World
WORLD
The earth on which we dwell, 1Sa 2:8 ; its inhabitants, Joh 3:16, or a large number of them, Joh 12:19 . In several places it is equivalent to “land,” meaning the Roman Empire, or Judea and its vicinity, Luk 2:1 4:3 Ac 11:28. It also denotes the objects and interests of time and sense, Gal 6:14 1Jo 2:15 .
Fuente: American Tract Society Bible Dictionary
World
The conception of the world in the apostolic writings is one of much complexity. Its content is derived partly from the OT, partly from later Judaism; but it has also assimilated an important element from Greek thought, and the peculiar experience of early Christianity has added to it a sinister significance of its own. Thus the various synonyms by which it is expressed reveal so many narrowly differentiated senses in each, and also shade off into each other in such a way, that a delicate problem for exact exegesis is often created. The three terms chiefly to be considered are , , and , which in their proper significance denote the world respectively as a place, a period, and a system.
1. The spatial conception of the world.-The spatial conception of the world as the orbis terrarum, the comprehensive abode of man and scene of human life, is rendered in the OT by and its more poetical synonym i, which in the lxx are translated, the former by , the latter by (vice versa in a few passages in Isaiah). In the apostolic writings is retained in this sense in quotations from the lxx (e.g. Act 2:19, Rom 9:17, Heb 1:10), also in Act 17:26, Jam 5:5, and frequently in the Apocalypse (Rev 1:5; Rev 1:7; Rev 3:10, etc.). The more distinctive term is (sc. ). Originally it was used, with racial self-consciousness, to signify the territorial extent of Greek life and civilization (Herod. iv. 110); but after the conquests of Alexander, and in consequence of the same unifying influences as those by which the Greek dialects were merged in the , it came to express a view and feeling of the inhabited world as overpassing all national distinctions and boundaries. Later, when the rule of the Caesars seemed to be practically co-extensive with the habitable earth, it acquired a more special sense-the Empire as a territorial unity (e.g. Luk 2:1); but in the apostolic writings it has the larger significance, the world-wide abode of man (Act 11:28; Act 17:6; Act 19:27 by passionate exaggeration, Act 24:5, Rom 10:18, Rev 3:10; Rev 16:14), or, by a natural transition, mankind (Act 17:31, Rev 12:9). As an example of the elasticity which characterizes the use of these terms, it may be noted that to express the same thought of the world-wide field for the dissemination of the gospel St. Paul prefers (Rom 1:8, Col 1:6); and that, on the contrary, the writer of Hebrews gives to the proper significance both of , the terrestrial order (Heb 1:6), and of (cf. the unique of Heb 2:5 and , Heb 6:5).
2. The temporal conception of the world.-The temporal conception of the world as a saeculum, a cycle of history, complete within itself yet related to a before and an after, is distinctively expressed by , or in contrast with the world to come, as actually it always is, by (1Co 1:20; 1Co 2:6-8; 1Co 3:18, 2Co 4:4, Eph 1:21; variants, , Gal 1:4; , Eph 2:2; , 1Ti 6:17, 2Ti 4:10, Tit 2:12; , Rom 3:26; Rom 8:18).
The use of in this sense, as denoting the present order of existence, does not occur in the OT (Ecc 3:11?), but is characteristic of later Hebraism, the contrast between the two aeons being an essential feature in the Apocalyptic view of history. Dalman remarks upon the absence of evidence for this form of expression in any extant pre-Christian writing (Words of Jesus, p. 148); it occurs chiefly in the later parts of the Baruch Apocalypse, in 4 Ezra (e.g. 6:9, 7:12, 13, 8:1, 52) and the Slavonic Enoch. In Rabbinism (Dalman, p. 150) the earliest witnesses for the expression are Hillel and Jochanan ben Zakkai (fl. c. a.d. 80). The idea, however, is vouched for by earlier documents, Enoch, Jubilees, Assumption of Moses (see on the whole subject Boussets Religion des Judentums2, p. 278 ff.), and the frequency of its occurrence in the NT, with the assumption of its familiarity, seems to imply its popular currency (contrariwise, Dalman-the expressions characterised the language of the learned rather than that of the people [p. 151]).
