Logos (NIDNTT)

Classical Usage

OT Usage

NT Usage

Jesus Christ as the Word

λόγος G3364 (logos), word, utterance, meaning; λέγω G3306 (legō), collect, count, say; λογικός G3358 (logikos), intellectual, rational, reasonable, spiritual; λόγιον G3359 (logion), saying; λόγιος G3360 (logios), eloquent, cultured; ἄλογος G263 (alogos), irrational, without speech; λαλέω G3281 (laleō), to talk, chat, speak.

CL In the secular Gk. world, the word logos had already assumed a central significance for speculative thought long before its own terminology was more precisely defined. This became even more important at the time when the word was being adopted—precisely on account of the breadth of its basic meaning—as a technical term by the various developing sciences in Greece of the 5th cent. B.C. Grammar, logic, rhetoric, psychology and metaphysics, theology and mathematics gave it a different sense, even within the same branch of science.

1. Early Usage. The word logos, from the root leg-, to collect, to pick up, to recount, to speak, means word, discourse, language, account. In Homer, who uses it only in Il. 15, 393 and Od. 1, 56 in the plur., its meaning is not distinguished from mythos (→ myth) and epos, which dominate the same lexical field. But the post-Homeric usage differentiates the meanings. It reserves epos for epic literature based on the Homeric metre, and mythos to characterize fictitious stories, and then fictitious tales of the gods, which though poetically shaped, have an inner content of truth (first in Hdt., 2, 45). The area thus, so to speak, left free to denote that which is meant by “speech”, “word”, is occupied by a new post-Homeric word constructed on a Homeric root, rhēma, whereas logos, only weakly attested, stays restricted to the meaning of discourse (Xen. in Diels-Kranz I, 127, 9) or the theme of a discourse (Theognis, 1055).

2. Philosophical Usage. (a) The decisive change in the use of the word logos begins with Heraclitus (c. 500 B.C.). For him logos can mean discourse, didactic discourse, i.e. teaching (Frag. 1), word (Frag. 87), and even reputation (Frag. 39). But at the same time, it can also mean relation, proportion (Frag. 31), meaning (Frag. 50), common universal law (Frag. 2), truth (Frag. 1). It is worth noting with this breadth of meaning that Heraclitus has the whole field of meaning in mind in each individual use of the word: the words which contrast the objects with one another, the relationships which exist simultaneously between the objects, the law which underlies these relationships—a common law, in fact, including human beings as well—and the demand which grows out of this law, common to all men, for appropriate behaviour. It becomes clear from this that Heraclitus was not concerned with a philosophical system, but with getting hold of the unity of the One and the All (Frag. 50) through the existence of the universal law of proportion which underlies continuous change. logos for him is thus the instrument of thought, expressing both the thought-process and its conclusion, and also its consequences for the thinker (Frag. 2).

Since the logos, “unlike myth, which the god places in the soul of the poet as an inner truth … is directed to that which is existent and material”, it embraces “the whole empirical breadth of everything which one has ascertained by the use of eyes and ears” (Schadewald, Antike, 155). These conclusions are founded on the meaning of the verb legō, which underlies logos, and which denotes the activity of collecting, carefully selecting, cataloguing in succession, and arranging together in an orderly sequence. Thus originally it had nothing to do with talking or speaking. Everything that man sees he explores with his mind and relates together; this relationship, according to Heraclitus, is the logos of individual objects, contained in the objects themselves, and exhibiting a law common to all existents (Frag. 2). He is therefore able to say “the One is All” (Frag. 50). The world represents for him a reciprocal relationship between the objects and with the whole, into which man himself is drawn, on account of which he is also capable of reason. Hence he recognizes universal laws within himself (psychology) and the laws of his own being in the world-whole (metaphysics). This “world-whole”, however, still remains “world”. It must not be interpreted transcendentally; in fact, the thought of transcendence does not yet exist.

The precision with which Heraclitus expounded his teaching inevitably provoked opposition. If he himself had also required people to listen to nature (Frag. 112), his contemporary Parmenides combined with the word logos (with which he soon equated the term noēma, thought, Parmenides, Frag. 8, 50) the idea of pure thought undisturbed by the senses (Frag. 7, 4 f.). Parmenides thus transplanted the realm of the logos to the other side of the deceptive world of appearances, in the world of pure Being. In the world of appearances itself there is only the insoluble struggle of opposites with one another (→ Truth).

Three things become evident for the first time in the logos-concept: (i) antithetical argument (Parmenides regards himself as consciously opposed to Heraclitus in his thought: cf. Frag. 6, 4 f.); (ii) dualism (Parmenides divides Heraclitus’ “Whole” [Frag. 50] into two equal and clearly divorced spheres); (iii) the narrowing down of the concept of logos to the subjective sphere of the activity of thinking and the thought itself (Parmenides, Frag. 8, 50, where he even gives preference to the word noēma).

(b) At the same period (the middle of the 5th cent.), the teaching of the Sophists spread throughout Greece. This was an intellectual movement which stirred Greek society at all levels, and can be characterized by the following view-points: (i) reflection is directed towards man and towards the relationship between the individual and society; (ii) knowledge of the necessity, but also the possibility, of educating people to play a sensible part in political life; (iii) the conviction that the logos, discourse—accomplished by elucidation and criticism of poets (especially Homer)—made this possible.

In the confrontation over these three themes, the word logos took on the meaning of the individual method of argument, which was able to deal with the most varied problems in a totally disinterested manner, the only important thing being to defend one’s own proposition. The reason why this appeared possible was the conviction that every logos already contained the counter-logos (Protagoras in Diels-Kranz II, 266, 15 f.). Antithetical argumentation is thus recognized as the basic principle of debate. As compared with Parmenides, it was the world of here-and-now reality, which he had so devalued, which gained exclusive interest. This is reflected in the inductive method, which had likewise become the victim of severe condemnation by Parmenides.

It was now possible for debates on a particular theme to take place (dissoi logoi), through two-sided, mutually contrasted discourses concerning Good and Bad, Beautiful and Ugly, Truth and Falsehood (Diels-Kranz II, 405 ff.; even personified on stage by Aristophanes, Nubes 889–1104).

Dexterous manipulation of arguments made it possible to turn a “lesser”, i.e. a disreputable, unjust matter into the “better” (ton hēttō logon kreittō poiein), as, by a sophistic twist, Socrates in his trial was charged with having done (Plato, Apol. 18b).

However, it was not only the totally value-free meaning of logos, adapted to purely individual aims, which characterized the time of the Sophists. At the same period people saw a great force in the logos, a potentiality for everything great and significant. Gorgias (Diels-Kranz II, 290, 17 ff.) names it a great ruler, who can effect “most divine” (theiotata) works in the smallest body. Isocrates (3, 7) ascribes to it a pedagogic power by which the bad are reproved and the good are praised; he almost goes as far as to assign a civilizing power to the logos (cf. TDNT IV 82), since nearly everything that man has created has been created by the logos (15, 254). Here is the expression both of an enthusiasm that is typical of this period of enlightenment; but also of a recognition of value-conceptions that has an almost missionary trait. It is, however, significant that, according to the self-same Gorgias (Diels-Kranz II, 277, 39), the Sophistic art of oratory did not operate with empirical knowledge, by contrast with other skills (the word “knowledge” is expressly rejected in the sentence), but only with words (dia logōn), whereby the real truth of the matter was left out of account by the speaker. The activity of discussing (dialegesthai), in the Sophistic understanding, accordingly brings to light no more than thesis and antithesis. It is in the implementing of the discussion itself that there lies the value for which one is striving. It was possible for a Sophist to break off with a remark such as “Now it is time to turn to something else” (Plato, Prt. 361e), without any loss of face.

(c) Socrates turned against this Sophistic separation of word and content, with two basic considerations in mind: (i) since the world itself is ordered, the material objects of the world can only be expressed univocally; (ii) the activity of conversation (dialegesthai) takes place in the true sense of the word only when the intention is to reach agreement, the koinos logos, the common foundation of human community. He viewed discussion as a community-producing activity, so long as in the struggle for truth “all knowledge drives irrestibly towards realization” (R. Stenzel, “Socrates”, Pauly-Wissowa, III, 831). Socrates himself behaved in just such a way in prison (Plato, Crito 46b and c). The purpose of discussion for him is not talking for talking’s sake (logoi heneka logou, Plato, Crito 46d; cf. above 3 (a)), but the process of reflection through dialogue, which discovers the logos of things.

(d) Plato, whose thought was more concerned with the concept of Ideas or Forms, added nothing decisively new to the philosophical understanding of logos. Even with Aristotle no new ground is broken in the use of the logos-concept in the problem of the interpretation of the world and man’s relation to and in it. Rather, the Socratic-Platonic concept is systematized, and understood in a specialized and limited way. Man alone of living beings has logos, because his actions are determined by the word, and he himself is capable of speech and understanding (Pol. 1, 2p, 1253a, 9 f.; and Eth. Nic. 1, 6p, 1098a, 4 f.).

(e) Reviewing the development of the concept of logos so far, it is clear that no further development can take place along the lines of understanding that have been marked out. Heraclitus’ general universal law and the Sophists’ individual oratorical ability are the extremes beyond which one cannot go within the frame of reference provided by the existing understanding of logos. A fundamentally new orientation of thought, namely, the thesis that ethics is the basic problem for man, was provided by the Stoics, who confronted the Gk. starting-point of knowledge with the formulation of their question: How must I live in order to be able to be happy? Nevertheless, here too the complex of ideas from which the answer is worked out is denoted as the logos. It is instructive that in a → philosophy which was no longer orientated along either national Gk. or political, or ontological lines, the logos-concept yet retained the power to serve as a designation for the “Most General”. This “Most General” is, however, now no longer won by perception but set by conviction. The logos in this thinking is the expression for the ordered and harmonious purposiveness of the world (TDNT IV 84). It is equated with → God, or (as in Chrysippus, the second head of the Stoa, c. 250 B.C.) combined with God; it is the constitutive principle of the cosmos, which extends right through matter. In that the world is viewed as a unity and allowed to become an unfolding of the logos, a high degree of spiritualization is conceded to it. There is no room here for the Socratic conception of the active search for truth, which is necessarily followed by its re-enactment in society, although there is for the Heraclitean sense of the world-whole. For the Stoics the latter is not, of course, to be found in the world independent of thought, but derives from a specific point of origin in the Logos-God. Attempts are certainly made to bridge the gap between both realms by the idea of development; but a dichotomy or dualism is still presupposed, which—despite Parmenides—cannot be derived solely from Gk. thought.

A thorough intellectual organization of the world and the definition of man’s location in it—a fundamental pre-condition for ethics—is undertaken on the basis of Aristotelian schematization. There are, on the other hand, the seminal, the seed-bestowing Logoi (spermatikoi logoi) which permeate the whole world and bring about the continuity of all growth and occurrence and thus its meaningful course. Furthermore, there is a right Logos (orthos logos) or universal law which bestows on man the power of knowledge and thence of moral behaviour. Corresponding with the dual conceptuality of the word logos (thinking and saying) a distinction is made between the inner Logos (thinking), given by the God-Logos, and the Logos ordained for articulation (speaking)—a regression vis-à-vis Plato’s formulation that thinking is a dialogue with oneself (Plato, Soph. 263e).

(f) The secular Gk. intellectual beginnings brought late fruits to maturity in Neo-Platonism, a philosophical system of the 3rd cent. A.D. As in the Stoa, the Logos is here conceived as a force which invests material objects with shape, form and life (TDNT IV 85 f.), and is even bracketed together with → life (zōē; Plotinus, Enneads 6, 7, 11). Plotinus (A.D. 205–c. 269) asks: what is the Logos? His answer runs: It is as it were an emanation from spirit and soul (the components of the intelligible world) into the material world, and by means of this emanation the whole world, right to the last—even an already dead—little piece of matter is permeated by the Logos (cf. Enneads 3, 8, 2; TDNT IV 85). This process is thought of as a continuing, that is to say, not as a once-for-all, historical event. It represents in its combined association of intelligible and real world an overcoming of Stoic dualism. It is true that the Logos-component, which produces all the many and varied phenomena, is also here called logos spermatikos. But this is now no longer understood (as with the Stoics) in a biological and scientific sense as the “moisture in the seed”, but as a spiritual quality, Number, Measure or Logos.

Finally, as in Stoic doctrine, man is able to raise himself out of the delusion of reality by means of his own logos. But this process no longer leads in a Gk. sense to knowledge, with ethical behaviour as a consequence. Rather, it leads from the logoi (i.e. above and beyond the intelligible world) and sight (epi tēn thean), to the vision which is no longer Logos, but which creates a relationship with that which was earlier and is more than the logos (Enneads, 9, 4 and 10). However, with this conception of the goal of vision as the disclosure of a trans-logical reality, the realm of secular Gk. thought (for which the whole world is divine, but not yet divided into real and intelligible) is evidently left behind.

(g) Among the systems offering an explanation of the world in terms of the Logos there are, finally, the mystery religions. These cultic communities did not see their task as lying in the communication of knowledge of a scientific nature, but of mysteries to their initiates who strove for purification in the recurrent enactment of sacred actions (cf. G. Wagner, Pauline Baptism and the Pagan Mysteries, 1967). The foundation for the cultic actions was sacred texts (hieroi logoi, already thus in Hdt., 2, 51), revealed by the founder of the cult or by men inspired by the divinity on the basis of a → revelation. Among them were the cult of Dionysus, the Pythagoreans and the Orphic mysteries. By means of these cults, non-Gk. (primarily Egyptian) theological speculations influenced Gk. thought, such as in the Isis-Osiris mysteries, in which Osiris, the logos created by Isis, is the spiritual → image of the world (Plutarch, De Iside et Osiride 54). Similarly in the cult of Hermes, the latter informed his son Tat (an Egyptian name) in the “sacred text” belonging to the cult how by God’s mercy he became logos and thus a son of God (hyios theou). As such, he brought regulations and form into the world, but himself remained a mediating being between God and matter on the one side, and God and man on the other. The logos can also however appear as the son of Hermes, resulting in a triple gradation: God (Zeus), Son (Hermes), logos.

3. Usage in Grammar, Logic and Rhetoric. (a) Apart from its use in formulations of general interpretations of the world, the word logos is used with striking precision in the field of grammar. One of the examples of definition transmitted under Plato’s name (Plato, Definitiones 414d) is the following: “logos is a sound representable in written characters, which is able to express everything that exists, a discourse composed of substantives and verbs in the field of prose” (translation by H. Leisegang, “Logos”, Pauly-Wissowa, III 1037). logos is thus here set over against the Homeric concept, in line with the basic general Gk. meaning and set in the realm of (in particular, non-poetic) discourse. The word denotes a higher totality composed of levels made up of parts varying in size (letters, i.e. the basic elements, and words, the latter chosen qualitatively as being the words which constitute a sentence). Its possibilities for use are limitless. The formulation of this element-doctrine of the Logos is ascribed to the Atomists. Plato worked with it, and the doctrine initiates the development first to grammatical science, the teaching of sentence-analysis, and secondly to metaphysics, the teaching of the “logical” shape of the cosmos. (The word “logical” first appears in the Stoa.) By contrast with epos and lexis, logos is meaningful discourse.

(b) When the defence of mutually contradictory theses became the chief occupation of Sophistic philosophers, it became clear that anyone who wished to argue well and unassailably could not forgo a knowledge of grammar. Plato had realized that it was possible to form such opinions only when the existence of the object of the discussion could be asserted. For this, however, one needed a sentence, i.e. a combination of noun and verb; and such a sentence, i.e. a meaningful association of words, is in Plato called logos (cf. Soph. 262a).

