How To Do A Word Study
An easy method to help you interpret Scripture correctly.
By Kent R. Wilson
“The finest words in the world are only vain sounds, if you cannot comprehend them,” wrote French author Anatole France. Words, even in Scripture, can be “sweeter than honey to my mouth” (Psalm 119:103), or they can be “things that are hard to understand, which ignorant and unstable people distort” (2 Peter 3:16).
Though words are the simplest of building blocks for language and communication, they can be perplexing with their myriad shades of meaning and usage. In the Oxford English Dictionary the word round has over 70 distinctly different meanings. The study of Scripture must eventually involve the study of words.
The basic purpose for a word study is to discover the most appropriate meaning of a particular word and to understand how that meaning affects a passage as a whole. The encouraging part about doing word studies is this: they can be as elementary or as involved as the Bible student desires.
Word studies can be as simple as following three easy steps with only a Bible in hand. Or they can be as complicated as a lexical and etymological study using original languages and Greek or Hebrew reference works. You decide the complexity needed based on the resources you have available, the time at hand, and the nature of the word itself.
The Basic Steps
There are only three basic steps in every form of a word study. The depth to which these steps are carried out and the study resources used determine the complexity of the study
Step 1: Determine the various meanings and uses of the word. Decide what word to study by looking for key words within the passage or words whose meanings are unknown or confusing to you. Imagine you are studying Ephes. 1:7: “In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, in accordance with the riches of God’s grace.” You could do word studies on redemption, forgiveness, sin, or grace.
In Step 1 you try to find other possible meanings of the selected word. It may be used differently in other parts of the passage or the Bible. Or you can refer to dictionaries, concordances, or other resources for differing meanings of the word. A Bible dictionary would tell you that the word forgiveness from our passage actually means “to send away” and is pictured in the Old Testament by the scapegoat. There the sins of the people are confessed on the head of a goat which is then sent away into the wilderness, never to be seen again.
A good all-around resource for conducting word studies is W. E. Vine’s Expository Dictionary of New Testament Words, or Expository Dictionary of Bible Words by Lawrence Richards. Both are inexpensive resources that are based on the English text yet give Greek and cultural information that is understandable to anyone.
Step 2: Discover the best meaning of the word in the passage under study. In studying a specific word only one meaning may arise. That makes your job easy. But if a number of possible meanings surface, then you have to decide which meaning best fits the particular passage and context. Try each potential meaning within the passage. Which meaning best fits and is consistent with the context? Which meaning is compatible with other passages of Scripture?
In Ephes. 1:7, redemption can either mean “to release from something,” such as in freeing a prisoner, or more specifically “to free by paying a ransom.” When the word is associated with the shed blood of Christ, ransom becomes the best meaning since Christ’s blood is the payment made for our captivity in sin.
Step 3: State the resulting meaning of the passage. Word studies are only useful when the word is studied in the context and illuminates the meaning of a selected passage. When the word’s specific meaning is applied to the passage, the meaning of the passage can be determined. Only then can one apply the passage to his or her life.
The word round has numerous meanings to us until it is used, for example, in a discussion about guns, such as when someone says, “I took the round out of the chamber for safety.” In Step 3 the best meaning of the word becomes the basis for interpreting the meaning of the entire passage or context.
Various Forms of Word Studies
The three steps above can be applied to various forms of word studies depending on the resources available and the complexity of the word. Here are six different forms of word studies that use the same basic steps but different resources.
1. English Definition Study. By using an English dictionary, various meanings of a word can be written out. Good dictionaries will also indicate word origins and foreign-language uses.
2. Origin or Etymology Study. Here you’ll need a good Bible dictionary like Vine’s or a lexicon such as A Greek-English Lexicon by Arndt and Gingrich to learn if the word originally comes from several words combined together. Steward is a compound word made from the word for house and the verb “to arrange.” When Paul refers to elders as stewards in Titus 1:7, he no doubt is thinking of their arranging or care of the house of God, the church. One Greek word for worship literally means “to kiss towards,” while the Hebrew word means “to bend the knee.”
3. Usage Study. Here a good concordance is all you need as you look for patterns in the way the word is used in other passages. Study every occurrence of the word, looking for other possible meanings or patterns in the way certain authors use it. You may find that James uses the same word for trial two times in James 1 with two different meanings. Or that some words are unique to Paul’s letters, such as predestinate.
4. Lexical Study. Instead of trying to discover the various meanings of a word on your own, let a good Bible dictionary or lexicon do the work for you. In them you’ll find information about the word’s origin, history, meanings, theology, etc. Look up the word, briefly list its basic idea and various meanings, then try to pick the best meaning for the passage before looking at the recommendation in the resource.
5. Synonym Study. Most words have synonyms whose meanings are distinct from the chosen word yet illuminating in their differences. Again, a source like Vine’s or Synonyms of the New Testament by Richard Trench is helpful for finding synonyms. List each synonym with its distinctive meaning. Then evaluate the insight learned from knowing that the author chose that specific word instead of one of its synonyms.
Paul chose his words carefully in Ephes. 4:26 when he spoke about how long anger should last. He used the word for anger that means a more settled or long-term feeling which, if left unchecked, can sometimes lead to revenge or sin. He purposely did not use its synonym “wrath,” which refers to a sudden outburst of emotion that is usually short-lived. However, in Ephes. 4:31 he uses both words when he cautions against all forms of anger and bitterness.
6. Translation Study. Each translation of the Bible can be a resource to understand word meanings. Look up your chosen word in a number of different translations and paraphrases and you will be able to gain insight into possible word meanings and a preferred rendering. Be sure to use a combination of translation types: literal translations such as the KJV or NASB, modern translations such as the NIV or New Century Version, specialty Bibles like The Amplified Bible, and even paraphrases such as The Message or The Living Bible.
