One of the most important verbs in the Koine NT is translated by our English “free.” But the Koine word and its translation can be confused with other ideas, or short-sighted as to its significance.
The Koine mss (manuscript) word is, phonetically, “LOU-oh.” In the Greek script it is among the simplest of Koine verbs: λύω, where λ (lambda) corresponds to English “L” and ύ (upsilon, here accented) is “u;” the omega, ω, is the long “o” sometimes shown in English transliterations as a double “o,” namely “oo,” So the pronunciation of λύω would be as λύ-ω, “LOU-oh,” with the accent on the first syllable.
The Strong’s Number for λύω is G3089. (The search phrase as—strongs g3089–can be used in any web search window to show websites with expanded definitions, and NT and LXX [Septuagint] occurrences, such as www.blueletterbible.org).
Before we begin, here are some preliminaries as to why this simple three-letter word is worth studying:
- λύω is a verb. Verbs are a particularly important word form in the NT. (More on the importance of Koine verbs is given at the end of this post).
- λύω is expressed by Koine morphology in many different forms, 29 forms (in the so-called Majority Text), each expressing particular significance to the underlying idea of loose, loosing, loosed, being loosed, had been loosed, and so forth.
- λύω as a stem / root, λύ, is compounded with other Koine words in many additional occurrences and morphological forms.
- λύω is closely allied with synonyms, which broadly related to “loose” (in all its nuances) but expand upon “loose” to, for instance, point to the consequences of being “loosed.”
- λύω is a direct indicator of our universal, deadly-serious, fallen condition as being bound unto sin, rebellion against God, incapable to seeking God, and under the sentence of death and God’s wrath. We are in mortal need of “loosing.”
- λύω points to the great and final Work of Jesus Christ, His substitutionary death of Crucifixion.
- λύω reveals that the Work of Jesus Christ was propitious to God the Father, not only only removing the otherwise unremovable curse of sin but, further, making us righteous in Christ in God’s sight.
- λύω defines (in part) our present, eternally-secured condition.
Because of its great doctrinal significance, it is worthy of grasping as a keyword in the Koine NT (and LXX). And because of its Koine simplicity, we will use throughout its Koine form, λύω.
NT Occurrences of λύω
Let us look at the simplest and most-direct NT use of the idea expressed by λύω. The root meaning of λύω is untie, release, unbind, even liberate that which has been tied, bound.
Loosing (λύω) Sandals Securely Tied to One’s Feet
Standard footwear in the NT period were sandals that were secured by leather straps which bound the footpad to the foot. Sandals were removed to enter a house because the roads and paths trod upon would be highly unclean. Because both the sandals themselves and the securing straps would both be unclean, it was an act of humble servanthood for someone else to such loosening.
It was a humble task to untie the unclean sandals, and then cleaning the feet of the person who had been wearing them. Such responsibility would flow to a household servant, or perhaps a child of the family.
Such humility is reference in several Gospel texts of the NT:
44 Then turning toward the woman he said to Simon [a leading Pharisee], “Do you see this woman? I entered your house [Simon’s]; you gave me no water for my feet, but she* has wet my feet with her tears and wiped them with her hair. 45 You gave me no kiss, but from the time I came in she* has not ceased to kiss my feet. 46 You did not anoint my head with oil, but she* has anointed my feet with ointment.
Luke 7:44-46 (ESV). [*She: was an unarmed visitor, who was not invited to the event of dining, but was present with others as an observer outside the table of feasting; she is only identified as “a woman of the city, who was a sinner” {Lu 7:37}, likely a reference to a woman without a husband and of known ill repute. Simon’s household as a traditional courtesy to invited guests should have bestowed a basic sign of respect by caring for Jesus’s feet upon entrance to the home. So the unnamed woman’s actions were massively contrasting her humility of love as an undeserving sinner compared to the remote, self-confidence of the self-‘righteous’ Pharisee.]
3 Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into his hands, and that he had come from God and was going back to God, 4 rose from supper. He laid aside his outer garments, and taking a towel, tied it around his waist. 5 Then he poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples’ feet and to wipe them with the towel that was wrapped around him.
John 13:3-5 (ESV) [Because, apparently, there was no host of this gathering we know as The Last Supper, everyone had entered the room, likely having untied their own sandals, but with unwashed feet. So Jesus in His humility as an example of the great sacrifice that was to occur on the Cross performed a visual demonstration as well as providing a model for His disciples as to how they should serve one another, and others in general.]