Aristotle systematized this use of logos in making judgments in that he first of all investigated the words in themselves, before placing them in a meaningful context: there are the “categories”. In themselves they have no meaning, i.e. for Aristotle, in the realm of logic, there is no such thing as the logos of a word. But since it is the sentence which gives the individual word its sense and defines its limits of meaning, logos comes to mean the definition (Met. 7p, 1012a, 23; prepared for in Plato, Rep. 343a). Thirdly, alongside judgment and definition, logos for him means the conclusion, i.e. the final proposition of a line of argumentation (syllogism) which concludes the proof. A logos is a conclusion when, if something is posited, various other things of necessity follow from what is posited by virtue of the fact that it is the case (Analytica 1, 1p, 24b, 18, translation by Leisegang, op. cit., 1042). Finally, logos means the proof itself, so that the main points of a logical argument—judgment, definition, conclusion, proof—can be expressed both in Aristotle and subsequently in later logicians by the word logos. After Aristotle, Gk. philosophy did not again take great interest in the strictly logical shape of the word logos.

(c) If grammar is the science of the analysis of sentences (logoi, because meaningful), and if knowledge of it is necessary in order to argue logically, then it is inevitable that the art of rhetoric, in which this takes place, will also have to work with the idea of logos. For Gorgias, poetry, speeches in court and philosophical disputations are all equally logoi, now in verse, now under the imposed conditions of competition, now as controversies. The conflict arose over the different areas of competence of orators and philosophers: logos for the orator meant continuous discourse, for the philosopher dialogue. So, slowly, the dialogue took over as the stylistic form of the philosophers, the logos as the stylistic form of the orators. Plato is acquainted with both, but introduces also the entirely new so-called maieutic dialogue, or the Socratic dialogue, as it is now chiefly called (the term comes from Aristotle, Poet. 1447b, 11). This logos, the name of which is borrowed from midwifery, is characterized by the way that the one who engages in maieutic discussion does not wish to procure a victory for his own thesis (he does not even need to have one), but desires by his questioning to unearth the knowledge which may well be present in his partner, although he himself may not yet be conscious of it. From this form of dialogue the philosophical dialogue evolved, appearing among the Stoics as a sub-group of logic, and generally designated as dialectic.

4. The apparently bewildering overall picture of the use of logos fits together intelligibly, if we note that the word was used as human discourse with an eye to content—implying, however, objectivity and thereby conformity—in order to establish one’s mastery of the presumed regularity of the world. This is of course only true of those philosophers who were ready to argue from man to the world; but because of the strength of these systems the effect of these thinkers far exceeded that of the remaining representatives of Gk. → philosophy. To the same extent that the conviction of the order of the world (logos) was to be conveyed in a lecture (logos) to a sceptical audience, a speaker sharpened his appreciation of the particular choice and combination of various words (logos), their logical validity, and their power to convince (logos). Thus the speaker, who was able to convince his hearers with a carefully-constructed discourse (logos), was able to reap success.

One can also understand how the individual sciences (grammar, logic, rhetoric), the necessary means to this end, had already reached perfection in the 4th cent. B.C., because they were accessible to observation and systematic control, while the struggle for knowledge of the totality of the world was in flux far longer. It is worthy of note that, thanks not least to new basic assumptions from non-Gk. traditions of thought apparent from the time of the Stoics onwards, it was still possible to summon up the energy for a closed system in the 3rd cent. A.D.

G. Fries

OT 1. Heb. Terms for Word. The Heb. equivalent for logos is predominantly dāḇār, word, but not infrequently ’ēmer, word (cf. ’āmar, to say), ’imrâh, word, saying, and millâh, word. Since dāḇār is also rendered by → ῥῆμα in the LXX, it is important to make the statistical observation that in the OT historical books logos is the predominant rendering, while in the prophets rhēma predominates by as much as eight-fold. The vb. legō stands chiefly for ’āmar, to speak, to say, dāḇār means word, report, command, but also thing, matter, affair and (linked with adjs.) something (dāḇār ra’, something evil, Deut. 17:1; dāḇār gāḏôl, something great, 1 Sam. 20:2). It follows from the double structure of dāḇār—the meanings “word” and “thing”—that in the word there is always contained something of the thing itself, that the thing itself is only ever accessible in the word, and that the word cannot be separated from its content nor the content from the word.

The term “word of Yahweh” (deḇar YHWH) is found 241 times in the OT. The way in which these passages are distributed among the individual books (e.g. Jer. 52, Ezek. 60 times), the observation that the expression “word of Yahweh” is used substantially more often in the prophetic epoch than in any previous or later time, and the fact that 221 of all the OT occurrences (i.e. 93%) denote a prophetic word of God, permit the conclusion that this phrase virtually represents a technical term for the prophetic revelation of the word (O. Grether, Name und Wort Gottes im Alten Testament, BZAW 64, 1934, 77, cf. 63 ff.). In addition, dāḇār already served early on to designate the divine commandment and will for justice (Exod. 34:28, the Ten Commandments) granted to Israel along with their election and the → covenant, and, particularly in exilic and post-exilic times, to act as a periphrasis for the creatively efficacious activity of God in → creation (Gen. 1) and nature (Pss. 29 and 33). The prophetic word of promise which shapes history, the directive word of the covenant which takes possession of men and the creative word of God which determines nature and its order combine to describe the → revelation of God in the OT.

2. Ancient Oriental Notion of the Word of God. In the ancient Orient a word was widely regarded not as an indicative designation, i.e. as a bearer and mediator of meaningful content (the noetic aspect of the word), but as a power which was efficacious in incantations and magical spells, in blessings and curses, even in the spatial and material world. A → curse, as a baneful word, could penetrate the affected person like some disintegrating substance and bring destruction by spreading out-wards from within (the dynamic aspect of the word).

The divine word, in particular, was believed to possess dynamic power and creative potency in Egypt, Assyria and Babylonia. In Egypt the power of creation and the preservation of the world is traced back to the divine word. According to an inscription from Memphis, Ptah, the creator god, exercised his creative activity with the help of “heart and tongue”, i.e. with his word (L. Dürr, Die Wertung des göttlichen Wortes im Alten Testament und im antiken Orient, Mitteilungen der Vorderasiatisch—(ägyptisch)en Gesellschaft, 42, 1, 1938, 25). The dynamic power of the creative word is also conveyed from Ptah to other gods. Thus it is said of Thoth: “What rises up out of his mouth takes place, and what he says happens” (ibid., 27 f.). In Mesopotamia, too, the creative power of the divine word is praised. The following predications may be quoted from the Marduk-Ellil hymns: “His word, which passes by like a storm.… The word which rends the heavens above; the word which shakes the earth below.… His word is a storm which annihilates everything.… When his word proceeds gently along, it destroys the land” (8 ff.). As far as the difference between the biblical and the ancient oriental understanding of the word of God is concerned, one can assert, despite many analogies, that in the latter the divinity “is set in a partly magical and partly natural relation to the world” and that in consequence “the word is also viewed as a magical or natural quantity or as an emanation of the divinity, so that the divinity is linked to or identified with nature” (O. Grether, op. cit., 144). In Israel, by contrast, the creative word of God was purified of any magical or emanative understanding, and demythologized to become the word of the God who by exhortation, claim and promise gives shape to history. The OT knows only the particular and at any given time underived creative word of God spoken to the world.

3. The Forms of the Prophetic Proclamation of the Word of God. The subjectmatter of prophetic → proclamation is the word of God. However, in so far as the words of the OT prophets display certain basic common forms, despite their individual differences, one must ask what understanding of the word of God the various forms and literary categories of prophetic proclamation express, since it is not the prophet who avails himself of the word, but Yahweh’s word which takes the prophet into its service. Here the question of form-criticism passes immediately into that of content: “What determined the choice of the form was primarily the subject-matter of the message” (G. von Rad, Old Testament Theology, II, 1965, 39).

(a) The word of God as a word of vocation (the literary category of the account of a call). The special nature of prophetic proclamation finds expression in accounts of calls where the authority of the prophetic word is grounded solely in the word of God which gives the commission, i.e. in the call. Two forms of the accounts of calls can be distinguished: the first form (Jer. 1:4–10) is characterized by a divine discourse (a word of election and appointment), by the prophetic contradiction and the confirmation of the sending by a concluding sign (here the touching of the mouth, “Behold, I have put my words in your mouth”, Jer. 1:9). This form of call-account, characterized by the word of God addressed and transmitted to the prophet, is distinguished particularly by the “very personal individual encounter between Yahweh and the one called” and “the strict subordination of every other consideration to the word of Yahweh” (W. Zimmerli, Ezechiel, BKAT XIII/1, 1969, 17 f.). The second form begins with a vision, where the word issued to the prophet does not go forth in the context of a personal dialogue with the prophet, but is pictured as the result of a consultation of Yahweh with his council which the prophet sees in a vision (Isa. 6; Ezek. 1). But in that the word of vocation comes from the sphere of the divine council, i.e. in that the prophetic word of commission is crystallized out of the vision of the throne-scene, the second form of call-account also clearly exhibits the subordination of the visionary element to the word of vocation: the vision reaches its climax in the audition, in the promulgation of the word of God (W. Zimmerli, op. cit., 19 f.). The concentration on the word of Yahweh which calls the prophet, the account of the call as the prophet’s own “press report”, to which there are no adequate parallels in the ancient Orient, the fact that the prophetic subject “is knowingly, consciously and willingly addressed, and won over to obedience” (H. W. Wolff, Gesammelte Studien zum Alten Testament, ThB 22, 1964, 215), the observation that “the waking consciousness was greatly intensified but in no way switched off” (ibid.), that the prophet thus knew “that he had been really called and not intoxicated” (op. cit., 216), and, finally, the surprising fact that the prophets from Amos onwards do not understand themselves as bearers of the Spirit, but as proclaimers of the word of Yahweh—all this shows the difference between the prophetic reception of the word and an ecstatic experience, which by-passes the consciousness. In other words, the various forms of call-accounts make it clear that “the supremacy of the word is the essential distinguishing feature of the Old Testament prophet” (ibid.; cf. Grether, op. cit., 84 ff.).

(b) The word of God as the word of a messenger (the messenger formula). One of the most striking marks of the prophetic proclamation of the word is the introductory formula, “Thus says Yahweh”, which represents something of a constant within the literary categories utilized by the prophets, from Elisha to Malachi. This formula originates in the formal language of the secular sending of messengers. It presupposes the situation of a messenger who comes with a message he has received previously, and who, in delivering his message, refers back to this occasion (cf. Gen. 32:4–6; 2 Ki. 18:19, 29, 31). Since, at the point of time of delivering the message, the messenger refers back to the occasion, now in the past, when the employer entrusted him with the message, one should translate “thus has Yahweh spoken”. ([Ed.] But because this word has a continuing validity representing the mind and will of the master the emphatic present, “Thus says Yahweh”, is equally correct. The Hebrew mind probably did not draw a sharp distinction between past and present in this respect.) The adoption of the messenger formula to introduce the prophetic word indicates that this is strictly understood as a passing on of the entrusted word of God. The messenger formula turns up as early as the Mari letters of the 18th cent. B.C., which report of prophets who have to deliver a message to the king on behalf of God. But the unqualified announcement of judgment by the prophets from Amos onwards is a contrast to such qualified prophecies of well-being delivered to the king to which one can also add rebuke and intervention against the king (cf. Nathan in 2 Sam. 12:1ff.; Gad in 2 Sam. 24:11ff.). The Mari texts have no parallels to these unqualified words of judgment (cf. C. Westermann, Basic Forms of Prophetic Speech, 1967).

(c) The word of God as a word of disaster (the structure of the prophetic word of judgment). The word of disaster in the prophets before Amos, almost always directed immediately to an individual (usually the king), presents a two-membered statement: the prophet names the crime and announces Yahweh’s judgment. Between the accusation and the announcement of judgment stands the messenger formula (“therefore thus has Yahweh spoken”, 1 Ki. 21:17ff.; 2 Ki. 1:3f.). In other words, the prophets made a clear distinction between the initial accusation (the motivation) and the announcement of the judgment (the direct word of God). Strictly speaking, the word of God is only the announcement of judgment. It is characterized as such by the introductory messenger formula: the accusation stands before the actual word of the messenger (cf. C. Westermann, ibid.). The prophetic words of disaster from Amos onwards, directed against Israel or Judah as a whole, frequently display the same two-membered nature—motivation, messenger formula and announcement of judgment (Amos 4:1–3; Isa. 8:5–8). The word of God issued direct to the prophet and characterized as such by him by means of the messenger formula (mainly containing subject-matter of a general sort, e.g. “the end has come”, Amos 8:2) is given added precision by the prophet by means of an introductory, explanatory and accusatory word of motivation addressed to the listeners. The accusation which provides the motive for and preface to the word of disaster is thus a piece of prophetic reflection on the basis of the reception of the direct word of God. The prophet is no mere mouthpiece of God, but a responsible translator of the received word of God into the situation of the addressee: “It is hardly possible to overrate the importance of the prophet’s share, for without it the word the prophet receives does not reach its goal” (G. von Rad, op. cit., II, 73).

(d) The word of God and the word of man (quotations in prophetic oracles). Those to whom the word is addressed are also drawn into the word of God, in that the prophet reproduces moods, sentiments and attitudes of the hearers in quotations of words they have spoken (H. W. Wolff, “Das Zitat im Prophetenspruch”, op. cit. 38 ff.). Yahweh’s word is then understood as his reply to a statement by the people reproduced in quotation form. Characteristically, however, this is not placed in the messenger’s word itself, but in the prophet’s grounding of the accusation which precedes the word of God. For the prophetic messenger of the word, God’s word and man’s word are not interchangeable. Conversely, of course, a messenger word which merely extends the word of God “but fails to produce a confrontation with the hearers is essentially unprophetic” (Wolff, op. cit., 110). It is thus precisely the quotation in the prophetic word which shows that Yahweh’s word, promulgated by him directly to the prophet, sets out to engage in complete dialogue with the addressees and can assimilate the word of man. But in that the word of man can thus be taken up into the movement of the word of God, it becomes true that “even the quotation is proclamation” (Wolff, op. cit., 84).

(e) The character of the word of God as event (the word-event formula). The characteristic formula for the prophetic reception of the word runs: way ehî deḇar YHWH ’el …, lit. “and the word of Yahweh was to.…” 113 OT passages contain this formula, which turns up in the prophetic histories of the early monarchy (e.g. Samuel, 1 Sam. 15:10; Nathan, 2 Sam. 7:4; Elijah, 1 Ki. 17:2, 8; 18:1), appears in the redactional headings of the prophetic books (Hos. 1:1; Zeph. 1:1), but in Jer. (30 times, in part secondary) and especially in Ezek. (50 times) invades the prophet’s own words, and also has a firm place in Hag. (2:10, 20) and Zech. (9 times) (cf. W. Zimmerli, BKAT XIII/1, 89).

This word-event formula is characteristic for the OT conception of the word of God in several respects. (i) Since the basic meaning of the verb hāyâh, “it was”, denotes that something becomes effective, the formula could almost be translated “the word of God became active reality with …” (S. Mowinckel, Die Erkenntnis Gottes bei den alttestamentlichen Propheten, 1942, 19, quoted in G. von Rad, op. cit., II, 87, n. 15), or “the word assumed effective shape in” (C. A. Keller, BHHW III 2183). The dynamic, urgently pressing force of the word of God clearly emerges here. (ii) The word-event formula stresses “the eminently historical character of the word of God in partaking of the nature of an event” (W. Zimmerli, BKAT XIII/1, 89). The revelation of the word to the prophet is not a process of one-sided spiritual perception of timeless truth but an event which assails the prophet, even, at times, physically (Isa. 21:1–10; Jer. 4:19–21); here the word of God appears as a virtually objective force with a dynamic impact (O. Grether, op. cit., 150 ff.). (iii) The word-event formula does not speak indeterminately of “a word”, but of “the word of God” becoming an effective event (L. Koehler, Old Testament Theology, 1957, 106). The word which goes forth at any particular time demands to be accepted as the complete word of God. There is no superior concept with which to organize and domesticate the word of God. (iv) The frequent utilization by Jer. and especially Ezek. of the word-event formula is the mark of an “already highly developed knowledge of the ‘word of Yahweh’, almost indeed, of the development in Prophetic circles of a ‘prophetic theology of the word’ ” (W. Zimmerli, op. cit., 89).