But while in primarily a time-concept, this world-age in contrast with the future age of the regeneration, the temporal element tends to become secondary. The notion of a period of time (emphatic in 1Co 7:31) is always implied; but the ruling idea approximates to that which properly belongs to the , the organic system of terrestrial existence (e.g. in 1Co 1:20 and are parallel and synonymous). The opposition between the two aeons is qualitative even more than temporal: the one is evil (Gal 1:4), and under the dominion of the Devil (2Co 4:4) and kindred spirits (1Co 2:6; 1Co 2:8), a world of sin and death in contrast with that other eternal world of righteousness (2Pe 3:13) and life. The two, indeed, are thought of as in a sense contemporaneous; the world to come projects itself into the present; its powers are already experienced by all in whom the Spirit of God dwells and the work of spiritual quickening and transformation is begun (Heb 6:5).
3. The world as an organic system.-The world as an organic system, a universe, is distinctively .
The idea which underlies all the various uses of is that of order or arrangement (as in the common Homeric phrases, = in an orderly manner; = to sit in order), and since the strongest impression of unvarying and reliable order in nature is given by the movement of the heavenly bodies, it was probably to this that the term was first applied in a more special sense. In classical Greek, while it is sometime used with reference to the firmament above, and its sense is not anywhere restricted to the earth, so also in the lxx it translates , the host of heaven (in Enoch also, , xx. 4), and elsewhere appears only in the sense at ornament. Pythagoras is credited with having been the first to employ the word to express the philosophical conception of an ordered universe of being (plutarch, de Plac. Phil. 886 B); and from the Pythagoraeans it passed into the common vocabulary of philosophic poetry and speculation. Plato (Gorgias, 508 A) defines in its widest extent, , , . In Stoicism the idea was further developed in a mystical and pantheistic fashion. The universe, the macrocosm, was conceived after the analogy or the microcosm, man. It was a ; and as the human organism consists of a body and an animating soul, so God was the eternal world-soul animating and ruling the imperishable world-body. Through the influence especially of Posidonius, this conception of the Cosmos became widely influential in the Graeco-Roman world (see P. Wendland, Die hellenistischrmische Kultur, Tbingen, 1907, p. 84ff.). In the OT there is neither term nor conception corresponding to the Hellenic (yet cf. Jer 10:16, Ecc 11:5); it is in Hellenistic compositions such as 2 Maccabees and the Book of Wisdom that they first appear in Judaism. In the latter the idea of the Cosmos is specially prominent. is formed by the word of God out of formless matter (Wis 1:14; Wis 7:17; Wis 11:7) and the ever-living Spirit of God is active in all things (Wis 12:1); Divine wisdom and beauty pervade the world in all its diverse parts, establishing all things by number, measure, and weight (Wis 7:24, Wis 8:1, Wis 11:20), at the same time giving to human intelligence its power to apprehend the Divine ordering of all things (Wis 7:17-23, Wis 8:8), a striking anticipation of Rom 1:20. In the same book there is another anticipation of NT usage, the employment, unknown to classical Greek, of for the world of mankind, the human race as a unity. Thus Adam is described as Wis 10:1); a multitude of wise men is the salvation of the world (Wis 6:24), as the family of Noah was its hope (Wis 14:6).
Such indications of the penetration of Hellenic influences into Jewish thought explain, from a historical point of view, the use of , both as term and as concept, in the apostolic writings, (a) Primarily the Cosmos is the rerum natura, the sum of terrestrial things, without moral reference. Occasionally the conception is simply this (1Co 8:4, there is no such thing as an idol, ; 1Co 14:10, there are various kinds of sounds in it); but normally the thought of God as Creator of the Cosmos is expressed or implied (e.g. Act 17:24, Rom 1:20, Eph 1:4, Heb 4:3).