As to the specific and first use of λύω, it arises in a scene that is a rare example of text that appears in all four Gospels. There we hear John the Baptist emphasizing to different audiences that as highly regarded as he was by the people, he recognized that he would be unworthy even of such humble task on behalf of serving the feet of Jesus.
11 “I [John the Baptist] baptize you [the “you” were: “the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to his baptism, he said to them, “You brood of vipers! ” John 3:7] with water for repentance, but he who is coming after me is mightier than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.
7 And he [John the Baptist] preached [to “all the the country of Judea and all Jerusalem” who had come out to John in the wilderness], saying, “After me comes he who is mightier than I, the strap of whose sandals I am not worthy to stoop down and untie.
16 John [the Baptist] answered them all [crowds who had come to John to be baptized], saying, “I baptize you with water, but he who is mightier than I is coming, the strap of whose sandals I am not worthy to untie.
26-27 John [the Baptist] answered them [priests and Levites who had been sent by the Jewish leaders in Jerusalem to confront John], “I baptize with water, but among you stands one you do not know, even he who comes after me, the strap of whose sandal I am not worthy to untie.”
John 1:5; Mark 1:7; Luke 3:16; John 1:26-27; respectively. (ESV) [Because we see reported different contexts at which John made such statements it is likely that he repeated such words over and over again to each new group of people who had come to him. Thus he was emphasizing that he was not “The One”–The Messiah–but that The Messiah was soon to appear, One Who was of a different Being than even a man as highly-regarded as John himself was.]
Loosing (λύω) Being Involuntarily Bound
Untying / loosing is also used in an intensified sense in the NT. Sandals tied and untied is a voluntary experience of everyday living, though freighted with the humility by the above passages regarding the extreme honor rightly accorded to the Lord. Other important uses of λύω are when the binding to be loosed is involuntary imprisonment. Consider the following two examples:
The man who had died [Lazarus] came out, his hands and feet bound with linen strips, and his face wrapped with a cloth. Jesus said to them, “Unbind him, and let him go.”
But on the next day, desiring to know the real reason why he was being accused by the Jews, he [a Roman Tribune who had unknowingly imprisoned Paul, a Roman citizen] unbound him and commanded the chief priests and all the council to meet, and he brought Paul down and set him before them.
Then I saw an angel coming down from heaven, holding in his hand the key to the bottomless pit and a great chain. And he seized the dragon, that ancient serpent, who is the devil and Satan, and bound him for a thousand years, and threw him into the pit, and shut it and sealed it over him, so that he might not deceive the nations any longer, until the thousand years were ended. …After that he must be released for a little while….And when the thousand years are ended, Satan will be released from his prison
John 11:44; Acts 22:30; and Revelation 20:1-3 and 20:7, respectively. (ESV) [Highlights mine; in Rev. Ch 20, we see Satan’s imprisonment upon the even of the Lord’s return, and Satan’s subsequent release, λύω, for a time, at the end of the Millennium.]
Loosing (λύω) as a Metaphor for Being Involuntarily Bound
And ought not this woman, a daughter of Abraham whom Satan bound for eighteen years, be loosed from this bond on the Sabbath day?”
Lu 13:16 (ESV) [Highlights mine]
λύω Used to Express Bursting / Breaking Free
The above λύω texts illustrate acts of setting free from an act of untying or unlocking. λύω is also used to express a violent breaking up of what had been previously bound together, constructed as with a ship, or a building even the massive and symbolic Temple itself. And ultimately, such unbending, λύω, will occur to the very forces that hold together all physical substance of materiality–molecules, the atoms themselves, the components of all atoms, the protons and neutrons, extending even to quarks and the so-called strings / waves which may be the lowest level of existence.
Jesus answered them [the Jews in the Temple at the time of the Passover, demanding a sign to establish Jesus’s authority for His having cleansed the Temple], “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.”
But striking a reef, they ran the vessel aground. The bow stuck and remained immovable, and the stern was being broken up by the surf. [The shipwreck scene at the island of of Malta of Paul’s imprisoned sea travel from Jerusalem to Rome as his final missionary journey.]
But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, and then the heavens will pass away with a roar, and the heavenly bodies will be burned up and dissolved, and the earth and the works that are done on it will be exposed. Since all these things are thus to be dissolved, what sort of people ought you to be in lives of holiness and godliness, waiting for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be set on fire and dissolved, and the heavenly bodies will melt as they burn! But according to his promise we are waiting for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells.