4. The Word of God in Prophetic Proclamation. (a) Prophecy before the writing prophets (Samuel, Elijah, Elisha). As Samuel, to whom “the word of Yahweh” was revealed (1 Sam. 3:7) at a time when “Yahweh’s word had become rare in the land” (1 Sam. 3:1), announced judgment on Saul on account of his “rejection of the word of God” (1 Sam. 15:23, 26), so → Elijah invoked the validity of the word of Yahweh with absolute authority against King Ahab, basing himself on the covenant-traditions of the “God of Israel” (1 Ki. 17:1) and the “God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob” (1 Ki. 18:36). He announced to Ahab that neither dew nor rain would fall “except by my word” (1 Ki. 17:1). In consequence of the efficacious power of his mighty word, Elijah was for Ahab the “destroyer of Israel”, because he had not only prophesied the drought, but also caused it by his word (1 Ki. 18:17). In view of the threat of confusion between Yahweh and Baal as a result of Ahab’s syncretistic religious policies, Elijah, as God’s spokesman in Israel on Mount Carmel, brought about a fundamental divorce between Yahweh and Baal on the basis of divine judgment, in order to prove that Yahweh was God and that Elijah had “done all these things at thy word” (1 Ki. 18:36). Thus, thanks to the preaching of Elijah all areas of life, whether in respect of property (the story of Naboth, 1 Ki. 21) or health (Ahaziah’s search for healing, 2 Ki. 1) were subordinated to Yahweh’s lordship, and transgression of the divine law was requited with a word of judgment to the individual (1 Ki. 21:17–19; 2 Ki. 1:3f.; cf. C. Westermann, op. cit.). Elijah’s journey to Horeb, which links up with Israel’s → wilderness tradition, showed with regard to → revelation, that Yahweh does not reveal himself in storm, earthquake and fire, but in quietly whispered words (1 Ki. 19:12). As with Elijah, so with Elisha, prophetic word and action are closely interwoven. Nowhere in the OT are so many miracles crowded into so small a space and recounted as proof of the prophet’s charisma as here (G. von Rad. op. cit., II, 27). By contrast with the prophets from Amos to Jeremiah, Elijah and Elisha are bearers of the Spirit at the same time as they are proclaimers of the word of God—Yahweh’s word and Yahweh’s spirit are here closely interconnected. The power of the prophetic word in the political sphere is shown not least by Elisha’s designation of Jehu (2 Ki. 9).

(b) The conception of the word of God in the writing prophets. (i) Amos. “The words of Amos of Tekoa” (Amos 1:1): so runs the heading to an older selection of Amos’ words from chs. 3–5, which has not yet been given the heading “word of Yahweh”, as those who later pass on the words of the prophets like to do (cf. Hos. 1:1; Jer. 1:1). The connexion of the heading “the words of Amos” with the form of the collection of the wise men (cf. the “words of the wise” in Prov. 22:17) indicates, conversely, that at the time of the recording of the sayings of Amos there is still no tradition of literary collections of words of the prophets (H. W. Wolff, Dodekapropheton, BKAT XIV/1, 19652, 153).

The rhetorical question, “If the lion has roared, who is not afraid? If Yahweh has spoken, who can but proclaim it?” (Amos 3:8) presents a word in the form of a discussion, giving a reply to the question of the legitimacy of speaking in the name of Yahweh: Yahweh’s word has startled and caught the prophet by surprise. Anyone who attributes his appearance to brazen caprice must ask himself whether terror at the sudden roaring of a lion is capricious. The inseparable connexion between cause and effect makes it clear: Yahweh’s word has irresistibly compelled the prophet to engage in proclamation. His proclamation is a reflex action in response to the word of Yahweh, as is terror to a lion’s roar.

In the cycle of visions (Amos 7:1–8; 8:1–2; 9:1–4; cf. 8:2 “the end has come upon my people”), Amos explains how Yahweh forced on him the word concerning the imminent end. Amos distinguishes himself from all previous prophets by preaching total destruction, not just for a single individual (e.g. the king by Nathan in 2 Sam. 7 and 12 and Gad in 2 Sam. 24 and 1 Chr. 21) but for the whole of Israel. Since in Amos’ time under Jeroboam II (787–747 B.C.) Israel was enjoying a period of booming economic prosperity, the proclamation of disaster cannot be viewed as the consequence of rational calculation and political far-sightedness. Its sole source is the event of Yahweh’s word itself, Yahweh’s firm grip, which took Amos from herding the flocks and compelled him to speak (Amos 7:15).

From this one can understand the frequent appearance of the messenger-formula (“Thus says Yahweh”, 11 times; Amos 1:3, 6, 9, 11, 13; 2:1, 4, 6; 3:12; 5:3f.) and the concluding formula (“Yahweh says”, Amos 1:5, 8, 14; 2:3, 11, 16; 3:15; 4:3, 5f., 8–11; 5:17; 7:3; 9:15). The advice of the high priest Amaziah to his king—“the land is no longer able to bear all his words” (Amos 7:10)-is also explicable from Amos’ announcement of total judgment. The word of Yahweh, proclaimed by Amos, has reached dangerous proportions for Israel’s religious, political and economic life. Amos is banished from the land: “You must not preach any longer” (Amos 7:13). A thoughtless people, especially its upper classes, self-confident in their own prosperity, have not listened to his word.

Amos therefore preached that a hunger for the word of God would so overwhelm them that they would stagger around exhausted in the search for the word of Yahweh (Amos 8:11f.). Yahweh can hold back his word; he retains the right of disposal over his word. The longing to hear Yahweh’s words is not here a sign of religious life but a hunger which results in death. If Yahweh has withdrawn his word, on which Israel’s whole existence is based, that is the ultimate catastrophe (cf. G. von Rad, op. cit., II, 92; for a different view see Wolff, BKAT, XIV, 379 f., who holds that the saying belongs to a later time reflecting Deuteronomic preaching).

(ii) Hosea. The heading “the word of Yahweh that came to Hosea” (Hos. 1:1; cf. Joel 1:1; Micah 1:1; Zeph. 1:1; Jer. 1:1 LXX) comes from a collector of prophetic tradition from Deuteronomistic circles in Judea.

Since Hosea’s commissioning as messenger includes not only his word, but also his marriage and family life, this title makes it clear that “Yahweh’s word” does not exclusively denote the word of God to be proclaimed by the prophet (Hos. 2:18, 23f.; 4:1 etc.), but also the life of the prophet expropriated by the word of Yahweh. “Thus the book of Hosea does not even present the narratives of the prophet (1:2–9; 3:1–5) out of biographical interest, but only because they preserve the word of Yahweh” (H. W. Wolff, BKAT XIV, 3). Yahweh’s command to Hosea to marry a girl (a “whore”) who had fallen prey to Canaanite cultic immoralities, and in this marriage to exemplify the guilt of the Israel of that time, which had itself lapsed into Canaanite fertility rites, is a symbolic action (Hos. 1:2ff.) with which the prophet is commissioned at the beginning of his prophetic ministry, “for the land commits great harlotry by forsaking Yahweh” (Hos. 1:2b). This symbolic disclosure of the word of God introduces the first period of Yahweh’s speaking through Hosea by stating, according to Hos. 1:2a, how Yahweh began to speak through (not to) Hosea, and is to be understood as a kind of foreword. This first period of the promulgation of Yahweh’s word is directed towards a second; Hos. 3 reports another symbolic action, whereby Hosea rescues his wife from slavery and takes firm protective measures to prevent her giving way to her inclinations (Hos. 3:1–5). That is to say, although Israel has turned away from Yahweh and been justly repudiated by him, she will be accepted back again, because Yahweh loves her. The two symbolic actions together thus sound out the centre of Hosea’s proclamation. In that the prophet himself presents the word of Yahweh in his own life, and not merely proclaims the word of God by mouth but by his whole family life, Hosea himself comes entirely under the word of God. “This vivid symbolic demonstration of the word of God in the prophet’s family … announces the message of the incarnation of the word” (H. W. Wolff, op. cit., 24).

In the second part (chs. 4–14), introduced by the attention-catching formula, “Hear the word of the LORD, O people of Israel” (4:1; “word of God” only occurs in Hosea at 1:4 and 4:1) “the whole path of Hosea’s proclamation from the threats of judgment to announcement of salvation is … now trodden a second time” (Wolff, op. cit., 83).

This ultimate correlation of word of judgment and word of salvation in Hosea is confirmed finally by Hos. 6:5: “Therefore I have hewn them by the prophets, I have slain them by the words of my mouth, and my judgment goes forth as the light.” “Prophets” and “words of my mouth” here stand in parallel, i.e. the prophets are messengers of Yahweh, in so far as they proclaim the words of the mouth of Yahweh. The goal of Yahweh’s word of judgment is the restoration of a new order of life (Hos. 6:5b); the word that slays is in the service of the word which saves. The teleological correlation of God’s word of judgment with his word of salvation is particularly clear in Hosea.

(iii) Isaiah. If the heading of Isa. 1:1 describes the content of the whole book of Isaiah as a “vision” (ḥāzôn) of the prophet, the content of the selection which originally began at Isa. 2:1 is characterized as “the word” which the prophet “saw”. The visionary experience of the reception of the word is expressed here, just as is the central position of the word as being the content of the prophetic vision.

The corresponding absolute use of “word” is found in Isa. 9:7 (EVV 9:8): “The LORD has sent a word against Jacob, and it will light upon Israel.” This verse not only speaks of the “word” in the absolute as of an almost independent entity, but it also gives us no information as to the content to which people should listen. What is under discussion here is not a word as the bearer of a message, but the word as a bearer of divine and powerful consequences, which creates history. According to Grether, the word is here “rather like an accumulation of latent energies which cannot wait to be released very much longer … The dāḇār is like a missile with a timefuse which has just hit the enemy lines and must explode in the next few seconds” (op. cit., 104). This word of Yahweh bound to the prophet (the word is “sent”) is the power which sets history in motion and causes all kinds of destruction, which judges the disobedient nation in a cumulative series of acts of divine punishment (Isa. 9:7–20; 5:25–30). Isaiah looks back to an epoch when Yahweh intervened in Israel’s history with ever new blows, and understands these judgments as the ever new discharges of the word of God sent, proclaimed and dismissed.

This is how the word concerning hardening of the heart in Isa. 6:9f. should be understood. Isaiah is commissioned to make the nation obdurate and to harden its heart by means of this very word of God, “until cities lie waste without inhabitant, and houses without men, and the land is utterly desolate” (Isa. 6:9–11). In the word concerning hardening of the heart, the conception of the creative word of God at work in history is given its sharpest definition, namely that “this word effects judgment not only in the external world of history, but in human beings, in the most hidden recesses of their own hearts, namely, their refusal of the appeal by which Yahweh would save them” (G. von Rad, op. cit., II, 154; cf. Isa. 9:7). The hardening of Israel’s heart to Yahweh’s solicitous offer and the word about obduracy which forms the subject-matter of the prophetic commission—these are the things which constitute the puzzle of Isaiah’s proclamation.

The word of God to be proclaimed by Isaiah is thereby independent of its rejection by men. “The fact that a prophet’s word is not heard is far from meaning that this is the end of it” (G. von Rad, op. cit., 155). The repudiation of the word by Isaiah’s generation means that it must be recorded for a future one: “And now go, write it before them on a tablet, and inscribe it in a book, that it may be for the time to come as a → witness for ever.… Because you despise this word” (Isa. 30:8, 12; cf. 8:16ff.). This process of the documentary recording of the message rejected by those who heard it shows not only that, despite its lack of success, the word of God is far from finished. It also, and for the first time, shows the character of the written word, where the prophet extends the area of reference of the word of God beyond the first circle of recipients to hearers further off. The word of God still has a future beyond its rejection, for “he does not call back his words” (Isa. 31:2; 55:11).

This future is depicted in Isa. 2:2–5 (cf. Micah 4:1–3). Here is the account of a pilgrimage of the nations to the → mountain of God, one nation urging another: “Come, let us go up to the mountain of the LORD.… For out of Zion shall go forth the law and the word of the LORD from Jerusalem” (→ Wilderness, → Mountain, art. κατήγορος). The hope is directed to the new order of life established by Yahweh, in the centre of which stands the word of God, signifying righteousness and life and embracing directions for living. The close relationship of the word of God to instruction and law (see below, 5) is shown not only in the designation of the word of God as Torah (Isa. 2:3) but also in the prophet’s words which are spoken in the style of priestly Torah.

(iv) Jeremiah. The heading of the book as a whole “words of Jeremiah” (not as W. Rudolf would have it: “the story of Jeremiah”, Jeremia, HAT 12, 1968 3, 1), and the statistical observation that the term “word of Yahweh” appears 52 times in Jer. out of a total of 241 occurrences in the OT, and that the word-event formula appears 30 times out of a total of a 113 occurrences in the OT (Grether, op. cit., 65 ff.) makes it quite obvious that we are already here in a world of reflective knowledge of the “word of Yahweh”, which entitles us to speak in Jer. of a “theology of the word”. This view still stands, even discounting the suggested Deuteronomic revisions and additions (e.g. Jer. 11:1ff.; 46:1; 47:1; 49:34).

The word of God came to Jeremiah as a powerful word of vocation (627 B.C.). The calling of Jeremiah (Jer. 1:4–10) is characterized by the introductory word-event formula as being entirely word-event. Yahweh’s word of election and commission (Jer. 1:5) dominates the whole process; the touching of his lips by Yahweh’s hand seems to be the sole visionary trait (Jer. 1:9a). The word of appointment to be “a prophet to the nations” is followed by the prophet’s interruption (Jer. 1:6). The exhortation to be fearless (Jer. 1:8) makes it clear that the real cause of the prophet’s interruption is not his youthful age but his fear of the office of messenger of the word; Jeremiah is well aware of their sufferings from the past history of prophecy. By contrast with the voluntary application of Isa. 6:8b we see here already a knowledge of the burden of proclaiming the word of Yahweh. The process of sending consists, in the case of Jeremiah, in the transference of the word of God: “Behold, I have put my words in your mouth” (Jer. 1:9). The transmission of the word of God to the prophet does not signify for Jeremiah that he has any rights over the word, but it includes the knowledge of Yahweh’s freedom to keep him waiting for the event of the word of God. It is through the transmission of the word of God to Jeremiah that he becomes an agent of the word who has been set “over nations and over kingdoms”; as an individual he has been given the power to intervene in the fortunes of nations and kings. These are not the reflections of a megalomaniac which “would make the weal and woe of whole nations dependent on the word of a young man from a petty state” (expressly rejected by W. Rudolf, Jeremia, 6). Here, rather, is revealed the mightiness of the word of God, which is not thrown into history without effect (cf. Isa. 9:7). The prophet’s mandate of the word is negative and positive: “to pluck up and break down, to destroy and to overthrow, to build and to plant” (Jer. 1:10). Already there begins to emerge here in the call the clear knowledge of the two-sided nature of the word of God as word of judgment (chs. 1–25) and word of salvation (chs. 30–32).

The word of God features prominently in Jeremiah’s early preaching (627–622 B.C., the time of Josiah). The theme of the first phase of Jeremiah’s preaching is Yahweh’s complaint against Israel’s faithless back-sliding into the Baal cult (Jer. 2:1–4:5, cf. Hosea), and the announcement of the dawning of Yahweh’s wrath in the shape of the advancing sinister foe from the north (Jer. 4:5–6:30). In response to Jeremiah’s proclamation of judgment, by which he placed himself in the succession of his predecessors, his hearers replied in effect: “What the prophets say turns out to be nothing but wind, and the word [of the LORD] is not in them” (5:13). But because the prophet’s word is denied as God’s word, God turns it to its destructive fulfilment: “behold, I am making my words in your mouth a fire” (5:14). That is the reply of the word of God (dāḇār) to the practical atheism of men’s words of mockery (dāḇār; 5:14). The prophet’s temptation to doubt, which arises in view of the people’s ridicule of the message of judgment, issued and issuing, and his question: will the word that I have proclaimed as Yahweh’s word also definitely come true? is similarly reflected in the vision of the almond-bough, which follows immediately after the account of the call. This indicates clearly the beginning of the prophet’s reflections and doubts concerning the effective fulfilment of Yahweh’s word. Yahweh’s interpretation of the vision of the almond (Heb. šāqēḏh) is: “I am watching [šōqēḏh] over my word to perform it” (Jer. 1:12; note the play on words in which the point of the vision turns on a pun).

