Numbers 12:7 · Symbol · Faithfulness
The Words Emunah and Pistos
Emunah in Hebrew and pistos in Greek name faithfulness, said first of God and then of His servants.
A poet writing over a ruined city chose emunah for the great faithfulness of God.
But this is not so with My servant Moses; he is faithful in all My house.
- The word
- אֱמוּנָה (emunah), H530
- First appears
- Exodus 17:12 “When Moses’ hands grew heavy, they took a…”
Summary
In the Hebrew Bible a form of the verb aman, neeman, calls God the faithful God and calls Moses faithful. The Psalms and the Prophets speak most of His emunah, His firmness toward His people. In Greek the adjective pistos means trustworthy, and it stands in Paul's letters, in Hebrews and in Revelation.
- Emunah means firmness, and Scripture uses it for fidelity.
- Pistos can mean trustworthy or, in a few places, believing, and the context decides.
- Nehemiah 9:8 calls Abraham's heart faithful with the same form, neeman.
Faithful in All My House
The scene is the Tent of Meeting in the wilderness.
Emunah and pistos carry the Bible's teaching that God can be relied on and that His servants must be. They matter to every reader who has to decide whom to trust. The question they raise is what the two words mean and of whom Scripture says them.
Below stand the scene of Numbers 12, a table of four words with their counts, emunah of God in the Psalms and Prophets, and pistos in the New Testament. Then come a caution on each word, the teachers who read them and the lexicons a reader can open.
Miriam and Aaron spoke against Moses, and the LORD answered that He speaks with prophets in visions and dreams. Of Moses He said that he is faithful in all His house (Numbers 12:7). The Hebrew word is neeman, a form of the verb aman glossed faithful in the STEP word index.
Now Moses was faithful as a servant in all God’s house, testifying to what would be spoken later.Hebrews takes up the verse in Greek, where the word for faithful is pistos.
Read the word study of Emunah and Pistis, the words for faith
Four Words for Faithfulness
Each word's sense and count stand beside a verse where it occurs.
The Greek adjective pistos is used more often than the Hebrew noun emunah.
| Word | Sense | Uses | A verse and the form there |
|---|---|---|---|
| Hebrew words | |||
| aman, אָמַן, H539 | to be firm or faithful | 106 | Deuteronomy 7:9, ha-neeman, the faithful God |
| emunah, אֱמוּנָה, H530 | firmness; fidelity | 49 | Lamentations 3:23, emunatekha, great is Your faithfulness |
| emun, אֵמוּן, H529 | trusty; trustworthiness | 8 | Proverbs 20:6, emunim, who can find a trustworthy man? |
| Greek word | |||
| pistos, πιστός, G4103 | trustworthy; trustful | 67 | 1 Corinthians 4:2, pistos, that they be found faithful |
Emunah of God
The Psalms and the Prophets use emunah for the faithfulness of God to His people.
At Exodus 17:12 emunah names the steadiness of Moses' hands held up by Aaron and Hur. In the Psalms and the Prophets it becomes the word for God's own faithfulness, often joined to His loving devotion.
FAITHFULNESS TO THE CLOUDS
David measures God's emunah against the height of the sky, emunatekha, Your faithfulness.
FAITHFULNESS TO ALL GENERATIONS
The psalmist proclaims God's emunah to all generations before he laments the fall of David's line.
PLANS IN PERFECT FAITHFULNESS
Isaiah praises God for plans formed long ago and carried out in emunah.
BETROTHED IN FAITHFULNESS
Hosea's promise of a new betrothal uses be-emunah, in faithfulness.
Plans in perfect faithfulness, Betrothed in faithfulness
Two Cautions
Each word carries more than one sense, and the verse decides which.
Strong's dictionary gives pistos two sides, "objectively, trustworthy; subjectively, trustful". In John 20:27 Jesus tells Thomas to stop being apistos and be pistos, which the STEP word index glosses unbelieving and believing, and the Berean text renders "Stop doubting and believe".
Adam Clarke read neeman in Numbers 12:7 as "a prefect or superintendent", a title of office, and he gathered other places where the word names a person set over others. The Berean text renders it faithful, and Hebrews 3:5 takes it in that sense.
Pistos in the New Testament
Six verses show where the adjective stands.
The words "God is faithful" stand in Paul's letters as a ground for comfort. In each case the word is pistos, and in each case it stands beside a promise, that God will keep His people, provide a way out of temptation or finish what He began.
God is faithful
Paul assures the Corinthians that God, who called them into fellowship with His Son, is pistos.
The One who calls you
Near the end of his first letter to the Thessalonians Paul calls the God who called them pistos and promises that He will do it.
He who promised
Hebrews grounds hope on the faithfulness of the One who promised, pistos.
Faithful and just to forgive
John joins pistos to just in the promise of forgiveness to those who confess.
Faithful and True
John's vision names the rider on the white horse Pistos, Faithful.
Faithful even unto death
The risen Christ asks the church at Smyrna to be pistos to the end.
How the Words Have Been Read
Matthew Henry read pistos in John's promise of forgiveness.
1662 to 1714 · Matthew Henry
“God is faithful to his covenant and word, wherein he has promised forgiveness to penitent believing confessors. He is just to himself and his glory who has provided such a sacrifice, by which his righteousness is declared in the justification of sinners.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible · on 1 John 1:9Puritan
Books to Read Next
A concordance and a Greek lexicon a reader can open in full.
The Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible
James Strong · 1890
Strong numbered every Hebrew and Greek word of the Bible in this concordance, and H530 and G4103 are his numbers for emunah and pistos.
Read on archive.orgA Manual Greek Lexicon of the New Testament
G. Abbott-Smith · 1922
The Greek glosses of the STEP Bible lexicon are based on this work.
Read on archive.orgHe Remains Faithful
Paul wrote these words to Timothy near the end of his life.
In 2 Timothy 2:13 the Greek sets apistoumen, we are faithless, beside pistos, faithful, in one short line.
if we are faithless, He remains faithful, for He cannot deny Himself.The line closes a short saying of four conditions that Paul calls trustworthy.
Sources
Scripture is the Berean Standard Bible.
- STEP Bible, Translators lexicon of Extended Strongs for Hebrew and for Greek (Tyndale House, Cambridge), CC BY 4.0, with the Greek lexicon based on Abbott-Smith (1922)
- James Strong, The Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible, with its dictionaries of the Hebrew and Greek words of the original (1890)
- STEP Bible, the Translators Amalgamated Hebrew Old Testament and Greek New Testament (TAHOT and TAGNT), Tyndale House, Cambridge, CC BY 4.0, with Strong's numbers, glosses and transliterations.
- Adam Clarke, Commentary on the Bible, on Numbers 12:7.
- Matthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible (1710), on 1 John 1:9.
Keep Studying
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