John 2:19; Acts 27:41; and 2 Peter 3:10-13,, respectively. (ESV). [Highlights mine]
λύω Used Symbolically as to the Breaking of Soul-Bondage
Even more notably, λύω is used to described the loosing of the bondage of the curse of Genesis Ch 3, putting everyone, all of us, under the wrath of God, unable to self-rescue, doomed to death and eternal judgment.
God raised him [Jesus] up, loosing the pangs of death [the death of the Cross, both physically and as our sin-bearer], because it was not possible for him to be held by it.
For he himself is our peace, who has made us both one and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility
Whoever makes a practice of sinning is of the devil, for the devil has been sinning from the beginning. The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the works of the devil.
Acts 2:24; Eph 2:14, and 1 John 3:8, respectively. (ESV). [Highlights mine]
λύω Used to Characterize the Unbreakability of the Law of God
As our present, final category of usage for λύω is with regard to the Law broadly given to us in the Scriptures.
“Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. 18 For truly, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot, will pass from the Law until all is accomplished. 19 Therefore whoever relaxes one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven.
Jesus answered them, “Is it not written in your Law, ‘I said, you are gods’? 35 If he called them gods to whom the word of God came—and Scripture cannot be broken—
If on the Sabbath a man receives circumcision, so that the law of Moses may not be broken, are you angry with me because on the Sabbath I made a man’s whole body well?
Matt 5:17; John 10:34; and John 7:23, respectively. (ESV) [Highlights mine]
λύω as to Its Deeper Significance
As this is the first post in a series, we will not here encompass all the weight of λύω as to central doctrines of the Bible. Here let us ask the following: apart from, and prior to, any regenerative work of God upon the innermost being of man(-kind), what is his / her most-essential condition?
Answers to Man’s Essential Condition before God
The traditional answers fall can be clustered in four broad groups: from (1) wounded but capable, (2) unlearned but can be taught, (3) self-teachable if given time and opportunity, (4) enlightened and ever more so. Group 2 is home to virtue-learning, something like boot camp, perhaps lifelong. Group 3 is Rousseau’s argument for education, which had been a teacher favorite until recent times wherein the favored view is Group 2. Group 4 is where authoritarians live, either as self-authoritarians, or authoritarians over certain immediate contexts, or even as some form of supreme authoritarians, a form of “Übermensch” (the philosophy of being as “superman”), or the Philosopher King (of Socrates / Plato).
If one drives the question away from relativism, which is reflected in Groups 2, 3, and 4, to solitary one-on-One engagement, man to God, the prevalent answer in all but the utterly self-deceived is Group 1. Then what distinguishes this Group further is by the form “capable” can take? Is it penance? Sacrifice? Ascetic obedience? Assenting to an external authoritarian? Adopting a belief (faith)? Verbal expression? Some rite or ritual (say, baptism)? Some ceremony of commitment?
The answer to any form of Group 1 should be framed by the underlying idea of λύω. All of the above answers have in common the belief that whatever the particulars of man in his beginning state it is not without some means of self-deliverance. Once such principle is claimed, then many forms can be thought to be efficacious.
But is any form of self-deliverance possible? λύω says “no.” (If one applies the test to write the truest sentence that one knows, the highlighted three words is it in this post).
Is it True that “λύω says no?”
Bold universal claims–and all universal claims are indeed bold–demand and should be supported by clear and convincing evidence. What might such evidence be?
- Death.
- Dead
- Turned
- Wretched
Again we must here be brief. Let us consider first “Death.” Genesis Ch 2 and 3 made clear by God’s Word and action of judgment, that the consequences of sin as to man’s nature (and of course woman’s) is “death,” literally “dying you will die.” It has been the universal of perhaps some 100 or so billion descendants and the number of dead grows about 7000 each hour, perhaps the time it takes to read this post. Some might say “death” proves nothing because, as the syllogism goes “all men die, Socrates was a man, Socrates died” and, so, what’s for lunch? The Bible, however, makes clear, specifically to the Sadducees who held such view that God proclaims Himself to be the Father of Abraham, Issac, and Jacob…but He is not the God of a cemetery but of eternal living beings. Universal death is evidence of a universal judgment that no man (or woman) escapes, as the 7000 who will die this hour will individually experience, as will, one day, you yourself (and me).