The word of God also features in the misunderstanding of the Deuteronomic reform (609–598 B.C., the time of Jehoiakim). Jeremiah was silent in the period following the Josianic reform (622–609 B.C.). He was waiting to see whether the nation was really turning to Yahweh. Jeremiah was neither a critic nor a propagandist of the reform; no word from God reached him during this time. After the death of Josiah, however, and with Jehoiakim’s accession to the throne, when it became clear that the Deuteronomic reform had produced no return to Yahweh, but only a false religious confidence, the word of God reached the prophet anew (Jer. 7:1; 26:1). In the famous temple sermon Jeremiah inveighed against the religious confidence of the nation which appeals to the → temple and the divine presence (Jer. 7:4) but has no use for the covenant commandment (Jer. 7:5ff.). This excessive emphasis on the temple and on confidence in their deliverance is nothing but an impenitent trust in “delusive words” (Jer. 7:4, 8 JB) and will bring in its train the destruction of the temple (Jer. 7:14). In the great liturgy of the day of repentance, which Jeremiah depicts (Jer. 14:1–15:4), and in which there are echoes of conventional songs of repentance sung by the people (Jer. 14:7, 9, 19–22), the reply of Yahweh (Jer. 14:10; 15:1–4) is the announcement of judgment and catastrophe. In Yahweh’s word through the prophet, the people’s pious impenitence comes to light. A further consequence of the misunderstanding of the Deuteronomic reform was the bragging of the scribes about the word of the covenant commandment, which thus became a dead law: “How can you now say, ‘We are wise, and the law of the LORD is with us’? But, behold, the false pen of the scribes has made it a lie. The wise men shall be put to shame, they shall be dismayed and taken; lo, they have rejected the word of the LORD, and what wisdom is in them?” (Jer. 8:8f.). The invectives against the temple and scribes earned Jeremiah a death-sentence (ch. 26). But he stood by his message and was ready to answer for it with his own life. The word of Yahweh and the messenger of the word cannot be separated. In ch. 26 it is accordingly not the suffering of the prophet, but the passion-story of the word of God that stands at the centre.

The word of God plays an important part in the confessions of Jeremiah. Jeremiah’s ministry as a messenger was not exhausted by his preaching of the word of God. Jeremiah’s suffering was the suffering of the man who has, in his own person, been hurt himself by Yahweh’s word of judgment. We see the prophet sharing suffering under the word of God, shaken to the very depths of his physical being by that judgment which he himself announced (Jer. 4:19–21). In Jeremiah’s lament over the sick and dying land (Jer. 8:18–23), we see man under the judgment and onslaught of the word of God. As often as Yahweh’s word came to him, he accepted it greedily as if it were his favourite dish: “Thy words were found, and I ate them, and thy words became to me a joy and the delight of my heart” (Jer. 15:16). But this pleasure and happiness at receiving the word was broken by the knowledge of the judgment he must proclaim, which drove him into isolation from human beings (Jer. 15:17; cf. 16:1–9). Jeremiah, the proclaimer of God’s word of judgment, who himself suffered as he announced this judgment against his own inward feelings (Jer. 4:19), and who staked everything on restraining the judgment by means of his intercession (Jer. 14:11; 15:1), suffered at the same time under the taunt that the judgment he announced apparently never seemed to come: “Behold, they say to me, ‘Where is the word of the LORD? Let it come true!‘” (Jer. 17:15). Jer. 19:1–20:6 reports how, after the symbolic action of the smashing of an earthenware flask, Jeremiah was beaten and put in the stocks by Pashhur, the priest and chief officer of the temple, on account of this proclamation of judgment. The confession of Jer. 20:7–9 follows immediately after the passion: “the word of the LORD has meant for me insult” (20:8 JB). The prophet’s resolve to proclaim the word of Yahweh no longer (20:9a) came up against the irresistible weight of the word which presses in on him, like some objective force, from within and without. The suppressed word of God burnt like a fire inside him, threatening disintegration, so that it seemed preferable to endure ridicule and maltreatment rather than be consumed by the burning of the word. Because Jeremiah stood on the side of those who have experienced the assault of the word of God, and because, as a messenger of the word of judgment, he was simultaneously drawn into the suffering of God over his people, it belongs to the event of the word of God that the → witness himself is broken. With no other prophet is the extent of the word of judgment entrusted to him, the suffering which he shares under the assault of the word of God, the suffering he feels at the taunt that the word of God has been proclaimed, but apparently not fulfilled, and the knowledge of the impossibility of escape from the commission to preach the word of God so clearly perceptible as in the case of Jeremiah. The story of the scroll in ch. 36, as also the suffering of Jeremiah himself, is intended to be understood as a kind of passion story of the word of God: man wants to burn the word (Jer. 36:23), but Yahweh’s word remains in force even more fully than beforehand (Jer. 36:32). The fact that suffering with Jeremiah was an integral component part of the prophetic ministry is expressed at least (in formal respects) in the fact that, by contrast with the prophets before him, one can no longer clearly notice any formal demarcation between accusatory prophetic discourse and God’s actual word of judgment (G. von Rad, op. cit., II, 69, 193).

The word of God is the criterion of false prophecy at the time of Zedekiah (598–587 B.C.). As the collection of sayings “concerning the prophets” (Jer. 23:9–40) shows, Jeremiah clashed with prophetic circles in Jerusalem which proclaimed after the first deportation of 598 B.C. that the disaster would be averted, and that the deportees would soon return (Jer. 23:16ff.; 28:2ff.). In the face of the sanguine words of these dreamers—what has the word of God to do with dreams? (Jer. 23:28)-Jeremiah proclaimed the abiding validity of God’s powerful word of judgment: “Is not my word like fire, says the LORD, and like a hammer which breaks the rocks in pieces?” (Jer. 23:29). In his confrontation with the prophets of optimism and Hananiah, who proclaimed deliverance for Jerusalem, Jeremiah sought for the criteria of the true word of God in false prophecy. Anyone who has been present in Yahweh’s council will not be able to tell his hearers what they desire (Jer. 23:18, 22). When the word comes true it will be known whether the prophet has spoken Yahweh’s word (Jer. 28:9). How little the prophet himself has these criteria at his disposal is shown in Jer. 28:11. Jeremiah is not able to counter Hananiah’s proclamation of deliverance with any word of Yahweh and goes his way in order to wait for the renewed event of the word of God (Jer. 28:12). Yahweh’s even more severe word of judgment (Jer. 28:12ff.) thus links up with the breaking of the yoke and Hananiah’s message of optimism. God’s word of power does not leave man’s negative reply out of account. However much the word of God may be accompanied by such signs, serving as criteria, these are not open to human manipulation, either objective or neutral. “The right to articulate the predicate ‘false prophet’ with authority is reserved alone for the prophet” who waits in obedience and readiness for the new event of the word of God (cf. G. Quell, Wahre und falsche Propheten, BFChTh 46, 1, 1952, 194).

(v) Ezekiel. The frequent appearance of the messenger formula, the appearance 60 times out of 241 OT occurrences of the phrase “word of Yahweh”, the appearance 50 times out of a total of 113 occurrences of the word-event formula, which respectively mark the beginning of new units of speech, and finally the “oracle of God” formula—ne’um YHWH “Oracle of Yahweh” or “utterance of Yahweh”—occurring 83 times in Ezek., and the concluding formula of the word of God—“I, Yahweh, have spoken it”—appearing 11 times, all make it obvious that, as with Jeremiah, we are dealing with an “already highly developed knowledge of the ‘word of Yahweh’ ” (W. Zimmerli, Ezechiel, BKAT XIII III, 1969, 89).

Ezekiel was commanded at the outset to eat the scroll of the word of God (Ezek. 2:9–3:3). Ezekiel is called by the God who appears to him in a scene of the heavenly throne, making it clear that the decisive element in the depiction of the throne-vision is the commissioning of the word. The one sent by Yahweh is entrusted with a word, of which the strongly formal character is quite striking: “Thus has the Lord Yahweh spoken” (Ezek. 2:4). The formal wording of the commission (the messenger formula) is intended to make clear that the prophet’s charge to proclaim the word does not rest primarily in a message with firmly fixed outlines and content, but in personal adherence to the Sender, who remains Lord of his word. Ezekiel’s proclamation of the word of God is to be before everything else the reflex of his reception of that message (W. Zimmerli, op. cit., 73). Ezek. 2:10 pictures the hand of Yahweh stretched out towards the prophet and holding an open scroll, with writing on both sides, intended to display the oppressive surfeit of the word of God. In that the contents of what is written are named as “lamentation and mourning and woe”, “the contents of the book are described from the perspective of the effects which the word written in the book and to be proclaimed by the prophet will bring to maturity” (W. Zimmerli, op. cit., 77). The effect of the word of God is powerful and direct. The roll is offered for the prophet to eat, and thus Jeremiah’s picture of his ardent devouring of Yahweh’s word as it comes to him (Jer. 15:16) is turned into dramatic reality in the experience of the prophet Ezekiel. The eating of the scroll (Jer. 3:2), the absorption of what is eaten into the inner self (Jer. 3:3), makes clear that the prophet becomes totally one with the word of God. This consent to the word of God excludes outbursts such as Jeremiah’s, in the same way that Jeremiah’s irresistible longing for the word of God (Jer. 15:16) has become “that which Yahweh has strictly ordered and commanded at the hour of his call” (Ezek. 3:1; cf. Zimmerli, op. cit., 78). Ezekiel’s speaking takes place in the knowledge of the absolute transcendence of the divine word. As already in the passion-story of the word of God in book form in Jer. 36, so now in the mention of the scroll in Ezek. the written form of the prophetic word of God is presupposed. In Ezek. 3:4, by way of conclusion, the command is given to “speak with my words to them”. This describes Ezekiel’s commission as the prophetic proclamation of the word of God, in correspondence with the word-event of Yahweh.

In Ezek. prophetic symbolic actions anticipate in event-form the history announced by the word of God. Symbolic actions are a vital element of the proclamation of the word of God in Ezekiel. In the brick which he besieges, the scanty fare which he eats, the cutting and destruction of his hair (Ezek. 4:1–5:4), but also in his carrying out an exile’s baggage (Ezek. 12:1ff.) and in marking out the two roads (Ezek. 21:23ff.), Ezekiel is to give an active symbolic representation of the advance of the enemy, announced by the word of God, the beleaguering and reduction of the city, and the deportation of the population. By contrast with the accounts of prophetic actions in earlier prophecy, which follow an exposition and the account of the action with the interpretation (1 Ki. 22:10f.; 2 Ki. 13:14–19; Jer. 13:1–11, 19; 28f.), the introduction in Ezekiel is replaced by the divine word of command, and (with the exception of Ezek. 12:1–16 and 24:15–24) the actual performance of the action by the prophet is no longer reported, but simply the word of God which commands the action (cf. Ezek. 3:25–5:4; 12:17–20). This assimilation of the accounts of symbolic actions into the divine word of command in Ezekiel makes it clear, however, that the symbolic actions are absolutely and entirely the word of Yahweh embodied and becoming event, an anticipation in event-form of the history announced by the word of God (cf. W. Zimmerli, op. cit., 104). It is not, however, simply actively but also passively that the prophet, in his own person and fortunes (lying bound, Ezek. 4:4–8; trembling, Ezek. 12:17–20; numb in the face of his wife’s death, Ezek. 24:15–24), is a prediction in word-form of coming events. Whereas in Jer. 4:19–21 the prophet’s individual suffering and outcry are expressed unmodified, in Ezekiel all suffering is swallowed up into the word of Yahweh and put at the service of the proclamation of the word of God. It is because the word of God proclaimed by the prophet is not powerless, but itself occasions future history, that the prophet is a symbolic proclamation of the word of God, not only with his mouth, but also with his actions and his suffering, for in them the history which has been introduced by the word of God is already taking shape.

A feature of Ezek. is the debates. The fact that in the proclamation of the word of God it is not only a matter of a “majestic monologue by God, but a process of real encounter with the people of the nation of Israel” (W. Zimmerli, op. cit., 55) is shown in Ezek. by the form of discourse in which an answer is given in debate-form to a quotation of the people (Ezek. 12:21ff.; 26:2 ff). In answer to what the people are saying, that the prophetic word is not fulfilled and that the natural erosive process of time is taking effect on the word of God (Ezek. 12:21f.), or that the word of God will only affect reality in the far-off future (Ezek. 12:27), Yahweh replies: “But I the LORD will speak the word which I will speak, and it will be performed. It will no longer be delayed, but in your days, O rebellious house, I will speak the word and perform it, says the Lord GOD” (Ezek. 12:25). Yahweh’s word is a word which produces history; it is not eroded by time, and there is no possibility of banishing it to the far future. The peculiarity of this form of debate in Ezek. consists in the fact that the quotations of the nation against which the word of Yahweh is directed are also entirely assimilated into the word of God. That is, in the quotations the actual hearer of the word of God has his say, but in the way that the word of God sees him.

The word of God comes as the word to the individual (the prophet as watchman). Ezek. 33:1–9 introduces the third section of the book, in which the word of Yahweh concerning the coming salvation is the central point. The great judgment on the nation has already overtaken them in the final fall of → Jerusalem and the final dissolution of the state of Judah. By contrast with the introductory account of his call in Ezek. 1:1–3:15 and his mission there to the whole nation “whether they listen or not” (Ezek. 2:5), Ezek. 33:1–9 has the force of a second calling of the prophet. The messenger of the word, who had Yahweh’s burning word of judgment to proclaim, becomes after the fall of Jerusalem a watchman and a warner, delivering the word of Yahweh entirely to the individual. If the prophet hears a word from Yahweh’s mouth, he is to warn the individual sinner (Ezek. 33:7). If he neglects to do so, Yahweh will require his blood at the hand of the prophet (Ezek. 33:8). The word of God thus refers the prophet to the individual recipient of the word with a directness unknown in previous prophecy, and assigns the responsibility for each individual life to the prophet—whereby the messenger of the word of God is himself at stake. The directedness of the word of God to an individual man has not been articulated in this way before Ezek.

The word of God is also creative in Ezek. In Ezek. 37:1–14 the vision of the raising of the bones of the dead is recounted. Taken to a field of completely dried-out bones, the prophet is given the charge of speaking Yahweh’s word of promise over this field of the dead (Ezek. 37:4–6). At the spoken word of Yahweh the bones come together, and ligaments, flesh and skin grow over them. At a new word of Yahweh the breath of life comes into that which is still lying dead on the ground, so that the dead rise and stand up alive (Ezek. 37:9–10). This vision is God’s reply to the resigned declaration of the nation (Ezek. 37:11, “our bones are dried up”), in which, for its confession of its lostness, Israel is promised new life, resurrection from the graves of the exile and safe conduct home to their own land (Ezek. 37:11–14). The following points should be remembered, with respect to Yahweh’s word. (1) What is here depicted comes astonishingly close to the original creation of man by Yahweh (Gen. 1), but is heightened by the fact that this creation is a new creation out of the bones of the dead, i.e. of men whose history has reached a point of breakdown. Yahweh’s word effects new creation from the dead. (2) If Yahweh, according to Gen. 1, creates by means of the creative word which he himself speaks, so in Ezek. 37:1–14 it is the “word of Yahweh” (37:4) proclaimed by the prophet which becomes the power which creates life from the dead. (3) This creative word of the prophet, however, does not represent a spell or any magical power. It is related to Yahweh’s word of promise, which provides both the basis, the content and the interpretation of the prophetic discourse (Ezek. 37:4–6, 9, 11–14). (4) This creative word of Yahweh, proclaimed by the prophet, is not a magical potency ruling over nature. It is the resurrection of the scattered nation, its being led out of exile and home to its land, and the bestowal of the → Spirit. Yahweh’s creative word is the opening of a new history which does not come about from the nation’s own natural resources: it can only be expressed in the category of new creation from the dead by Yahweh’s creative word of promise (W. Zimmerli, op. cit., 885 ff.; K. Balzer, Ezechiel und Deuterojesaja, BZAW 121, 1971, 101 ff.).