The simple pictorial phrase, the heaven and the earth, by which the OT expresses the idea of the visible creation as contrasted with the Creator, is still retained in the liturgical and rhetorical style (Act 4:24; Act 14:15; Act 17:24), and for the sake of special emphasis (Eph 1:10, Php 2:10, Col 1:16; Col 1:20, Rev 20:11; Rev 21:1). To the same effect Paul uses (Rom 8:19-22, Col 1:15; 2Pe 3:4, Rev 3:14), but more frequently (Rom 9:5; Rom 11:36, 1Co 8:6; 1Co 15:28, etc.; cf. Heb 1:3; Heb 2:8; Heb 2:10; Heb 3:4, Rev 4:11).
And when the Cosmos is defined as the terrestrial order it is to be remembered that in the apostolic cosmology this includes the heavens with their inhabitants as well as the earth and mankind. The world created in the includes all things in the heavens and upon the earth, visible and invisible (Col 1:16). Heaven, in the popular sense of the word, the sphere of Gods immediate self-manifestation, the place of His Throne and Majesty on high (Col 3:1; Heb 1:3), the sphere from which Christ comes (1Co 15:47) and to which He returns (1Co 3:1), the kingdom of eternal light in which believers already have an inheritance (2Co 5:1, Php 3:20, Col 1:12), is above all heavens (Eph 4:10). It does not belong to this world or to this age. All else does. The heavens and the spiritual beings that dwell therein belong naturally and morally to the same cosmic system as the earth and its inhabitants (1Co 2:6; 1Co 2:8; 1Co 4:9; 1Co 6:2-3; 1Co 11:10, Eph 2:2; Eph 6:12, Col 1:16; Col 1:20; Col 2:8; Col 2:20).
(b) Yet the immediate interest in the Cosmos lies in its relation to man as the physical environment of his life, and thus it naturally acquires the more limited significance of the terrestrial order in association with mankind-the world of human existence, into which sin comes (Rom 5:12-13), into which Christ comes (1Ti 1:15, Heb 10:5, 1Jn 4:9), where He is believed on (1Ti 3:16). (For Jewish parallels see Dalman, p. 173.) Hence also it easily comes to mean (as already in Enoch [see above]) mankind in general (1Co 4:13, Heb 11:33); and, by further natural transitions, worldly possessions (1Jn 3:17), and the whole complex of mans secular activities and relationships (1Co 7:29-33).
More characteristically the word is used with moral implications more or less strong. In the majority of its occurrences the idea is coloured by the dark significance of the . It is the present material order together with its inhabitants, both demonic and human, as lying under the power of evil, destitute of Gods Spirit and insensible to Divine influence-not merely profane and unchristian humanity, but the whole organism of existence which is alienated from God by sin. It has a spirit of its own (1Co 2:12) which is antagonistic to the Spirit of God; a wisdom of its own (1Co 1:20-21) which is foolishness with God (1Co 3:19); a sorrow of its own (2Co 7:10) which is opposite in character and effect to godly sorrow; its moral life is governed by the prince of the power of the air (Eph 2:12; cf. 2Co 4:4); physically it lies directly under the dominion of elemental powers () hostile to man (Col 2:8; Col 2:20, Gal 4:3); the Christian is redeemed from it and inwardly no longer belongs to it (Gal 6:14, Col 2:20); its kingdoms finally become the Kingdom of God and of His Christ (Rev 11:15; cf. 1Co 15:28, Eph 1:10, Col 1:20) in the new Cosmos which arises in its place (Rev 21:1).
But here, again, since the primary interest is in man and his salvation, the Cosmos naturally comes to mean the human race as under sin, and as the object of Christs redeeming and reconciling work (Rom 3:10-19, 2Co 5:19, 1Jn 2:2; 1Jn 4:14). In the later apostolic writings, especially the Johannine, it takes on a still darker hue. It is not only the world of fallen sinful humanity; it is that portion of society, Jewish or Gentile, with its opinions, sentiments, and influences, which is definitely antagonistic to the Church and the Christian cause. It hates the people of Christ as Cain hated Abel (1Jn 3:12-13); its character and conduct are dominated by the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the vainglory of life (1Jn 2:16), and are morally polluted (Jam 1:27; 2Pe 2:20); it offers a fruitful field to anti-Christian teaching (1Jn 4:1; 1Jn 4:7, 2Jn 1:7); its friendship is incompatible with loyalty to God (Jam 4:4, 1Jn 2:15).
