Lamb.
It is beautiful to observe that while in John’s Gospel the-word used when speaking of Christ is the common Greek one amnos, in the book of Revelation the word used throughout is arnion, meaning “a little lamb,” as if to reassure us when moving amongst the transcendent scenes there unfolded, by giving to Christ the humblest and lowliest name ever applied to Him. This is the more remarkable because the word is never applied to Christ elsewhere, and indeed is only used once besides, when He bids Peter feed His “little lambs.” It is wonderful indeed to think that the very word given by the Lord Himself to the feeblest believer here is the title He takes for Himself when moving in the highest scenes of heaven’s glories.
Love.
The two words both translated thus are agapao and phileo. The former is a reasoning love, an esteem, a love caused by the intellect only, rather than the heart, whereas the latter is a more impulsive love of the affections alone. Thus we are frequently told to love (agapao) God (Matthew 22:37; Luke 10:27; 1 Corinthians 8:3) but never to love (phileo) Him, while God both loves (agapao, John 3:35) and loves (phileo, John 5:20) the Son. In John 21:15-17 the distinction is important. The first “Lovest thou me?” is agapao: Peter answers “I love (phileo) thee.” The second question is in the same words, and again Peter replies “I love (phileo) thee.” The third time the Lord adopts Peter’s word phileo. A beautiful distinction between the words is seen in John 11:3,5. “Lord he whom thou lovest (phileo) is sick”: but when the Evangelist speaks of the love of the Lord to Lazarus and his two sisters, the other word agapao is used.
Miracle.
Dunarnis, one of the two words thus translated means power (Acts 2:22; 1 Corinthians 12:1 o; Galatians 3:5, etc.), and refers to the divine power displayed in the miracles; Seemeion, the other word means a sign (Mark 16:20; Acts 14:3; Hebrews 2:4, etc), and refers to the purpose for which they were wrought. The former —thus refers to the cause, and the latter to the effect.
Murderer.
We have three Greek words to consider which are 411 rendered “murderer.”
Anthropoktonos (John 8:44;1 John 3:15 only) means “homicide” or “manslayer.”
Sikarios only occurs once (Acts 21:38) and means a man who wore a short sword or dagger, and hired himself for the express purpose of assassination.
Phoneus, the third word, means any murderer, but may be applied morally, and does not necessarily refer to men. It occurs Matthew 22:7; 1 Peter 4:15; Revelation 21:8, etc.
Net.
This is represented by three distinct words in the Greek, diktuon, amphibleestron and sageenee. The first, meaning something which is thrown, is the common word for all nets, and includes other than fishing nets, whereas the two latter refer only to this class. Amphibleestron, which only occurs in Matthew 4:18 and Mark 1:16, is the casting net, and is of small size, thrown by one man; sageenee is the large draw net or “seine” which is swept along the bottom of the sea between two boats; it is used in the New Testament only in Matthew 13:47.
New.
Kainos and Neos both mean, and are both translated “new” the former in Ephesians 2:15; Hebrews 9:15; Matthew 26:29; the latter in Colossians 3:10; Hebrews 12:24; Matthew 9:17. In each of these three cases they are applied to the same thing, viz: man, testament, and wine respectively. The meaning, however, may in spite of this be distinguished, kainos meaning “new” as opposed to “old,” neos, “new” with regard to time, i.e. recent. Thus, we find kainos in Luke 5:36; Matthew 9:17; Luke 5:28; 2 Peter 3:13; Mark 16:17; Matthew 28:60. This last passage plainly shows its meaning, the newness of the tomb not consisting in its having been recently excavated, but in its never having been used before. Still more striking is the difference between 1 Timothy 4:12 (neos) and Romans 6:4 (kainos’ the former meaning youth, the latter newness or novelty. If this distinction is borne in mind it shows at once the force of the new (neos) man of Colossians 3 Jo, and the new (kainos) man of Ephesians 2:15. For that which is born again is now recent as regards time when compared with “ the old man,” And not only so, but is of a different sort or species, being no repetition of the other as a son is of his father, and hence is not only neos but kainos. He is new as to time and new in quality. Neos then refers to time, kainos to the thing itself.