(vi) Deutero-Isaiah. Many modern scholars regard Isa. 40–55 as the work of a prophet writing towards the end of the exile of the Jews in Babylon between approximately 550 and 538 B.C. His prophecy came to be included with that of Isaiah of Jerusalem. The following reconstruction takes account of this historical perspective. At the beginning of the exile there stands Ezekiel’s unrelenting word of judgment; at the end we have Deutero-Isaiah’s proclamation of the powerfully effective word of God, whose theme is Israel’s salvation.

The word of God is the sole abiding reality (Isa. 40:8; 55:11). Isa. 40:1–8 relates the prophet’s call. Vv. 1–5 speak of comforting the nation and building a road through the desert. The prophet counters the summons to “proclaim” with the resigned question, “What shall I cry? All flesh is grass …” (v. 6). It is the complaint of those who are left in exile, those who have felt the breath of Yahweh’s judgment (vv. 6f.). By contrast with the despair and scepticism of the prophet who stands in solidarity with his people comes the message: “the word of our God remains for ever” (40:8 JB). This word of God is the foundation of all the prophet’s proclamation; his whole proclamation is summed up in Isa. 40:8 and 56:6–11 (C. Westermann, Isaiah 40–66, 1969, 8). The subject-matter of this word is that the nation will be forgiven, comforted and led back home along the desert-road. This word of God is not the word which stands dualistically opposed to a world of transience and death, but the word which is spoken into history, bringing about a new history and a new future: as the rain waters the earth and causes the crops to spring up, “so shall my word be that goes forth from my mouth; it shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose, and prosper in the thing for which I sent it” (Isa. 55:11). It is this creative power of the word of God in history, which will be realized in the return of the nation from exile, which Deutero-Isaiah proclaims.

The word of God is expressed by the word of the prophet. Isa. 40:8, in connexion with the call of the prophet, spoke of the permanence of the word of God, and Isa. 55:11 spoke equally of the word which changes the world, which effects that “for which I sent it” (O. Grether, op. cit., 134). The word of God powerful in history is the word of God proclaimed by the prophet he has sent. By contrast with the soothsayers and oracle-mongers of Babylon (Isa. 44:25), Yahweh has honoured the word of judgment of Israel’s prophets (Isa. 44:26). But if Yahweh has made their word of judgment come true, then he will also make the saving action proclaimed by his prophets come true (Isa. 44:27). The movement in history announced by Deutero-Isaiah is the out-working of a word, which does not return empty (cf. Isa. 45:23).

The word of God is vindicated by world-history. In the face of the world of the Babylonian gods the question must be asked: What is the power which alone is at work in history? Deutero-Isaiah’s answer runs: Yahweh alone is the God, whose word of promise creates history. He is the One who surpasses the idols of Babylon in that the events of Israel’s history have all been announced and correspondingly taken place. “The reliable connexion between God’s speaking and his acting is the decisive argument in the judicial proceedings between Yahweh and the gods” (C. Westermann, op. cit., 16; cf. Isa. 41:26f.; 43:9f.; 44:7; 45:21; 48:14). God’s power and right of disposal in his word over future history is the real proof that he is God, as against the impotence of the idols (Isa. 44:1).

The word of God is the ground of the creation of the world. Deutero-Isaiah extends the compass of the word of God to a dimension which it had never reached in any prophet before him, namely, to the creation of the world by the word of Yahweh (Isa. 40:26; 58:13; 50:3). The stars, which were regarded in Babylon as the supreme gods, are creations of Yahweh’s word. By his word Yahweh has created the world and called the whole host of the stars of heaven into existence (Isa. 40:26). By contrast with the creative power of the word of Marduk, the creative word of Yahweh is here proclaimed as not only causing history, but calling the whole of creation into existence. The proclamation of the creation of the world by the word signifies the extension of the historical efficacy of the word of God into the world of creation, whereby the creation of the world itself becomes an element in Yahweh’s saving activity in history.

The word of God is a word of deliverance and salvation. In view of the exile and the persisting Babylonian domination, was it possible to believe the prophet with his proclamation of the word of Yahweh as creating history in its dimensions of creation and in its dimensions of past and future? It is from this angle that one should understand the literary category of the priestly word of deliverance, which the prophet adopts in his proclamation to “those of little faith and those who had grown very weary, for whom reality wore a very different appearance, because they felt themselves forsaken by God and were unable to believe that Jahweh cared about their ‘way’ ” (G. von Rad, op. cit., II, 249; cf. Isa. 41:8ff.; 45:9ff.; 49:14ff.; 54:4ff.). This word of deliverance is for Deutero-Isaiah the most characteristic form of a promise of salvation, utilizing, as it does, the form of favourable hearing by a priest in answer to an individual’s complaint (1 Sam. 1; cf. J. Begrich, Gesammelte Studien zum Alten Testament, ThB 21, 1964, 217 ff.). The word of God which he has to proclaim is directed to every member of this nation as a whole in his most individual and personal self (cf. C. Westermann, op. cit., 12 ff.). The word which embraces the world and history, which Yahweh has put in the prophet’s mouth (Isa. 51:16), and which makes his mouth a sharp sword (Isa. 49:2), is at the same time there, “so that I [the prophet] may know how to sustain with a word him that is weary” (Isa. 50:4). The mighty word which calls the world and history into existence is also the word of deliverance and salvation with which God lovingly condescends to his people and woos their heart, so hardened by suffering. “Never before had he [Jahweh] come so close to his people when he addressed them, laying aside anything which might alarm them in case he should terrify one of those who had lost heart” (G. von Rad, op. cit., II, 250).

5. The Word of God as Covenant Commandment. (a) “The words” constitute the proclamation of God’s will for justice. The commandments, the proclamation of God’s will for justice, are called “the ten words” in Exod. 34:28 (cf. Gk. “decalogue”), and described more precisely as “the words of the covenant”. It is not they which are the basis of the covenant (cf. O. Procksch TDNT IV 99); it is the → covenant grounded in Yahweh’s election which includes the covenant ordinances. The proclamation of God’s will for justice is introduced in Exod. 20:1 by “Yahweh spoke all these words”. Thus the communication of these commands is founded by the introductory preamble in Exod. 20:2 on the self-disclosure of Yahweh and the leading out of the nation from → Egypt. This is also expressed in the account of the ratification of the covenant attached to the so-called Book of the Covenant (Exod. 20:22–23:19). In Exod. 24:3–8 Moses recounted to the people “all the words of Yahweh and all the ordinances”, and the people answered with one voice, “All the words which Yahweh has spoken we will do.” Then Moses wrote down “all the words of Yahweh” (Exod. 24:3f.).

(b) The Covenant Commandments and the Prophets’ Message of Judgment. The way in which the prophets viewed their commission of validating the authority of the covenant commandment against judicial malpractice and law-breaking in Israel is shown in Amos, who measures Israel by the old covenant regulations. Among the reasons for the word of judgment which he announced, Amos names the oppression of the → poor (Amos 2:7f.; 3:9f.) and the perversion of justice as transgression of the covenant order (cf. Exod. 22:30ff.; 23:1ff.). In Hosea the consequence of transgressing the covenant law (Hos. 4:2) is that Yahweh gives notice of the abrogation of the covenant: You are “Not-my-people” (Hos. 1:9). And in Jeremiah’s temple speech the people have their sin uncovered in a decalogue-like array of justice (cf. the enumeration of stealing, murdering, committing adultery and perjury, Jer. 7:9), and words of judgment (Jer. 7:1ff.). Equally, the threat to the nation in the covenant law, if they transgress the commandment, provides the background to the description of → Jerusalem as “the city of blood” (Ezek. 22) and Ezekiel’s announcement of judgment. Thus one sees already quite clearly in the prophetic proclamation the close association of God’s powerful word of judgment, which announces and forms the prelude to coming history, and the judicial proclamation of covenant law which provides the foundation for the word of judgment (R. Bach, Gottesrecht, 23 ff.; W. Zimmerli, The Law and the Prophets: A Study of the Meaning of the Old Testament, 1965).

(c) “The Word” as a Designation of the Whole Commandment. In Deuteronomy not only is the covenant commandment designated as “the ten words” (Deut. 4:13; 10:4), but the multiplicity of commandments are designated as “words” (cf. Deut. 1:1, 18; 4:10, 36; 5:5; 28:14), and an individual commandment as a “word” (Deut. 12:28; 15:15; 24:18, 22). However, in so far as in Deut. “the words of this Torah” (Deut. 17:19; 27:3; 28:58; 29:28), despite the great variety of individual commandments, are understood for the first time as the simple uniform revelation of the will of Yahweh to Israel, “word” also appears in the sing. to denote the whole commandment (Deut. 4:2; cf. Jos. 1:13), and in consequence to express total human dependence on “this word” (cf. this word “is your life”, Deut. 32:47). Every seven years, in the context of the festival of the renewal of the covenant, the divine covenant-law with its promises and threats (cf. the curses in Deut. 27) was read out at the great national assembly, “that they may hear and learn to fear the LORD your God, and be careful to do all the words of this law” (Deut. 31:12). The concentration on the one God (Deut. 6:4), the one sanctuary (Deut. 12) and the one “word” (Deut. 4:2) reveals Deut.’s theological concern. “The whole revelation of the divine will for justice imparted to Israel in the covenant, brought near to it by Yahweh and laid in its heart and mouth (30:14) is thus simply dāḇār [word]” (W. Zimmerli, RGG3 VI 1810).

6. The Word of God and History in the Deuteronomistic History. Deuteronomistic history, beginning in Deut. 1–3 with a glance backwards to the time of → Moses, and then presenting the history of the conquest of the land, the judges and the kings, i.e. comprising the books from Deut. to 2 Ki., is thought by many to-day to have been written in its final form after the catastrophe of 587 B.C. from the theological standpoint of the book of Deut.

(a) The curse of the covenant commandment. Deuteronomistic history presents the history of Israel in both northern and southern kingdoms as a story of progressive apostasy from Yahweh’s commandment, especially from the summons of Deut. to worship Yahweh at only one place (Deut. 12). Judgment on Israel and Judah (2 Ki. 17:7ff., 19f.) is the consequence of the powerful effect of God’s word of justice and of law in Israel’s history, and therefore the honouring of the possibility of the curse announced in Deut. (Deut. 27:15ff.; 28:15). The curse in Deut. was thus no empty word (Deut. 32:47), but became reality in the history of Israel’s downfall.

(b) The threat of the prophets. Not only was the curse of the covenant commandment realized in the history of Israel and Judah, but so also was the threat of the prophets. Deuteronomistic history portrayed the course of history it presented, a period of almost 700 years of Israelite history from the time of Moses to the Babylonian exile, in terms of the interconnexion between the promulgation of prophetic threats, and their corresponding historical fulfilment, making use of a fixed terminology. The prophetic word “is confirmed” (Deut. 9:5), “does not fail” (Jos. 21:45; 23:14; 1 Ki. 8:56; 2 Ki. 10:10), “it is established” (1 Sam. 1:23; 15:11, 13; 2 Sam. 7:25; 1 Ki. 2:4; 6:12; 8:20; 12:15), “it comes to pass” (Jos. 23:15), “it is fulfilled” (1 Ki. 2:27; 8:15, 24). “To show how this word functioned in history” (G. von Rad, Old Testament Theology, II, 94 n. 23) and “the correspondence between promulgated word and historical fulfilment” (op. cit., I, 340) are that which undergirds the concern of Deuteronomistic history (cf. Deut. 18:21f.).

(c) The summons to return. In teaching, however, that the history of total annihilation should be understood as the fulfilment of Moses’ curse and the honouring of the prophetic threat, Deuteronomistic history understood itself at the same time as a call to return (1 Ki. 8:46–53). As again and again after times of apostasy and judgment new deeds of deliverance followed a return to Yahweh (Jdg. 2:11–22; 1 Sam. 12:6–25), so, in view of the totality of the judgment, it remains an open question as to whether “it might not yet come to an entirely new phase with entirely new provisions of salvation for the people who are Yahweh’s possession” (H. W. Wolff, op. cit., ThB 22, 314). “The work therefore contributes to an urgent invitation to return to the God who brings salvation in history” (op. cit., 322). But this means, with respect to the word of God proclaimed by the prophet, that the goal of the proclamation of God’s word of judgment is not that (as with fortune-telling) it should become history, but that people should return to Yahweh. Hence, the announcement of judgment might not come true (Jer. 25:3ff.; 26:2ff.; 36:2f.; Ezek. 18:1ff.; 32:1ff.; Jon. 3:8ff.), or that, once executed, the judgment might itself become the message as in Deuteronomistic history.

(d) The promise to David. Alongside the fulfilment of the curse and the message of judgment in Israel’s history, and this history as itself a summons to return, there is the word of promise. But the significance it deserves is disputed. If we follow G. von Rad, the promise given to → David in 2 Sam. 7 stands as a heading to Israel’s history of judgment. The final notice in the Deuteronomistic history of the liberation of king Jehoiachin and his elevation to the table of the king of Babylon (2 Ki. 25:7–30) is also intended to turn people’s expectation to the God who has made his promise to David concerning the future of the Son of David, and who keeps faith even in face of judgment (G. von Rad, Old Testament Theology, I, 343 f.). However, Deuteronomistic history teaches that the history of Israel should be understood as the fulfilment of the covenant commandment proclaimed by Moses with its possibilities of blessing and curse. It honours the threats announced by the prophets and is thus a summons to return to Yahweh. At the same time it brings a reminder of the promise even in face of Israel’s history of judgment. Thus both elements of the word of God are bound together here, as indeed they already had been in the pre-exilic prophets (cf. above 5 (b)). “The word of God is here both the permanently present demand of the commandment in the nation and also the continually new proclamation in the prophetic word which affects and shapes history” (Zimmerli, RGG3 VI 1810). What Zimmerli says here of the prophetic word is true of the word of promise, the summons to return and the message of judgment.

7. The Word of God as the Word of the Creator. The fact that the OT conception of the creative power of the word of God is influenced by ancient oriental hymns (L. Dürr, op. cit., 8 ff.; cf. above, 2), which praise the thunder and violence of Marduk’s voice in the storm, is shown by Ps. 29, which portrays the appearance of Yahweh in the storm (v. 3ff.) and hears God’s booming word of power in the thunder-clap. There is a two-fold distinction between the OT conception and that of the ancient orient, which saw the mighty word of the divinity as a dynamic potency which emanated from the divinity and held sway over nature.

(a) In the OT there is a correlation of the word of the Creator with God’s word of salvation (Pss. 33:6, 9; 148:5, 8). Yahweh’s word in creation, by which he called heaven into existence (Ps. 33:6, “by the word of Yahweh the heavens were made”) is an element of Yahweh’s historical lordship in word and deed (Ps. 33:4) and of his covenant-based condescension to the poor (Ps. 33:13ff.). The protological word of the Creator (Ps. 33:6) has the function of serving the soteriological word of salvation (Ps. 33:4). The determination of this relationship is confirmed by the first creation narrative (ascribed to the priestly tradition) which not only speaks of the word of command of Yahweh the Creator, by whose power all things come into existence (Gen. 1), but also intends creation by the word to be understood as the opening chapter of the history of the covenant. C. Westermann represents a critical approach to Pentateuchal study when he writes: “In the great context of the Priestly Code God’s working by the word is in no way limited to the creation; his activity in history is similarly determined”, and this (following the Priestly representation) reaches its climax in the establishment of the cult (Exod. 25:1; C. Westermann, Genesis, BKAT, I, 153). In this association of the word of the Creator with the covenant-and salvation-history of Yahweh in his dealings with Israel Gen. 1 corresponds with the proclamation of Isa. 40–55.