For the sake of clearness the various uses of may be thus tabulated, with the proviso that at certain points classification cannot be more than tentative.
(a) = adornment (1Pe 3:3).
(b)= (metaphorically) a universe (Jam 3:6).
(c)= , the world-wide abode of mankind (Rom 1:8, Col 1:6; 1Pe 5:9).
(d)= the Gentile world in contrast with the elect people (Rom 4:13; Rom 11:12; Rom 11:15).
(e)= the terrestrial order, without moral implication: simply as such (1Co 8:4; 1Co 14:10, Eph 2:12 [?]), as related to the Creator (Act 17:24, Rom 1:20, 1Co 3:22, Eph 1:4, Heb 4:3; Heb 9:28; 1Pe 1:20, 2Pe 2:5; 2Pe 3:6, Rev 13:6; Rev 17:8).
(f)= the terrestrial order without moral reference, but as especially associated with humankind (Rom 5:12-13, 1Ti 1:15; 1Ti 3:16; 1Ti 6:7, Heb 10:5, 1Jn 4:9), as associated with men and angels (1Co 4:9), with the secular activities and relationships of men (1Co 7:31-34, 2Co 1:12 [?]).
(g)= mankind in general (1Co 4:13, Heb 11:38).
(h)= material possessions (1Jn 3:17).
(i)= the terrestrial order, together with its inhabitants as lying under the power of evil (1Co 1:20-21; 1Co 1:27-28; 1Co 2:12; 1Co 3:19; 1Co 5:10; 1Co 6:2; 1Co 11:32, 2Co 7:10, Gal 4:3; Gal 6:14, Eph 2:2, Col 2:8; Col 2:20, Jam 2:5, 1Jn 4:17, Rev 11:5).
(j)= the human race as sinful and needing redemption (Rom 3:6; Rom 3:19, 2Co 5:19, 1Jn 2:2; 1Jn 4:14).
(k)= the human society as definitely hostile to christ, the gospel, and the Church (Heb 11:7, Jam 1:27; Jam 4:4; 2Pe 1:4; 2Pe 2:20, 1Jn 2:15-17; 1Jn 3:1; 1Jn 3:13; 1Jn 4:1; 1Jn 4:3-5; 1Jn 4:17; 1Jn 5:4-5; 1Jn 5:19, 2Jn 1:7).
To sum up, the world is an organic whole of being, a system (, Col 1:17) in which there is a complete interrelation of parts; having a transitory existence, beginning in time and in time coming to an end, an aeon within an encircling eternity; not self-originating but created; in the most ultimate sense Gods world, because not only created but continually upheld and animated by him (Act 17:28); and not only Gods world but Christs, who mediatorially is the source of its existence and the active principle of its unity (q.v. ). But while necessarily retaining its creaturely dependence on God and its natural unity, it has fallen as a whole under the dominion of moral and consequently of physical evil. Sin and death entered into the human Cosmos through the disobedience of our first father (Rom 5:12, 1Co 15:22), but anterior to this, and in some causal relation to it, sin was existent in the angelic Cosmos (2Co 11:3, 1Ti 2:14; 2Pe 2:4, 1Jn 3:8), and from this source human sin is still inspired (2Co 4:4, Eph 2:2, etc.). Into the speculative question of the origin of evil apostolic thought does not enter. It is enough that sin is not inherent in the Cosmos, but entered into it, and that therefore its presence there may come to an end. Christ has come into the Cosmos, directly into the world of mankind, and God is in Him reconciling it unto Himself. But the scope of Christs redeeming work is destined to include the whole Cosmos in both its physical and its spiritual elements (Rom 8:21, Eph 1:10, Col 1:20, 1Co 15:24-28). Yet this ultimate consummation will not be attained within the present aeon. That must pass away through the fires of Divine judgment, before Christ is universally triumphant, and God is all in all.
