2 Corinthians 1 · Symbol · Suffering
The Words Pathema and Thlipsis
Pathema stands only in the letters, from Romans to 1 Peter, while thlipsis runs from the Gospels to Revelation.
One verse of 2 Corinthians uses the verb to press, the noun for sufferings, the verb to suffer and the word for endurance together.
For just as the sufferings of Christ overflow to us, so also through Christ our comfort overflows.
- The word
- πάθημα (pathema), G3804
- First appears
- Romans 7:5 “For when we lived according to the flesh,…”
Summary
The New Testament's language of suffering rests chiefly on two nouns and the verbs beside them. The letters use them for the sufferings of Christ, for the troubles of the churches, and in two verses for the passions of sin. Paul joins both nouns to comfort in the opening of 2 Corinthians.
- Pathema comes from the verb paschō, to suffer, and names the thing suffered.
- Thlipsis means pressure, and Jesus used it when He warned His disciples of tribulation in the world.
- Tsarah, tightness or trouble, and oni, affliction, are the Hebrew words for the same ideas in the Old Testament.
Two Words for Suffering
The two nouns have verbs beside them and Hebrew counterparts in the Old Testament.
A reader of an English Bible meets many words for suffering, and one Greek noun often lies behind more than one of them. Knowing the words helps a reader see when Paul speaks of what Christ suffered, when he speaks of the pressure his churches bore, and how he joins the two. They are the vocabulary the apostles used for suffering itself.
The question this study answers is what pathema and thlipsis mean and how the New Testament uses them. It sets the words and their verbs beside the Hebrew words for trouble and affliction, follows each noun through its chief texts, and marks where a word's picture must not be pressed too far.
Where the Words Stand
Each row gives a word's sense, its count of uses and one use in the Berean words.
Thlipsis is the most frequent of the four Greek words, and the Hebrew tsarah is the most frequent of all six.
| Word | Sense in the STEP Bible lexicon | Uses | One use in the Berean words |
|---|---|---|---|
| Greek | |||
| Pathema (G3804), noun | something undergone, i.e. hardship or pain | 16 | our present sufferings are not comparable to the glory that will be revealed in us (Romans 8:18) |
| Paschō (G3958), verb | to experience a sensation or impression (usually painful) | 42 | Christ also suffered for you (1 Peter 2:21) |
| Thlipsis (G2347), noun | pressure (literally or figuratively) | 44 | In the world you will have tribulation. (John 16:33) |
| Thlibō (G2346), verb | to crowd (literally or figuratively) | 10 | We are hard pressed on all sides, but not crushed (2 Corinthians 4:8) |
| Hebrew | |||
| Tsarah (H6869), noun | tightness (i.e. figuratively, trouble) | 73 | God, who answered me in my day of distress (Genesis 35:3) |
| Oni (H6040), noun | depression, i.e. misery | 36 | I have indeed seen the affliction of My people in Egypt. (Exodus 3:7) |
Tsarah (H6869), noun, Oni (H6040), noun
Pathema, What Is Undergone
Paul and Peter use the noun for what Christ bore and for what His people share with Him.
In 2 Corinthians 1:3 to 7 Paul uses pathema three times, in 2 Corinthians 1:5, 2 Corinthians 1:6 and 2 Corinthians 1:7, and each time he sets comfort beside it.
If we are afflicted, it is for your comfort and salvation; if we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which accomplishes in you patient endurance of the same sufferings we experience.Paul's affliction and his comfort both serve the church, and the endurance he names grows in the same sufferings he bears.
Origen, in his Exhortation to Martyrdom, read 2 Corinthians 1:5 as a call to welcome Christ's sufferings for the sake of His comfort.
“If as the sufferings of Christ abound so also comfort abounds through Christ, let us welcome the great encouragement of Christ's sufferings and let them abound in us, if we indeed yearn for the abundant comfort with which all who mourn will be comforted, though perhaps it will not be alike for everyone. For if the comfort were alike for everyone, it would not be written, ‘As the sufferings of Christ abound for us, so also our comfort abounds through Christ.’”