(b) There is also a correlation of the word of the Creator with God’s word of law (Ps. 147:15ff.). In Ps. 147:15ff. the creative word of God is specifically linked with meteorological phenomena; Yahweh’s word, sent out like a messenger (Ps. 147:15, “He sends forth his command to the earth, his word runs swiftly”), brings snow (v. 16) and hail (v. 17). Yahweh’s word also causes the ice to melt again (v. 18). But this creative word which holds sway over nature is none other than the word of the covenant commandment, by which Yahweh lays claim to Israel: “He declares his word to Jacob, his statutes and ordinances to Israel” (v. 19). Israel consequently does not understand the creative word mythically or naturalistically but in accord “with the word of law and lordship which was imparted to the chosen people.… Having had the word of law and lordship imparted to them, the chosen people came to know and understand the God who rules nature by his word, and who bears and sustains all creation” (H.-J. Kraus, Psalmen XV/I, 19724, 958 f.).

Thus in the OT Yahweh’s creative word is to be understood only in close connexion with the word of God as the word of salvation (the word of promise) and as the word of law (the covenant commandment). It is this which constitutes the specifically Israelite understanding of the word of God.

8. For the understanding of the word of God in Judaism → ῥῆμα OT 2; for the religious historical background to John’s Gospel see also under NT 4 (b).

NT 1. The Occurrence and significance of logos and legō in the NT. (a) logos is attested 331 times in the NT (appearing in all writings except Phm. and Jude), with both secular and theological meanings. logos means inter alia statement (Matt. 5:37), utterance (Matt. 12:32; 15:12; Lk. 20:20), question (Matt. 21:24), command (Lk. 4:36), report, information and rumour (Acts 11:22; Matt. 28:15; Mk. 1:45; Lk. 5:15), discourse (Matt. 15:12), wording (1 Cor. 15:2), word of mouth (Acts 15:27; 2 Cor. 10:10) as opposed to the written (Acts 1:1) word, mere words by contrast with power and action (1 Thess. 1:5; 1 Cor. 4:19), object, matter (Mk. 9:10; Acts 8:21), words of Scripture (1 Cor. 15:54), words of warning (Heb. 5:11), account (Rom. 14:12), settlement (of an account) (Phil. 4:15), motive (Acts 10:29), proclamation, teaching, instruction (Lk. 4:32; 10:39; Jn. 4:41; 17:20), the word of God, the word of the Lord, the word of promise, of truth, of life, the word of Jesus, the word concerning Jesus Christ (Acts passim), Jesus as the Word (Jn. 1:1, 14).

(b) legō, to speak, appears 1320 times in the NT, mostly unstressed, but sometimes used with the theological, qualified significance discussed below (cf. the → Amen-words under 2 (a) (iii), and Jesus’ words of healing 2 (a) (iv)). The vb. laleō, to speak, which belongs to another stem and is less important, however (298 instances), is used primarily by Luke (Gospel and Acts 91 times), John and Paul (60 times each, including 34 times in 2 Cor.). logikos, reasonable, is found only in Rom. 12:1 and 1 Pet. 2:2; logios, scholarly, educated, only in Acts 18:24. The diminutive logion (formed from logos), saying (originally a short word, oracle), is attested only 4 times in the NT (Acts 7:38; Rom. 3:2; Heb. 5:12; 1 Pet. 4:11), always of some form of divine inspiration.

2. The Word of Jesus Christ: Jesus’ own words. (a) The proclamation of Jesus. At the centre of Jesus’ words stands the → proclamation of God’s pressing nearness and the announcement of the inauguration of God’s world-wide dominion (→ Kingdom), already present in Jesus’ person and words. Jesus’ words therefore announce neither simply the presence, nor exclusively the future of the kingdom of God. Rather, Jesus spoke of a present coming of the future kingdom of God which was already taking place in his words. But in Jesus’ proclamation one finds no absolute use of “the word of God”. Mk. 4:13–20, the sole place where this term is encountered in the mouth of Jesus, is regarded by J. Jeremias and others as belonging to the early church’s interpretation of the parables (Jeremias, The Parables of Jesus, 19632, 77 (but see → Parable, art. παραβολή NT 3).

(i) The lack of messenger and word-event formulae. Nowhere did Jesus follow the OT prophets in prefacing his words with the messenger formula “thus says the Lord”; and, in the context of his proclamation, the word-event formula “the word of God came to me” is similarly lacking. This OT formula occurs once only in Lk. 3:2 (rhēma theou egeneto, “the word of God came to John”) in the case of John the Baptist, who is however placed in the time of the OT prophets (Lk. 16:16). It is lacking similarly in apostolic times. The lack of messenger and word-event formulae in the case of Jesus is an indication that Jesus’ proclamation cannot be understood simply in prophetic categories.

“There can be only one reason why the idea of a detailed Word of God imparted to Jesus Himself has not found its way into the [Synoptic] record. This is that such an idea was felt to be inappropriate and inadequate to describe the relationship of Jesus with God” (G. Kittel, TDNT IV 114). The saying of Jesus that the Father had delivered everything to him (Matt. 11:27) “set the unity of Jesus with the Father and also with the Word of God, on a completely different basis far beyond isolated impartation” (ibid.).

(ii) The antitheses and the Amen-formulae. There is a positive correspondence with this lack of messenger and word-event formulae in the proclamation of Jesus in the presence of introductory formulae, which show that the claim of Jesus breaks the bounds of that of an OT prophet of the word. In the antitheses of the Sermon on the Mount with the schematized, “You have heard that it was said to the men of old … but I say to you” (Matt. 5:21ff.), Jesus annuls the statements of the past which were regarded as having divine authority, setting his own “I” in the place where, in the prophets, we find Yahweh’s.

In this, Jesus is not claiming, as the OT prophets and the rabbis did, to be the legitimate interpreter of the → law of God. He is instead setting himself up over against the Torah. While in the Qumran community “the radicalized demand of the divine commandment is nowhere set over against the Torah of Moses” (E. Lohse, “Ich aber sage euch”, in E. Lohse, ed., Der Ruf Jesu und die Antwort der Gemeinde. Exegetische Untersuchungen Joachim Jeremias zum 70. Geburtstag, 1970, 189–203, see p. 197), Jesus is speaking in the antitheses as once the God of Moses did, and thus setting himself and his words up directly alongside God and the word of God. The same is true of the formula, “Amen, I say to you” (cf. Mk. 3:28; 8:12; 9:1, 41; 10:15, 29; 11:23; 12:43; 13:30; 14:18–25, 30 and par.), which has no analogy in the whole of the Jewish literature (→ Amen). The Amen-formula normally served to strengthen someone else’s words, and was used in OT times to adopt words of blessing or cursing (G. Dalman, The Words of Jesus, 1902, 226–29), but Jesus used it without exception in order to preface and strengthen his own words. As such, however, it is not to be compared with the messenger-formula used by prophets (J. Jeremias, New Testament Theology, I, 35 f.). Rather, the placing of the Amen in front of Jesus’ own words characterizes them as something sure and trustworthy. “Thus in the amēn preceding the legō hymin of Jesus we have the whole of Christology in nuce” (H. Schlier, amēn TDNT I 338). The Amen-formula which prefaces Jesus’ words is an expression of Jesus’ divine certainty of himself and the divine self-authentication of his own words.

(iii) The authority of Jesus’ words. His use of the Amen-formula and “I” shows that Jesus intended his word to take the place of the Torah. It was stated in contemporary Judaism that the man who hears the words of the Torah and does good works is building on firm ground. We find Jesus saying “he who hears these words of mine and does them will be like a wise man who built his house upon the rock” (Matt. 7:24; cf. Deut. 28:15, 30). The “I” of Jesus which speaks here is claiming divine authority. “What distinguishes his word even from the highest claims of the prophets of old is the fact that Jesus makes people’s decision dependent on the hearing and doing of his own words. The OT prophets know that they are the bearers of the word of God—nothing less. But none of them says that ‘his words’ do not pass away or that it is by his words that the fate of his hearers will be decided. But, according to all the traditions, this is precisely what Jesus says” (J. Schniewind, Das Evangelium nach Matthäus, NTD 2, 196812, 105; cf. Mk. 8:38; 13:31).

The authority of Jesus’ word is seen in his call to discipleship: “and he said to him, ‘Follow me’ ” (Mk. 2:14; cf. 1:14ff.). This call of Jesus, which confronts men in the midst of their everyday work, is not bound to any pre-conditions. It comes about through the efficacious word of Jesus, which makes men’s response appear as something quite self-evident. The power of this word is further reflected in the response of the hearers. They either took offense at Jesus’ words (Mk. 10:22; Matt. 15:12) or were amazed at his words, “for he taught as one who had authority, and not as their scribes” (Matt. 7:29). Alternatively, they attempted “to entrap him in his talk [logō]” (Mk. 12:13 par. Matt. 22:15, Lk. 20:20), because it is in his words that his claim and the centre of his mission can be seen.

(iv) The unity of Jesus’ words and deeds. The power of Jesus’ word is also shown not least in the stories of healing, where the healings ensue (Mk. 1:25f.; Lk. 7:14f.) through the word of Jesus (Mk. 2:11, “I say to you, rise …”), and through his word of command (Mk. 9:25). The connexion between Jesus’ word of forgiveness (Mk. 2:5) and his word of healing (Mk. 2:11) is to be noted: the word of healing is the physical expression of Jesus’ word of forgiveness. The word of the Judge of the world, who has the power to forgive sins, is proved in the healing to be an effective and a creative word.

The healings are part of Jesus’ word and are not to be detached from his proclamation. According to Lk. 4:18, Jesus related the prophetic word of Isa. 61:1f. to his own mission. God had sent him to bring good news to the poor and sight to the blind. This denotes the unity of word and deed in Jesus’ proclamation. But it is not only the unity of word and deed, but the superiority of word over deed which is characteristic for Jesus’ proclamation. Mk. 1:21–38 recounts the various healings performed by Jesus and finally his “flight” (Mk. 1:35ff.) where he gives the disciples who are looking for him the reply: “Let us go elsewhere … so that I can preach there, too, because that is why I came” (Mk. 1:38 JB). It becomes obvious that Jesus’ deeds (→ Miracle, art. σημεῖον) are subordinated to his word in those accounts of healings where the healing takes place by means of Jesus’ word—“But only say the word, and my servant will be healed” (Matt. 8:8)—something without parallel in Jesus’ world, and thus striking for the eye-witnesses (cf. also Matt. 8:16: “he cast out the spirits with a word”). The proclamation of the kingdom of God takes place by means of Jesus’ word, and Jesus’ healings are the physical expression of his word.

(b) Jesus’ Unconcealed Word of Suffering and of the Cross: Mark’s Gospel. Mk. 1:45 (“he [the healed man] went about and began to talk about it and to spread the news [ton logon] …”) and the phrase “he [Jesus] spoke the word to them”, which appears in Mk. 4:33, cf. 2:2 and 8:32, belong entirely to the Marcan redaction (E. Schweizer, Neotestamentica. Deutsche und englische Aufsätze, 1951–1963, 1963, 100; J. Jeremias, The Parables of Jesus, 19632, 77). They are therefore to be interpreted in the context of Mk.’s theology. According to Mk., Jesus forbade those who had been healed to say anything further about the miracle of their healing (Mk. 1:44; 5:43; 7:36); people must not get to know that Jesus is the messiah by hearing tales of miracles (→ Secret). But it is stressed at the same time that Jesus’ commands to keep silence were broken again and again (Mk. 1:45; 7:36). Mk. recounts this breaking of the command to keep silence because Jesus’ divine authority cannot remain hidden, but he stresses the secrecy because it is not yet time for the proclamation of Jesus: his mystery is not yet revealed in his miracles; it is first truly revealed at the → cross (cf. E. Schweizer, The Good News According to Mark, 1970, 30 f.). The real centre of the story of Jesus is not to be found in the miracles, but in his suffering and death.

In the first part of Mk.’s Gospel, the collection of conflict-debates (Mk. 2:1–3:6), which recount Jesus’ victory over sin and law, the hardening of the Pharisees’ hearts and their decision to put Jesus to death, is introduced with the sentence “and he [Jesus] was preaching the word to them” (Mk. 2:2). The Pharisees’ response to the “speaking of the word [elalei ton logon]”, which proves the power of Jesus over sin and the law, was blindness to God’s revelation in his word. In the second part (Mk. 3:7–6:6) Jesus replied to the hardness of heart of his relations (“he is beside himself [exestē]”, Mk. 3:21) and to his rejection by the scribes from Jerusalem (“he is possessed by Beelzebul”, v. 22) by speaking in → parables (v. 23). Mk. 4:33f. establishes the necessity of parabolic language in retrospect: “With many such parables he spoke the word to them, as they were able to hear it; he did not speak to them without a parable, but privately to his own disciples he explained everything”. God’s revelation in Jesus’ word is so foreign to men that all Jesus’ speaking can be done only in pictorial language. Only God himself can open up such pictorial language for men.

By contrast with Jesus’ concealing teaching in parables, Mk. 8:32 speaks of the direct unconcealed speaking of Jesus: “and he said this plainly.” The content of this direct word of Jesus is the suffering and death of the Son of man (8:31). The word of the → cross is the dissolution of all pictorial speech: “The mystery which has previously been hidden and is now unconcealed is the suffering of the Son of Man” (E. Schweizer, op. cit., 100). For Jesus’ word of power over demons, sin and the law remains a concealed word so long as it is not understood in the light of Jesus’ unconcealed word concerning his suffering and death. In understanding the word of God, there is thus mirrored the thought that Mk. wished his gospel to be understood as a passion story with extended introduction (M. Kähler). In that Jesus’ words and deeds, together with his death and resurrection, are thus proclaimed by Mk. as the word of God, the transition to the “word of the cross and resurrection” as the decisive subject-matter of NT proclamation becomes readily intelligible.

(c) The Messiah of the Word and the Messiah of Deed: Matthew’s Gospel. Matthew not only presents the words of Jesus in large blocks of discourses (the Sermon on the Mount in chs. 5–7, the sending out of the Twelve in ch. 10, discourses against the Pharisees in chs. 12 and 23, parables in ch. 13, behaviour in the Christian community in ch. 18, and the apocalyptic discourse in ch. 24), but also gives expression to his understanding of the word of Jesus by the way, in particular, in which he has related the Sermon on the Mount (chs. 5–7) to the collection of ten narratives of miracles of Jesus (chs. 8 f.): the Sermon on the Mount (the word of the messiah) is followed by the deeds of Jesus (the → work of the messiah). Matt. has expressed this basic thought not only by his compositorial placing of the Sermon on the Mount before the miracle narratives, but also by the redactional sentences Matt. 4:23 and 9:35 which act as a surrounding frame for chs. 5–9: Jesus “proclaimed the gospel of the kingdom and healed every kind of sickness … among the people” (Matt. 4:23; 9:25). “The basic aspects of Jesus’ working are here described: He is a preacher, the messiah of the word … and, in healing, the messiah of the act” (J. Schniewind, op. cit., 8). Finally, chs. 5–9 are summarized and pointed in the words of Jesus, quoted deliberately at the end by Matt: the blind see, the lame walk, lepers are cleansed and the deaf hear, the dead are raised up and the poor have the good news proclaimed to them (Matt. 11:5).

In this Jesus-logion, the word concerning the good news preached to the poor, which stands at the end as a climax to the list of miracles enumerated, is transparently the central point; from this it is evident “that the good news is to be more than all miracles” (Schniewind, op. cit., 140). The importance of the placing of this word of Jesus at the end and as a climax to the enumeration is characteristic of Matt., although it seemed odd even to the earliest exegetes. Some MSS have moved the word about the resurrection of the dead to the end of Jesus’ words or left the word about the good news out entirely, because the resurrection of the dead seemed to them to be something far greater than the word of Jesus. For Matt. (and for Jesus) the case is exactly the reverse: the word of Jesus is the centre, the healings performed by Jesus’ word (Matt. 8:8, 16) are an accompaniment in the form of signs to the word of Jesus. They are a physical expression of his mightily creative word (G. Eichholz, Tradition und Interpretation, ThB 29, 1965, 39–43).