This scheme of the world and its history inevitably leaves vast questions shrouded in mystery, and in its conception of the intermediate process by which nature is operated and governed it moves in regions of ideas which are remote from those of the modern mind. Yet essentially all that it endeavours to express in the terms of contemporary thought-that man is Gods creature and child; that, therefore, the existing condition of human life is radically abnormal and sinfully wrong, yet is salvable by the sacrificial love of God in Christ; that the world is Gods world, and that, therefore, its existing condition also is abnormal and cannot be otherwise regarded than as the correlate of sin; that it is a fruitful source of temptation to the evil tendencies in man but also a school of salutary discipline and a field of moral victory for those who seek the things that are above; and that, finally, a new and perfect environment is destined for the regenerate and perfected life-all this belongs to what is central and abiding in the Christian faith. See, further, art. Worldliness.
Literature.-V. H. Stanton, art. World in HDB ; A. Ritschl and J. Weiss, art. Welt in PRE 3; H. Cremer, Lexicon of NT Greek3, Edinburgh, 1880; commentaries, esp. J. Weiss, Der erste Korintherbrief9, Tbingen, 1910 (particularly the note on 1:19, 20), and B. F. Westcott, The Gospel according to St. John , 2 vols., London, 1908, i. 64ff.; W. Beyschlag, NT Theology, Eng. tr. , 2 vols., Edinburgh, 1895. ii. 100-109; G. Dalman, The Words of Jesus, Eng. tr. , do., 1902, pp. 147-179; W. Bousset, Die Religion des Judentums2, Berlin, 1906, pp. 278-286; M. Dibelius, Die Geisterwelt im Glauben des Paulus, Gttingen, 1909.
Robert Law.
Fuente: Dictionary of the Apostolic Church
WORLD
The whole system of created things. (
See CREATION.) It is taken also for a secular life, the present state of existence, and the pleasure and interests which steal away the soul from God. The love of the World does not consist in the use and enjoyment of the comforts God gives us, but in an inordinate attachment to the things of time and sense.
1.”We love the world too much, ” says Dr. Jortin, “when, for the sake of any profit or pleasure, we willfully, knowingly, and deliberately transgress the commands of God.
2.When we take more pains about the present life than the next.
3.When we cannot be contented, patient, or resigned, under low and inconvenient circumstances.
4.We love the world too much when we cannot part with any thing we possess to those who want, deserve, and have a right to it.
5.When we envy those who are more fortunate and more favoured by the world than we are.
6.When we honour, and esteem, and favour persons purely according to their birth, fortunes, and success, measuring our judgment and approbation by their outward appearance and situation in life.
7.When worldly prosperity makes us proud, and vain, and arrogant.
8.When we omit no opportunity of enjoying the good things of this life; when our great and chief business is to divert ourselves till we contract an indifference for rational and manly occupations, deceiving ourselves, and fancying that we are not in a bad condition because others are worse than we.”
See Jortin’s Ser. vol. 3: ser. 9.; Bishop Hopkins on the Vanity of the World; Dr. Stennet’s Sermon on Conformity to the World; H. Moore on Education, chap. 9. vol. 2:; R. Walker’s Sermons, vol. 4: ser. 20.
Fuente: Theological Dictionary
World
is the English term by which our translators have rendered four Hebrew words (in addition to the general term , erits, “earth”):
1. , chedel, which is erroneously supposed by some to have arisen by transposition of letters from , comes from a root which signifies “to rest,” to “discontinue,” and hence “to cease from life,” “to be at rest;” and as a noun, “the place of rest,” “the grave.” ‘The word occurs in the complaint uttered by Hezekiah, when in prospect of dissolution, and when he contemplates his state among the inhabitants, not of the upper, but the lower world (Isa 38:11); thus combining with many other passages to show that the Hebrews, probably borrowing the idea from the Egyptian tombs, had a vague conception of some shadowy state where the manes of their departed friends lay at rest in their ashes, retaining only an indefinable personality in a land of darkness and “the shadow of death” (Job 10:21-22).
2. , cheled (Psalm 42:14), means “to conceal,” and derivatively “any hidden thing,” hence “age,” “antiquity,” “remote and hidden ages;” also “the world,” as the hidden or unknown thing (Psa 49:1).