A second evidentiary claim is “dead” as distinct from “death.” “Dead” is the present being in the real state of “dying” before the “you will die” finality of it. You and I do not look dead, and each initial visit at a doctor’s office the taking of your “vital signs” appears to give life to the claim that you (and I) are not actually (yet) dead. However, what such vital signs do not detect what God claims as to our ultimate reality, namely that we are actually dead, spiritually dead. Consider: “If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit who dwells in you.” (Romans 8:11, ESV). And: “And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience— among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind. 4 But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved.” (Eph 2:1-5, ESV)
Consider “turned” as a third evidentiary element. What has man chosen by his inclination from nature? To turn toward God or toward some alternative, especially self? Again Genesis Ch 3 gives us the exemplar answers: Eve by deception turned to self-autonomy embodied by special knowledge-seeking, and Adam by knowing choice turned to the creature (Eve). Consider: “All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned—every one—to his own way; and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.” (Isaiah 53:6, ESV) and “The dogs have a mighty appetite; they never have enough. But they are shepherds who have no understanding; they have all turned to their own way, each to his own gain, one and all.” (Isaiah 56:11, ESV)
What about our fourth point, “wretched?” That seems a little offensive, doesn’t it? It would not be a smooth conversation starter, let alone pick-up line…”hello, wretched one.” But consider this: “Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death?” (Rom 7:24), “Be wretched and mourn and weep. Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom.” (James 4:9), and “For you say, I am rich, I have prospered, and I need nothing, not realizing that you are wretched, pitiable, poor, blind, and naked.” (Rev 3:17, ESV).
One of the most beloved hymns of all time, and even at times a popular song, is Amazing Grace. Consider it’s opening verse: “Amazing grace, how sweet the sound, That saved a wretch like me, I once was lost but now I’m found, Was blind, but now I see.” (John Newton, 1779).
Folk singer Odetta (Odetta Holmes) sang that hymn many times. As she recorded it in her 2003 album “Odetta Blues” she artistically chose a word substitution. During her singing of it she broke rhythm to say “soul: no wretches here” and then substituted singing “soul” for “wretched.” It captured the essence of her denial that any λύω was needed before God. In contrast she was a famed voice in her community who expressed exactly such need for freedom within the context of culture (“Oh, Freedom”) and politics (against capitalism; unemployment).
Such is our common inclination: we feel injustice in many domains, all of which is tinged with a sense of being imprisoned or having to resist the forces of imprisonment. And we may likewise feel injustice with respect to God Himself, accusing Him, in effect, of doing wrong. Whatever the context or source of perceiving personal injustice, hence wrongly held down in some way, it is from the belief that we are underserving of it.
Life is rugged. Justice is elusive in reality and perception. (Consider Plato’s most-famous book, The Republic, which as a secular book has loomed over all philosophy for nearly 2500 years). But the core issue of being truly imprisoned, and justly so before a Holy God, goes back to the very beginning of time. And it is truly our condition before God.
In closing this Part 1 post on λύω, let us now consider the importance of verbs in the Koine NT.
Overview of the NT Koine Vocabulary and Word-Count
The Koine vocabulary of the NT is quite small, only 5426 distinct word-roots, known as “lemmas.” The lemmas of walking, walked, walks is “walk.” It is the dictionary form of any given word.
Such few number of lemmas (5426, varying slightly depending on the particular family of mss) is then expressed in the NT by a Koine word count of 138,020. The particular numbers cited–5426 and 138,019–are for the mss known as NA27, the 27th edition of Nestle-Aland, a mss family referred to as the “critical text” which underlies the ESV and many other more-recent translations. (The Koine text used for the KJV, namely “Stephanus 1550,” commonly known as TR, Textus Receptus, the total word count is 140,735, a difference resulting from the inclusion of certain words, phrases, known as textual variants, a subject far beyond KaiStudies).
In the ESV, the total number of English words are 175,734; this reflects that it typically requires a few additional words in English to express what is compactly given in the Koine, as will be shown by the discussion of Koine verbs below. As a point of comparison, A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens is about 140,000 words, and Moby Dick (Herman Melville) is 216,000 words. So the story, the revelation from God about the deepest significance we are able to grasp as to ultimate realities, sits between A Tale of Two Cities and Moby Dick. I take these two books as symbolic reference points, as the NT includes a ‘tale’ of two cities–Jerusalem and Rome–both in opposition to Jesus Christ’s Person and Work, and underlying such opposition, is the most-terrible Leviathan, by which the great white whale of Moby Dick is an exemplar.
Koine Verbs in the NT
Verbs are a dominant feature of the Koine NT. The NT vocabulary uses 1864 Koine verbs. The below table shows the comparative importance of verbs in the NT.
| Vocabulary | Word Count | |
| Verbs | 1864 | 28,342 |
| All Words | 5426 | 138,020 |
| Verb Percentage | 34% | 21% |
So, about every fifth word in the Koine NT is a verb of some form, and just over one-third of the NT Koine vocabulary is a verb.
