos |
faithful, believe, believing, true, faithfully, believer, sure not tr |
| G6066 |
ὀλιγοπιστία |
oligopistia |
littleness of faith |
I’m glad he challenged me to look it up and I think we were both sort of correct.
The root word found in each of the above greek words is pistos/pistis, and when checked in that web site I like (see above), both are derived from the Greek word “peíthō”.
Strong’s Definitions
πείθω peíthō, pi’-tho; a primary verb; to convince (by argument, true or false); by analogy, to pacify or conciliate (by other fair means); reflexively or passively, to assent (to evidence or authority), to rely (by inward certainty):—agree, assure, believe, have confidence, be (wax) conflent, make friend, obey, persuade, trust, yield.
For future posts, I would like to explore the concept of faith, and each of the terms found in the table above. But for now, I would like to consider the root word peíthō.
Peíthō
In the Strongs Concordance definition above I have italicized a number of synonyms that are synonyms for the root word Peíthō.
Consider the following shade of the Greek word Peíthō.
Believe
I suppose it is obvious that the root word for faith has a synonym of believe, but it may be instructive to consider that the next synonym given, is the term “Have confidence”
Difference? I don’t know “off the top” what the difference is, but I am willing to consider a difference since both descriptive terms were supplied. To believe, I sense is to have the mental assent of a fact, to consider a message true.
To believe is to accept an opinion, a statement, a message, a thought or a concept. It is the seed of faith, out of which all confidence, agreement, obedience and yielding grow. It is the germ of life out of which grows the fully mature Christian life.
To “Peíthō” is to believe the One who is the object of faith.
Come visit our next post. I HAVE CONFIDENCE you will gain a bit more appreciation for the full meaning of Peíthō. See you then!
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