3. , ‘olam (in the New Test. ), the root-signification of which is “to hide,” denotes a very remote, indefinite, and therefore unknown period in time past or time to come, which metaphysicians call eternity a parte ante, and eternity a, parte post (Ecc 3:11). In Psa 73:12, it is rendered “world;” but in this and in the previous instance it may be questioned whether the natural creation is really meant, and not rather “the world” in our metaphorical use of the term, as denoting the intelligent world, the rational inhabitants of the earth, and still more specifically that portion of them with which we are immediately concerned.
4. , tebel (the usual word so rendered the Greek ), comes from a root that signifies “to flow,” and as water is the unfailing cause of fertility in the East, it denotes “to be productive,” “to bear fruit;” and as a noun, “the fruit-bearer,” that is, the earth. This word is frequently rendered “world” in the common version, but if more was intended than the earth on which we dwell, it may be doubted if the passages in which it occurs will justify the translators. In truth, the Hebrews had no word which comprised the entire visible universe. When they wanted to speak comprehensively of God’s creation, they joined two words together and used the phrase “heaven and earth” (Gen 1:1). We have already seen that they had an idea of an under world; the meaning of their ordinary term for earth,
, which signifies the “lower,” shows that they also regarded the earth as beneath the sun; while the term for heaven, , denoting “what is elevated,” indicates that their view was that the heavens, or the heights, were above. Above, below, and under these three relations of space comprehend their conception of the world. SEE EARTH; SEE HEAVEN.
The following Greek words are also translated “world:”
1. , kosmos, the world, universe (Mat 13:35; Mat 24:21; Luk 11:50; Joh 17:5; Joh 17:24; Act 17:24; Rom 1:20); the inhabitants thereof (1Co 4:9); also the earth, as the abode of man (Mat 13:38; Mar 16:15; Joh 1:9; Joh 3:19; Joh 6:14; Joh 16:21; Joh 16:28; Joh 21:25; Heb 10:5; Mat 4:8; Rom 1:8); the inhabitants of the earth (Mat 5:14; Joh 1:29; Joh 3:16; Joh 17:14; Joh 17:25; Rom 3:6; Rom 3:19; Heb 11:7; 2Pe 2:5; 1Jn 2:2); the multitude, as we say “everybody” (Joh 7:4; Joh 12:19; Joh 14:22; Joh 18:20; 2Co 1:12; 2Pe 2:5); also the heathen world (Rom 11:12; Rom 11:15). It likewise designates the state of the world, as opposed to the kingdom of Christ (Mat 16:26; Mar 8:36; Joh 18:36; 1Co 3:22; 1Co 5:10; Eph 2:2; Gal 6:14; Jam 4:4) and men of the world, worldlings (Joh 12:31; 1Co 1:2; 1Co 3:19; 2Co 7:10; Php 2:15); also the Jewish dispensation, founded on Sinai and ended on Calvary (Eph 1:4; 1Pe 1:20; Heb 9:26)
2. , Oikounene, the inhabited earth, the world as known to the ancients (Mat 4:8; Mat 24:14; Luk 4:5; Rom 10:18; Heb 1:6; Rev 16:14); the inhabitants of the earth (Act 17:31; Act 19:27; Rev 3:10; Rev 12:9); the Roman empire (Act 17:6; Act 24:5); Palestine and the adjacent countries (Luk 2:1; Act 11:28).
3. , Aihn, the world, or age, the present time, or the future, as implying duration (Mat 12:32; Mar 10:50; Mar 3:28-29; Luk 18:30); the present world or age, with its cares, temptations, evils, etc. (Mat 13:22; Luk 16:8; Luk 20:34; Rom 12:2; 1Co 1:20; 1Co 2:6; 1Co 2:8; 2Co 4:4; 2Ti 4:10; Tit 1:12; Gal 1:4); and men of the world, wicked generation (Eph 2:2; Luk 16:8; Luk 20:34); also the world itself, as an object of creation and existence (Mat 13:40; Mat 24:3; Heb 1:2; Heb 11:3). This term also denotes the age or world before the Messiah, i.e., the Jewish dispensation (1Co 10:11; Heb 9:26); also, after the Messiah, i.e., the Gospel dispensation (Heb 2:5; Heb 6:5). SEE COSMOGONY.