But raw word counts of verbs do not tell the whole story. One other measuring stick showing the significance of Koine verbs is how they are expressed in mss form, that is how one would see any given verb expressed in the Greek script of any verse.
The lemma of a Koine verb is modified, the term is “inflected,” by prefixes, suffixes, and inserted letters that determine a rich range of meanings to any given verb. Although such details are outside our scope, it is useful to capture the way Koine verbs can be formed in distinctive, powerful ways. This is illustrated by the below table.
| Distinctive Element | Distinctive Possibilities | Total Number of Distinctives | Combinatorial Number |
| Voice | Active, Passive, Middle | 3 | 3 |
| Tense (Aspect) | Aorist, Imperfect, Perfect, Pluperfect, Present, Future, | 6 | 18 |
| Mood | Indicative, Imperative, Subjunctive, Optative, Infinitive, Participle* | 6 | 108 |
| Person | Singular, Plural | 2 | 216 |
| Gender | Masculine, Feminine, Neuter | 3 | 648 |
The calculated combinatorial number shows how many theoretical possible forms of a verb can be made from any given lemma. The actual number is less than the totals shown because not all distinctives occur for the various distinctive elements. However, the full complexity of possibilities has not been included because participles, an very important Koine verb form, have an additional distinctive element of “case” (nominative, accusative, genitive, dative, and vocative).
Consider How λύω is Used as a Verb and Other Parts of Speech in the NT
Consider the below passage from the Gospel of John of a dispute between Jesus and the self-righteous Jewish authorities:
31 So Jesus said to the Jews who had believed him, “If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, 32 and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free [Verb form, Strong’s G1659].” 33 They answered him, “We are offspring of Abraham and have never been enslaved to anyone. How is it that you say, ‘You will become free’ [Adjective form, G1658]?”
34 Jesus answered them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, everyone who practices sin is a slave to sin.35 The slave does not remain in the house forever; the son remains forever. 36 So if the Son sets you free [Verb, G1659], you will be free [Adjective, G1658] indeed.
John 8:31-36 ESV (highlights mine, with four occurrences of Koine form of λύω)
Such verb form, as highlighted in bold italics in John vs 32 and 36 above, are in the mss highly inflected forms. For completeness, let us see the other such verb forms of λύω in the NT.
Romans Chapter 6
15 What then? Are we to sin because we are not under law but under grace? By no means! 16 Do you not know that if you present yourselves to anyone as [1] obedient slaves, you [2] are slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin, which leads to death, or of obedience, which leads to righteousness? 17 But thanks be to God, that you who [3] were once slaves of sin have become obedient from the heart to the standard of teaching to which you were committed, 18 and, [i] having been set free from sin, [4] have become slaves of righteousness. 19 I am speaking in human terms, because of your natural limitations. For just as you once presented your members [5] as slaves to impurity and to lawlessness leading to more lawlessness, so now present your members [6] as slaves to righteousness leading to sanctification.
20 For when you [7] were slaves of sin, you [ii] were free in regard to righteousness. 21 But what fruit were you getting at that time from the things of which you are now ashamed? For the end of those things is death.
Romans 6:18-20 ESV [highlights mine]
In the above passage we see the two occurrences of the verb form of λύω (shown in bold-italics, vs. 18 and 20) contrasted with the remarkable seven references to slavery (shown in bold, vs. 16(2), 17, 18, 19(2), 20)
And consider yet another such passage, this from Galatians:
1 For freedom Christ has set us free; stand firm therefore, and do not submit again to [1] a yoke of slavery.
2 Look: I, Paul, say to you that if you [2] accept circumcision, Christ will be of no advantage to you. 3 I testify again to every man who [3] accepts circumcision that he is obligated to keep [4] the whole law. 4 You are severed from Christ, [5] you who would be justified by the law; you [6] have fallen away from grace. 5 For through the Spirit, by faith, we ourselves eagerly wait for the hope of righteousness. 6 For in Christ Jesus [7] neither circumcision nor uncircumcision counts for anything, but only faith working through love.
Galatians 5:1-6 ESV [Highlights mine]
Again I have contrasted the occurrence of a form of λύω in vs. 1 (by both italics) with, here, seven references to Law (and in particular the rite of circumcision under such Law), the yoke of slavery, the state of falling from grace (into Law).
In addition to all of the above, Koine verb stems are often compounded with other Koine words to create richer verb forms as well as nouns, adjectives, and adverbs. We shall see this in connection with λύω in subsequent studies to be posted.