3. The Word Concerning Jesus Christ: the Cross and Resurrection as the Content of the word of God. (a) The understanding of the word of God in Paul. Paul calls the message proclaimed by him to his congregation “the word of God” (1 Cor. 14:36; 2 Cor. 2:17; 4:2; Phil. 1:14), “the word” (1 Thess. 1:6; Gal. 6:6), “the word of the Lord” (1 Thess. 1:8), or “the word of God which you heard from us” (1 Thess. 2:13).

(i) The word of tradition. However much Paul was aware that the word of God which he had to proclaim was founded directly on the revelation of the Son of God outside Damascus (Gal. 1:1, 15f.), and distinguished him from other proclaimers of the word whose legitimation was mediated through men, he stressed just as much, on the other side, that the message proclaimed by himself and the Jerusalem apostles is the same (→ Proclamation). Closely following an old Jerusalem confession, Paul preached the message of the Son of God, who, on the basis of the resurrection, was designated Son of God in all his power (Rom. 1:3f.).

Paul reminds the spiritual party in Corinth of the message of salvation in accordance with the word (logō, i.e. wording) in which he proclaimed it to them, which he passed on to them in the same terms in which he himself received it (1 Cor. 15:1–3), the content of these traditions from Jerusalem quoted by Paul in the text being the resurrection of the messiah who had died for sins (1 Cor. 15:3–5). The word of God proclaimed by Paul is constitutively related to the cross and resurrection of Jesus as the object of the proclamation; here the remembrance of that which took place then is not simply an appeal to faith in the word of God (as with R. Bultmann, “The Concept of the Word of God in the New Testament”, in Faith and Understanding, 1969, 286–312, see especially 300 ff.). The word of God for Paul is the message of a unique event at that time, and as such speaks to people: this is the message “by which you are saved, if you hold it fast—unless you believed in vain” (1 Cor. 15:1f.).

(ii) The word of the cross. Paul describes the centre of his proclamation as “the word of the cross”. He has publicly proclaimed the crucified Christ in the Galatian congregations (Gal. 3:1), and made it the sole content of his preaching (1 Cor. 2:2). In the word of the → cross, Paul puts into words “what took place on the cross. Here a decision about mankind has been given by God. The message depends on what has happened. It proclaims the decision which has already been given” (G. Eichholz, op. cit., 105). This word of the cross stands in absolute opposition to the “→ wisdom of this world” (1 Cor. 1:18–3:20), in that it makes nonsense of the → wisdom of this world and the boasting of those who claimed superior knowledge (1 Cor. 4:8), and it thereby stands in opposition to a theology of glory consonant with such a wisdom, where the cross and the Crucified One no longer have any place (cf. 1 Cor. 2:8).

The message of the decision given about the world on the cross is in its critical function as the “word of the cross” related to the typical Jew, who asks for proof of God’s power, and to the typical Greek, who asks for divine wisdom (1 Cor. 1:22ff.). The word of the cross, with its reference to the varying Jewish and Gk. preconceptions, does not merely signify here the correcting but the exploding of the prior understanding, since man “just does not comprehend the message along the lines of his prior understanding. For God does not confront him along the lines of such a prior understanding” (G. Eichholz, op. cit., 111; against R. Bultmann, op. cit.). However much the word of the cross, as the message of God’s once-and-for-all decision in favour of the world given on the cross, is concretely related to its Jewish and Gk. hearers, it nevertheless destroys all their previously held misconceptions. The word of the cross is the central conception and criterion of the Pauline proclamation. But in that the word of the cross is at the same time “the word of life” (Phil. 2:16)—as the Crucified One is at the same time the Risen One—this word signifies the power of God and the wisdom of God (1 Cor. 1:24ff.) for those Jews and Greeks who are called. For “Christ’s death is not annulled by the resurrection and exaltation: rather it is held on to, made operative as a saving event in both judgment and deliverance, and so becomes the subject matter of preaching” (G. Bornkamm, Paul, 1971, 160).

(iii) The word of → reconciliation. The word of the cross is called “the word of reconciliation” by Paul in 2 Cor. 5:19. This word, which is passed on by the apostolic “ministry of reconciliation”, is founded on the event of reconciliation in the death of Jesus “while we were yet sinners” (Rom. 5:8–10). The reconciliation, which is related to and embraces all men, is the Pauline development of the universal representative statements of the early church (cf. 2 Cor. 5:14, “one has died for all”), and is developed later on in Col. 1:19–22. This universal reconciliation of the world with God in the death of Christ establishes and grounds “the word of reconciliation” (2 Cor. 5:19; cf. Col. 1:25), according to Paul, as the message of this event once and for all.

The word of reconciliation is to be distinguished from the reconciliation itself, as grounded in it; it is not that the event of the reconciliation of the world with God comes about further in the word of reconciliation, as though the word of Christian proclamation and the history which it communicates coincide, are indeed one (cf. R. Bultmann, op. cit., 305 ff.). By contrast with claims of a coincidence between NT kerygma (→ Proclamation, art. κηρύσσω) and the event proclaimed (Bultmann), Paul distinguishes between the historical event of the reconciliation of the world and the speaking event of the word of proclamation concerning this event. The word of reconciliation “looks back at a conclusive event that has already happened, and forward from this to the revelation of the conclusion which has already taken place in this event” (K. Barth, CD IV, 2, 204). On the other hand, commenting on the phrase “ministry of reconciliation” (2 Cor. 5:19), F. Büchsel writes, “Since the diakonia tēs katallagēs [ministry of reconciliation] has not yet come to an end, and the world has not yet heard the logos tēs katallagēs [word of reconciliation] in all its members, reconciliation itself must not be thought of as concluded” (TDNT I 257). The event of reconciliation in the death of Christ is neither to be separated from the event of proclaiming the word of reconciliation nor to be mediated along with this in the sense of a kerygmatic process; the “once-for-all” nature of the reconciliation is proclaimed as such in the word of reconciliation: it does not only become “once-for-all” in the word of reconciliation.

(iv) The word of promise. As Paul in Rom. 9:9 designates the word of election to Isaac as the word of God, so Christ, the Yes and the Amen of God’s promises (2 Cor. 1:19f.), makes the word of proclamation an unambiguous word of salvation (2 Cor. 1:18). The representative death of Jesus Christ and the curse laid on him is the fulfilment and universalization of the word of promise given to → Abraham (Gal. 3:6–14; cf. Gen. 12:3; 15:6; 18:18), which retains its validity even for the Israel which rejected the messiah, so that the question as to the validity of the word of God in view of the rejection of the messiah by Israel becomes the keynote of Rom. 9–11: “But it is not as though the word of God had failed” (Rom. 9:6). As the word of election stood over the history of Israel, so the word of → promise about the destruction of death stands over the world, and “then shall come to pass the saying that is written: ‘Death is swallowed up in victory’ ” (1 Cor. 15:54; cf. Isa. 25:8). For Paul, the question of the fulfilment, the honouring and the abiding validity of the OT word of promise means nothing less than that the whole perspicuity, trustworthiness and validity of the word of reconciliation and justification is itself at stake.

(v) Word of God and word of man. The word of God, which according to Paul is promulgated in the shape of the word of man, is thereby at the mercy of the possibility of being confused with other human words. This is why Paul thanks God that in the church at Thessalonica “when you received the word of God which you heard from us, you accepted it not as the word of men but as what it really is, the word of God, which is at work in you believers” (1 Thess. 2:13).

After Paul had been driven out of Philippi and come as an alien to Thessalonica, working hard of necessity to earn his living, he proclaimed the word of God to them without any attempt to impress by appearances (1 Thess. 1:9f.). Paul consciously avoided proclaiming the word of God like the wandering apostles of the day with enthusiastic speech and in the presentation of their own spiritual power, by drawing on impressive words of wisdom or preaching with mixed motives, modifying or falsifying the word of God (1 Thess. 2:5; 1 Cor. 2:1, 4, 13; 2 Cor. 2:17; 4:2). Instead, and in order to legitimate the word of God, he pointed to his human weakness (2 Cor. 2:9; cf. 10:10), and again in order to legitimate the word of the cross, he pointed to his persecution as a disciple of the cross (Gal. 6:17). Knowing the humanity of the word of God, Paul also instructed the church (1 Cor. 14:9, 19) to give precedence in worship to intelligible language rather than unintelligible indulgence of one’s own possession of the Spirit (speaking in tongues). “But the primary and intrinsic secret to which the New Testament message directs us is that God’s word has become one with man’s word, that it has come to us and become understandable in a human word” (G. Bornkamm, “God’s Word and Man’s Word in the New Testament”, Early Christian Experience, 1969, 4 f.).

(b) The Word of God as a Guaranteed Word of Promise: Hebrews. Having spoken repeatedly and in various ways through the prophets, God has in these last days spoken through his Son (Heb. 1:1–4). When God speaks thus in the Son as the final word of God which ushers in the turning-point of the ages, it is at the same time a summons not to miss the promised → rest (Heb. 4:1, 11). As a word of promise directed towards a coming fulfilment it is active and effective, like the “word of God” valid and promulgated by angels on Sinai (Heb. 2:2); where disdained it can bring death and judgment in so far as it is “sharper than any two-edged sword” (Heb. 4:12). This word of God, which had its beginning in the words of Jesus (Heb. 2:3) is decisively grounded in the exaltation of Jesus to the right hand of God (Heb. 1:5ff.) and in his installation as eschatological high priest (Heb. 7:1ff.).

This installation into the authority of the high priest, grounded in the divine “word of the oath” (Heb. 7:28; → Swear), is “the bringing in of a better hope” (Heb. 7:19 AV), and thus God’s decisive word of promise, guaranteed by oath. But in that Heb. teaches that the Christ-event in cross and exaltation is to be understood as a guaranteed word of promise, open for coming fulfilment, it is also the effective summons to the church to hold fast to their confession of hope. As this “word of exhortation” (Heb. 13:22), the letter itself is directed to the church community, now grown weary in the face of the persecutions and sufferings which were to be expected. The authority of the High Priest crucified for the many is the eschatological word of God, which, as a grounded word of promise, is directed to its coming fulfilment and must be grasped for that reason (B. Klappert, Die Eschatologie des Hebräerbriefs, ThEH Neue Folge 156, 1969, 11, 22, 28 f., 31 f., 46, 61).

(c) The Word of God as the Apostolic Message of Christ: Acts. In Acts the absolute use of the “word of God” is already a regular periphrasis for the apostolic preaching (Acts 4:29; 6:2, 7; 8:4; 11:19; 13:5, 7, 44, 46; 16:32; 17:13; 18:11). This word of God proclaimed by the apostles, which can also be called “the word of the Lord” (Acts 8:25; 12:24; 13:49; 15:35f.; 19:10, 20) and is “the word” which God sent to the children of Israel (Acts 10:36), has for its content the word-event of Jesus Christ, i.e. the history of the word (Acts 10:37, to genomenon rhēma) from its beginnings in Judea to the appearance of the Risen Christ and the sending out of the disciples. The apostolic word-event of proclamation is grounded in the word-event of the history of Jesus Christ (Acts 10:36f.), and this is its normative subject-matter.

The apostolic message of Christ is therefore “the word of this salvation” (Acts 13:26), which is for both Jews and Greeks. This word of God, which God himself (Acts 17:30), or Jesus Christ, the Exalted One (Acts 13:38f.; 26:23), proclaims is the word of the apostles Peter and John (Acts 8:25) and of Paul and Barnabas (Acts 13:5, 46; 14:25; 15:36; 17:13; 18:11). The word of God, to which Paul commends his congregation (Acts 20:32) is proved to be powerful (Acts 19:20), it grows and multiplies (Acts 6:7; 12:24), spreads throughout the whole land, and, according to the “words” of the Risen Christ (Acts 1:9), is to be proclaimed “in Jerusalem [cf. chs. 1–7], in all Judea and Samaria [cf. chs. 8–12] and to the end of the earth [cf. chs. 13–28]” (Acts 1:8). Acts closes (28:30f.) with the reference to Paul proclaiming the kingdom of God and the gospel of Jesus Christ in Rome; it is thus the document of the powerful advance in history of the word of God, both in the foundational and illustrative nature of the apostolic preaching in Jerusalem and Judea, on the one hand (chs. 1–12), and in the world-wide mission of Paul, on the other (chs. 13–28). This word of God or word of the Lord in the apostolic preaching is spoken (cf. Acts 4:29, 31; 11:19, 13:46) and proclaimed (Acts 13:5; 15:36; 17:13), it is to be received (Acts 8:14; 17:11), i.e. heard as the word of God (Acts 4:4; 13:7, 44; 19:10), and to be accepted in faith and praised (Acts 4:4; 15:7; 13:48). If the content of the apostolic preaching is the message of the saving-event in Jesus Christ, it can be said of Acts that “The Word of God is the Word about Jesus” (G. Kittel, TDNT IV 116).

4. Jesus Christ as the Word. (a) The Understanding of the Word of God in the Johannine Literature. John’s Gospel, like the Synoptics (cf., e.g. Mk. 4:14ff.; Lk. 5:1), denotes Jesus’ preaching as the proclamation “of the word [of God]”: Jesus’ words are those of the Father, in which the work of the Father is performed (Jn. 14:24; cf. 3:34; 14:10; 17:8). Anyone, therefore, who hears Jesus’ words and accepts them in faith hears God’s word (Jn. 5:24; 8:51; 12:48; 14:24; 15:3; 17:14, 17). Because Jesus’ word is at the same time the word of the Father, it is therefore the word of salvation (Jn. 14:24) and of → truth (Jn. 17:17), and that is why Jesus’ words effect → life in believers (Jn. 5:24) and → judgment in non-believers (Jn. 12:47f.). The “words of God” which Jesus speaks, are in their totality God’s self-revelation to men—“God’s word”, “thy word” (Jn. 14:6, 14, 17). But this is not to have mentioned the specifically Johannine understanding of the word of God in his Gospel; for “the words of the Revealer (sometimes called ta rhēmata, 3:34; 6:63, 68; 8:47; 12:47f.; 14:10; 15:7; 17:8) are not identical with the revealer as ‘the Word’ ” (R. Schnackenburg, The Gospel according to St John, I, 1968, 483). Over and above the statement that Jesus’ word is the word of God, Jesus himself is called “the Word” (Jn. 1:1, 14). That is, Jesus’ words (of proclamation) as the words of God are grounded in Jesus’ being as the Word. “He is not called the Logos absolutely because he utters the word or words of God; on the contrary, his words rather have the force of God’s words because he is the Logos, that is, the divine revealer and redeemer” (ibid.). This absolute and personal use of the Logos-concept in its identification with Jesus is found in addition to Jn. 1:1, 14 only in 1 Jn. 1:1 (Jesus as “the Word of life”) and Rev. 19:13, where the name “the Word of God” is used for Christ as he returns in victory (combining Wis. 18:5 and Dan. 7).

(b) The understanding of the Word of God in the Johannine Prologue. (i) The original form of the Logos-hymn. In understanding the Johannine Logos-prologue (Jn. 1:1–18), it is important to see that this represents a commentary-like adaptation of an earlier Logos-hymn, which originally comprised vv. 1–4 (5), 9–11, 14, 16 (R. Schnackenburg, op. cit., 224 ff.; E. Schweizer, Neotestamentica, 113 f.). It spoke of the incarnation of the Word in v. 14 only, and not in v. 5 (contra E. Käsemann, “The Structure and Purpose of the Prologue to John’s Gospel”, in New Testament Questions of Today, 1969, 138–67, see especially 150 ff.). Since v. 14 is a part of the original poem, representing in the incarnation of the Logos a genuinely Christian statement, it cannot stem from gnostic-Baptist circles, since it is utterly improbable that a pre-Christian hymn would have spoken of the incarnation of the Baptist (against R. Bultmann, The Gospel of John, 1971, 18). The original Christian hymn consists of four strophes and describes: (1) the divine Being of the Word and his function in creation (v. 1–3); (2) the function of this Word as light and life for the world of men (v. 4f., 9); (3) the rejection of the Word and his work in the human world even before the incarnation (Jn. 10f.); and (4) the complete surprise of the event of the Incarnation of the Word and its believing acceptance in the Christian community (vv. 14, 16).

