sacred

The Greek word translated in the Gospel According to Matthew 7:6 (NABRE) as holy or sacred is a common word with important Christian meaning. The word, ἅγιος (hagios), means dedicated to the gods, and it ultimately became the Greek word used to describe the Christian view of holiness.

This word in the original Greek, however, has a broader range of meaning. It is literally anything dedicated to the gods. In Greek religious thought, not all gods were good, and as a result, all such dedications were likewise not necessarily good and certainly not holy as we would perceive today.

Why do you think it is that dedicating ourselves to God in a Christian context is morally good?

related topics: consecration; holy; temple

you also may like our study of Saul, David & Solomon
The United Kingdom of Israel: Saul, David & Solomon Foreshadow Christ the King, a 28-lesson Catholic Bible study with an imprimatur, provides an in-depth look at the First and Second Books of Samuel to learn how the lives of the monarchs Saul, David, and Solomon point ahead to the kingdom of heaven. The unified reign of King David is seen as a foreshadowing or type of the unity that is one of the four marks of the Church—the kingdom of God—established by Jesus Christ. Click on the book’s cover to view a sample lesson.

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