In popular Christian phraseology, the world is taken also for a secular life, the present state of existence, and the pleasures and interests which steal away the soul from God. The love of the world does not consist in the use and enjoyment of the comforts God gives us, but in an inordinate attachment to the things of time and sense. We love the world too much
(1) when, for the sake of any profit or pleasure, we wilfully, knowingly, and deliberately transgress the commands of God;
(2) when we take more pains about the present life than the next;
(3) when we cannot be contented, patient, or resigned, under low and inconvenient circumstances;
(4) when we cannot part with anything we possess to those who want, deserve, and have a right to it;
(5) when we envy those who are more fortunate and more favored by the world than we are;
(6) when we honor and esteem and favor persons purely according to their birth, fortunes, and success, measuring our judgment and approbation by their outward appearance and situation in life;
(7) when worldly prosperity makes us proud and vain and arrogant;
(8) when we omit no opportunity of enjoying the good things of this life; when our great and chief business is to divert ourselves till we contract an indifference for rational and manly occupations, deceiving ourselves, and fancying that we are not in a bad condition because others are worse than we (Jortin, Sermons, volume 3, ser. 9). See Hopkins, On the Vanity of the World; Stennet, Sermon on Conformity to the World;. More, On Education, volume 2, chapter 9; Walker, Sermons, volume 4, ser. 20.
Fuente: Cyclopedia of Biblical, Theological and Ecclesiastical Literature
World
The general word translated world in the A. V. is tevel (, Ass tabalu, ‘dry land’). There are a few exceptions. Thus in Isa 38:11 we read, ‘I shall behold man no more with the inhabitants of the world;’ here the word () may perhaps signify the place of rest, cessation, forbearance. [We find the root rendered forbear in Eze 3:27; frail in Psa 39:4; and rejected in Isa 53:3.] in Psa 17:14, ‘From men of the world,’ and 49:1, ‘Inhabitants of the world,’ we find a word () which may refer to the transitory state of things in this world which ‘passeth away.’ It is rendered age or time in Job 11:17, Psa 39:5; Psa 89:47 in Psa 22:27, Isa 23:17; Isa 62:11, and Jer 25:26, erets is used. Olam () is found in Psa 73:12, ‘These prosper in the world;’ Ecc 3:11, ‘He hath set the world in their heart;’ and in Isa 45:17; Isa 64:4.
by tevel is signified, first, the solid material on which man dwells, and which was formed, founded, established, and disposed by God; and secondly, the inhabitants thereof. It is usually rendered in the LXX, never , which was originally used only to denote order and ornament, but had acquired a new meaning in our Lord’s time.
The orig in of the word is a little doubtful. A word spelt similarly, and used in Lev 18:23 and other passages, signifies pollution, confusion, or dispersion (from ). It is supposed, however, by Gesenius to be connected with the root yaval (), to flow, and to indicate the world is flooded.
In one or two passages only does the word tevel or appear to refer to a limited portion of the earth. Perhaps Isa 24:4 may be mentioned as an example.
The expression ’round world,’ which occurs in the P. B. version in Psa 18:15; Psa 89:12; Psa 93:2; Psa 96:10; Psa 98:8, simply stands for tevel. It is to be found in Coverdale’s Bible, and is traceable to the old, Latin version, Orb is terrarum, the earth being regarded by the ancients as a disk, though not as a globe.
In the N.T. the word is certainly used of the Roman Empire in Luk 2:1, and perhaps in the quotation in Rom 10:18, where the larger sense of the word implied in the Psalms could hardly be intended in other passages we must understand the word as signifying all the earth, e.g in Mat 24:14; Act 17:31; Heb 1:6; Heb 2:5. Prophetic students have a right to either interpretation in Rev 3:10; Rev 12:9; Rev 16:14, but the Roman use of the word is not so likely to be adopted by St. John as the Jewish.