As → wisdom vainly sought for a dwelling amongst men and returned to her heavenly place (Eth. Enoch 42:1 f.), so the original Christian hymn recounted the fate of the Word: the Logos, the true light which illuminates every man, by whom the world came to be, came to his own property but was not accepted by his own people (Jn. 1:5, 9–11). “As one shuts the door in the face of some unwelcome travelling stranger, so it turned out … with the divine Logos: people did not open up to him. They knew nothing of the fact that he had given the world its being; he was like a stranger, with whom one has nothing to do” (E. Haenchen, “Probleme des johanneischen Prologs”, in Gott und Mensch. Gesammelte Aufsätze, 1965, 131). Only in Jn. 1:14 does the hymn come to the actual statement of the incarnation of the Word, leaving the Wisdom-narrative far behind; “but now the Logos did the most that could be done, the final thing still possible; in order to gain acceptance among men, He became man himself” (v. 14, ibid.). The Incarnation of the Word is “the unprecedented thing to which the Wisdom-myth could offer no parallels” (ibid.).

(ii) The Prologue of John’s Gospel. In consequences of the incorporation of the commentary, and in particular of vv. 6–8 and 15 (12 f., 17f.) with the Evangelist’s allusion to the appearance of John the Baptist, whereby vv. 5, 9–11 are no longer to be referred to the work of the Logos before his incarnation, but anticipate the Incarnate Logos, the Prologue of Jn. 1:1–18 is to be divided into three sections: (1) The pre-existent being of the Word (Jn. 1:1–4). “In the beginning”—not “at the beginning” of Creation (Gen. 1:1), but in the “time before time” of divine eternity—was the Word (pre-existence of the Word, Jn. 1:1), the Word was with God (personal reference, Jn. 1:2), indeed, “the Word was God” (essential divinity of the Word, Jn. 1:1). By this Word, whereby the universe was created, men have their life and the benefit of light (Jn. 1:3f.). (2) The coming of the Word to the world of men and his incomprehensible rejection (Jn. 1:5–13). The Logos who came into the world, to whom John the Baptist bore witness (Jn. 1:6–8; in the Evangelist’s mind vv. 5ff. thus already hint at the incarnation), was rejected by men in an incomprehensible way (Jn. 1:9–11), with the exception of those who came to faith and thus became children of God (Jn. 1:12f.). (3) The event of the incarnation of the Word and its redeeming significance (Jn. 1:14–18). Without surrendering—indeed, rather, in the application of—his essential divinity, the Word became a mortal man (sarx), took up residence amongst men, and, as the presence of God’s glory with men, signified the gift of God’s grace and covenant faithfulness to them (Jn. 1:14, 16), surpassing the OT revelation of the word in the commandment and becoming event in Jesus Christ (Jn. 1:17f.).

(iii) The religio-historical derivation of the Logos concept. The question as to the sphere from which Jn. adopted the term Logos, “the word”, can even now not be answered with certainty.

(1) In Greek philosophy (cf. TDNT IV 79–91), in which “the word” plays a large part (according to Heraclitus: men do not comprehend this Logos, which always is, TDNT IV 81), and amongst the Stoics (cf. TDNT IV 84 f.; M. Pohlenz, Die Stoa, 19592, 32 ff.), where the Logos is the “world-reason” which sustains and permeates the cosmos like a fine spiritual substance, the personal character of the Logos (Jn. 1:1f.) and the thought of the world resisting the Logos (Jn. 1:10f.) are both absent. (2) The attempt to derive the Logos-concept from the OT pure and simple, founders on the facts that, although the LXX can occasionally speak of the word of God as of an active force (cf. Ps. 147:15–18; Wis. 9:1), it does not speak of the word of Yahweh as a person; and that, although the proclamation of “the word of God” by Jesus is spoken of in the absolute in the NT outside the Johannine literature, Jesus himself is never spoken of as the Word of God (not even in 2 Cor. 1:19f.; cf. T. Zahn, Introduction to the New Testament, III, 1909, 327 f., 330). Thus, the Johannine concept transcends the OT concept of the word. (3) In Jewish Wisdom-speculations, where → Wisdom participates in the creation of the world, she is sent into the world by God and rejected by men (Prov. 8:22–36; Sir. 24:3–12; Eth. Enoch 42:1 ff.). If Wisdom too has many conceptions and material statements parallel to Jn. 1:1ff., yet not only the statement concerning the creation of Wisdom (otherwise in Jn. 1:1f.), but also the fact that Jewish Wisdom literature cannot account for the choice of the term “Logos” (= “the Word”) in Jn. 1:1ff. speaks against a direct derivation of the Johannine Logos-concept from Jewish Wisdom-speculations. (4) The designation mêmrā’ (word) in the Targums appears as the Memra of Yahweh or Adonai, and always as an executive agent for God’s activity, which preserves his transcendence; but it cannot be considered as a parallel, since there was never any hypostasis of “Memra” (SB II 302 ff.; V. Hamp, Der Begriff “Wort” in den aramäischen Bibelübersetzungen, 1938). It is equally improbable either that the statements concerning the Torah made by the rabbis (which are quite similar to those made concerning the Logos (SB II 353, ff.) are in fact parallels, or that Jn. 1:1ff. is intended to be an antithesis directed against Torah-speculation (cf. G. Kittel TDNT IV 134 ff.), since the Logos-concept is lacking precisely in the antithetical vv. 1 and 17, and since it is not certain whether Jn. 1:17 ever belonged to the original hymn at all. (5) A gnostic derivation of the Logos-concept is doubtful not only because the myth of the descent of the Redeemer does not allow of certain proof of its pre-Christian origins (C. Colpe, Die religionsgeschichtliche Schule, FRLANT Neue Folge 60, 1961), but also because the Logos concept by and large remained foreign to the gnostic systems (W. Bousset, Kyrios Christos, [1913] 1970, 387 f.; J. Jeremias, “Zum Logos-Problem”, ZNW 59, 1968, 83 ff.; R. Schnackenburg, op. cit., I, 229 ff., 238 ff., 543–57). (6) Hellenistic Judaism. Not only the rendering of Hab. 3:5 “plague goes in front of him” (JB; deḇer, plague) in the Gk. translation of the LXX by “before him [God] will go the Logos [dāḇār]”; and not only Wis. 18:14ff. (God’s all-powerful Logos comes down from heaven to bring punishment and judgment on the Egyptians; J. Jeremias ZNW 59, 1968, 83 f.), but also Philo’s Logos-doctrine provide the strongest contacts with the Johannine Logos-concept. In Philo not only is the Jewish Wisdom identified with the Logos, the Logos understood as a mediating power between God and the Creation and ascribed divine predicates, but Philo (e.g. De Cherubin 125 ff.; Spec. Leg. 1, 81; Leg. All. 3, 96) also simultaneously combines OT statements of creation by the word, Stoic statements of the Logos as the world-soul and Platonic elements (the Logos as the archetype of the created world) with one another (cf. R. Schnackenburg, op. cit., I, 235 ff.; TDNT IV 88 ff.). In the question of the origin of the Logos-concept, pre-eminent significance is therefore to be attributed to Hellenistic Judaism.

(iv) The Incarnation of the Word. What does the Johannine message of the incarnation of the Word (Jn. 1:1ff.) signify within the compass of, and in antithesis to, this Hellenistic Judaic milieu? By contrast with its outlook (cf. Philo), according to which the divine Logos binds together the heavenly and earthly world and rules over and through both macrocosm and microcosm, the Good News of the Johannine Prologue consists in the fact that the Logos no longer works “spiritually” but is found embodied in a mortal man. It no longer embraces the whole world in a simultaneous transcendence and immanence in order to mediate salvation to it through inspiration, but the Logos “becomes one man among others, takes their sin to Himself” (C. Colpe, TDNT VIII 470; cf. Colpe, “New Testament and Gnostic Christology”, in Religions in Antiquity. Essays in Memory of E. R. Goodenough, 1968, 227 ff., especially 235 f.). Thus the incarnation of the Word does not mean that Jesus in his pure humanity proclaims the eschatological word of God (R. Bultmann, The Gospel of John, 1971, 35 f.; and Theology of the New Testament, II, 1955, 40–49, 59–69). Over against what is in point of fact a kenotic interpretation—i.e. one which eliminates the divinity of Jesus (H. J. Iwand, “Vom Primat der Christologie”, in Antwort. Karl Barth zum siebzigsten Geburtstag, 1956, 181), and a replacement of the Word becoming flesh by a notion of the flesh becoming word (i.e. the earthly Jesus), one must formulate in the sense of the Johannine Prologue—not a genuine man, commissioned with God’s eschatological call to decision, dwelt amongst us—but the Word, God himself (Jn. 1:1f.) in his divine glory (Jn. 1:14f.) who assumes the full reality of historical objectivity, human transience (sarx) and human death (Jn. 1:14a; cf. 6:61, 63; 1:29; 1 Jn. 3:5; Rom. 8:3). Or, with Schniewind’s pertinent phraseology, “Even the prologue speaks of the Cross” (in H.-J. Kraus, Julius Schniewind. Charisma der Theologie, 1965, 202). The incarnation of the Word thus does not mean Jesus as the eschatological ambassador, in whom God is present and acting (pace Bultmann); it signifies the presence of God himself in the flesh. A religious historical parallel to this statement will for this reason never be found (cf. C. Colpe, TDNT VIII 470). The message of the incarnation of the Word (Jn. 1:14) “is more and other than the historicising of a mythological event” (ibid.). In other words, the incarnation of the Word means the presence of God in the person of Jesus, not just the present activity of God in the words of Jesus.

B. Klappert

5. Cognates. Of the various cognates found in the NT, the most important is the group connected with eklektos, chosen, elect (→ Elect). Otherwise, the terms are comparatively rare. Apollos is described in Acts 18:24 as an anēr logios which may mean “an eloquent man” (RSV) or “a learned man” (TDNT IV 137). The former is supported by v. 25 and possibly by the picture of Apollos in 1 Cor. 1:12; 3:5. But too much cannot be read into these latter passages, as the Apollos faction might equally have been attracted by his learning, and in any case Apollos may not have been responsible for the formation of the faction.

logion in the LXX is used for an oracular saying (Num. 24:4, 16), individual sayings (Isa. 28:13), and the commandments (Deut. 33:9), but frequently as a general statement about the word of God (e.g. Isa. 5:24; Pss. 19:4 [18:4]; 107:11 [106:11]; 119:154–69 [118:154–69] [22 times in all]; 147:15 [147:4]). In Acts 7:38 Moses is said to have received “living oracles [logia zōnta]”, i.e. the Torah or perhaps more especially the Decalogue (cf. Deut. 32:46f.). In Rom. 3:2 Paul lists among the advantages of the Jews the fact that they were entrusted with the “oracles of God [logia tou theou]” (cf. Rom. 15:8). But in neither case did these advantages turn out to be an abiding benefit, for the Jews did not use them for salvation. The readers of Heb. 5:12 are rebuked for needing instruction in “the first principles of God’s word [stoicheia tēs archēs tōn logiōn tou theou]”, which evidently implies a failure to grasp not only the OT revelation but the Word of God in → Jesus Christ, for “in these last days” God “has spoken to us by a Son” (Heb. 1:2). In the context of an exhortation to employ gifts for one another “as good stewards of God’s varied grace” (1 Pet. 4:10), Peter urges: “whoever speaks, as one who utters oracles of God” (v. 11). Here logia theou, which is used elsewhere to describe the oracles of God in the OT and in Heb. 5:12 of Jesus Christ, is used of charismatic utterance. The phrase contains the implication that some charismatic utterances were less than edifying. It would appear to rule out not only speaking in tongues but any kind of unedifying pronouncement. E. Best sees the phrase “whoever speaks” as including “whether as prophet, preacher or teacher in the worship, instruction or mission of the community, or as an individual privately encouraging, evangelizing or rebuking another Christian, or even a pagan” (1 Peter, New Century Bible, 1971, 160). Hence, the speaker is urged not to give his own opinions or be motivated by self-esteem but to speak what is given to him as God’s word to the glory of God (v. 11c).

alogos is found in cl. Gk. meaning both dumb and without reason (TDNT IV 141). In Acts 25:27 it has the latter sense, but in 2 Pet. 2:12 and Jude 10 either or both senses are possible.

logikos is found in secular Gk. meaning “belonging to speech” and “belonging to reason”, “rational”. In this latter sense it is found in Gk. philosophy, especially the Stoics (TDNT IV 142). Man is a zōon logikon, “a rational being” (Epictetus, Dissertationes 2, 9, 2; M. Ant., 2, 16, 6; cf. 55, 4; Philo, Abr. 32, where there may be overtones of “spiritual”). In 1 Pet. 2:2 the RSV translates logikos “spiritual”: “Like newborn babes, long for the pure spiritual milk [logikon adolon gala], that by it you may grow up to salvation.” E. Best prefers this sense to either “of the word” (AV), though he admits that this is the natural meaning of the context (cf. 1 Pet. 1:23ff.; cf. also Jas. 1:21), or “reasonable” (RVmg), “rational” which is the normal meaning among Gk. philosophers (op. cit., 98). Best thinks that the latter meaning would suit Rom. 12:1, but finds it difficult to see how it would fit 1 Pet. 2:2. However, it may be suggested that there may be an intended paradox or contrast between milk as the food of babes and the rational word which, when fed upon, leads to maturity (cf. v. 2b). Best, like G. Kittel (TDNT IV 142), prefers “spiritual” as the meaning both here and in Rom. 12:1, seeing parallels in the later gnostic writings which allude to spiritual, i.e. non-material, sacrifices (Corp. Herm. 1, 31; 13, 18 and 21). The RSV uses “spiritual” in its rendering of Rom. 12:1: “I appeal to you therefore brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship [tēn logikēn latreian hymōn].” This meaning would fit the context, where Christian worship is set over against Jewish conceptions of religion. But the word may have been chosen both here and in 1 Pet. because of its ambiguity and overtones of both “spiritual” and “rational”. For in Rom. Paul may well be emphasizing the need for charismatic worship to express itself in forms which were at once spiritual and rational. In the context of Rom. 12 Paul returns to the subject of gifts (vv. 6ff., cf. vv. 3ff.), and the need for worship to be given a rational and practical expression may well be a counterpart to his treatment of charismatic worship in Rom. 8 (→ Prayer, art. ἐντυγχάνω).

The vb. logomacheō and the noun logomachia each occur in the Pastoral Epistles. 1 Tim. closes with a warning about contentious teachers: “If any one teaches otherwise and does not agree with the sound words of our Lord Jesus Christ and the teaching which accords with godliness, he is puffed up with conceit, he knows nothing; he has a morbid craving for controversy and for disputes about words [alla nosōn peri zētēseis kai logomachias], which produce envy, dissension, slander, base suspicions, and wrangling among men who are depraved in mind and bereft of the truth, imagining that godliness is a means of gain” (1 Tim. 6:3ff.). Similarly, 2 Tim. 2:14 urges Timothy to “Remind them of this, and charge them before the Lord to avoid disputing about words [mē logomachein], which does no good, but only ruins the hearers.” These passages evidently refer to those who in 1 Tim. 1:4 occupied themselves with myths and endless genealogies (cf. also 1 Tim. 4:3; 6:20; 2 Tim. 2:14–18; Tit. 1:14ff.; 3:9). The precise nature of the teaching is obscure, though it would seem to be some form of gnosticizing Judaism. Myths and genealogies were already linked in Plato (Tim. 22a; cf. Polybius 9, 2, 1). In the early church Irenaeus notes a link between them among the heretics (Haer. 1, 30, 9; cf. also Preface; Tertullian, De Praesc. 33; see further M. Dibelius and H. Conzelmann, The Pastoral Epistles, Hermeneia, 1972, 16 ff., 83 ff., 110 ff.).

C. Brown

- New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology (Zondervan)