Origen of Alexandria · Exhortation to Martyrdom 42 · on 2 Corinthians 1:5Patristic
I want to know Christ and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to Him in His death,This verse joins the believer's life to Christ's own sufferings, the use the opening of 2 Corinthians also makes.
trying to determine the time and setting to which the Spirit of Christ in them was pointing when He predicted the sufferings of Christ and the glories to follow.Peter says the prophets foretold the sufferings of Christ and the glories after them, a pairing he returns to in 1 Peter 4:13 and 1 Peter 5:1.
For when we lived according to the flesh, the sinful passions aroused by the law were at work in our bodies, bearing fruit for death.In this verse the noun leaves the language of suffering for the language of desire.
The second sense of pathemaGalatians 5:24
Galatians 5:24 uses the word in the same sense, for those who belong to Christ have crucified the flesh "with its passions and desires". The STEP Bible lexicon gives this as the word's second sense, a passive emotion or passion.
Philippians 3:10, 1 Peter 1:11, Romans 7:5
Oni in Three Names of Genesis
The names of Ishmael, Reuben and Ephraim each remember affliction.
Hagar's son Ishmael was named because "the LORD has heard your cry of affliction" (Genesis 16:11), and Leah named Reuben because "The LORD has seen my affliction" (Genesis 29:32). Joseph named Ephraim saying, "God has made me fruitful in the land of my affliction" (Genesis 41:52), and the word for affliction in all three is oni.
Thlipsis, Pressure and Affliction
Acts sets the noun beside endurance, and 2 Corinthians sets it beside comfort and glory.
The Berean text renders thlipsis by several English words, among them trouble in 2 Corinthians 1:4 and hardships in Acts 14:22. In 2 Corinthians 4:17 it is affliction, which Paul calls light and momentary beside an eternal weight of glory.
who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves have received from God.Paul uses thlipsis twice in this verse, and the comfort God gives in the one trouble becomes the comfort Paul gives in any trouble.
strengthening the souls of the disciples and encouraging them to continue in the faith. “We must endure many hardships to enter the kingdom of God,” they said.Paul and Barnabas gave this word to the churches of Lystra, Iconium and Antioch after Paul had been stoned at Lystra.
“Sir,” I answered, “you know.” So he replied, “These are the ones who have come out of the great tribulation; they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.John sees the great multitude as those who have come out of the great tribulation, the word's last use in the New Testament.
Romans 5:3 says that "suffering produces perseverance", and the endurance that thlipsis produces has its own study.
Basil on afflictions as trainingBasil of Caesarea, on Romans 5:3
Basil of Caesarea, in a homily on Romans 5:3, wrote that "tribulations are like certain foods and exercises for athletes which lead the contestant on to the inheritance of glory".
A Picture Pressed Too Far
The literal sense of a word's root shows in some verses, and a reader keeps it out of the rest.
Thlibō in Matthew 7:14 and the noun in the lettersMatthew 7:14, Acts 11:19, 2 Corinthians 8:2
The verb thlibō keeps its literal sense of crowding in Matthew 7:14, where the way that leads to life is "narrow". The noun names affliction of many sorts, from the persecution that scattered the church in Acts 11:19 to the "terrible ordeal" of a poor church in 2 Corinthians 8:2. A reader who finds a picture of crushing in every use reads the root into words that have moved past it.
Sources
Scripture is the Berean Standard Bible.
- STEP Bible, the Brief lexicon of Extended Strongs for Greek based on Abbott-Smith (1922), and the TBESH Hebrew glosses, Tyndale House, Cambridge, CC BY 4.0.
- STEP Bible, the Translators Amalgamated Greek New Testament (TAGNT), Tyndale House, Cambridge, CC BY 4.0.
- Origen of Alexandria, Exhortation to Martyrdom, section 42, on 2 Corinthians 1:5.
- Basil of Caesarea, Homily 16, on Romans 5:3.
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