Fuente: Synonyms of the Old Testament
WORLD
In the Bible, as in ordinary speech, the world may refer to the physical world of Gods creation or to the people who inhabit that world (Psa 90:2; Psa 98:7; Psa 98:9; Mat 25:34; Joh 3:16; Rom 10:18). Because of sin, the world has become a place where Satan rules in peoples lives (Joh 12:31; Rom 5:12; 2Co 4:4; 1Jn 5:19). Therefore, the Bible frequently speaks of the present world, or present age, as something that is evil and that is opposed to God (Joh 7:7; Joh 17:25; Jam 4:4; 1Jn 2:15). The world in this sense is the subject of the present article the world of sinful human beings along with all the wrong attitudes that characterize them.
Living in the world
Chief among the characteristics of the ordinary (unbelieving) people of the world are covetousness and pride. Their lives are governed according to what they want to get or want to do, without any regard for God (1Jn 2:16). This is worldliness, and it is an evil that the Bible warns Christians against. The lives of Christians are to be governed by an attitude that trusts in God, not in personal possessions or ambitions. To be constantly worried about such things is the attitude of unbelievers, not of Christians (Mat 6:31-32).
The temptation to worldliness may not lie in the more obviously sinful things of life. It may lie in those everyday things that are not sinful in themselves at all, such as food, work, possessions and concern for the future. These things can become wrong when people have wrong attitudes towards them (cf. Rom 1:25).
If Christians cannot see the relation that these things have to the life of faith in God, their attitude to them can readily become worldly. Ambition can very easily become selfish ambition, wisdom become worldly wisdom, and thoughts for the future become faithless anxiety (Mat 6:33-34; 1Co 1:20; 1Co 2:7-8; 1Co 2:12; 1Co 3:19; Jam 3:13-17; Jam 4:13-17).
Worldly people are those whose values in life are determined by what they understand of the world they see around them. Godly people are those whose values are determined by what they understand of God (2Co 4:18; 2Co 5:7; 1Jn 2:17). This does not mean that the godly must rid themselves of all possessions, power and status. But it does mean that they will not pursue those things at all costs, and will even sacrifice them when they conflict with their commitment to Jesus Christ (Mat 19:29; Gal 2:20; Gal 6:14; Php 3:7-8).
Overcoming the world
Some Christians build a set of laws for themselves to live by, hoping that the laws will prevent them from doing what they believe to be worldly. But the very act of making laws to live by is worldly. Such people refuse to trust in the indwelling Spirit to direct their enjoyment of the freedom God has given them. Instead they trust in the methods of those who still belong to the world, who still live in the flesh (Gal 3:3; Gal 4:9-11; Gal 5:1; Col 2:20-23; see FLESH). The Christians liberty does not mean they are free to commit sin (Rom 6:1-2; Rom 6:12; Gal 5:13; 1Jn 3:4-6), but neither do human laws enable them to overcome sin (Col 2:23; see FREEDOM).
Christians cannot overcome the temptations of the world by using the methods of the world. They can overcome them only by trusting in the power of Christ, who has conquered Satan, the prince of the world (Joh 12:31; Joh 14:30; Joh 16:11; Joh 16:33; 1Jn 5:4-5; see TEMPTATION). One day this same Christ will return, to free the world completely from Satans power (Rev 19:16; Rev 20:2-3; Rev 20:10).
Meanwhile Christians have to live in an evil world, while not joining in the sins of the world. They may find that, as a result, the people of the world will hate them (Joh 15:18; Joh 17:14-17). But they must remain faithful to Christ and keep themselves from being corrupted by the worlds evil. Only in this way can they properly carry out their function of delivering people from the corruption of sin (Mat 5:13-16; Joh 17:18; Jam 1:27).
Fuente: Bridgeway Bible Dictionary
World
WORLD ().1. The underlying significance of the term is that of order. Its probable derivation is from a root , which appears in Lat. comptus and in our comb. This order, regularity, neatness receives the widest illustration in classical usage. Thus includes the idea of decency of behaviour (aesch. Ag. 521, cf. Soph. Aj. 293), of constitutional government (Thuc. iv. 76), of elegance of attire (Hdt. iii. 123), and so, by just transference, of the world or universe (Plat. Tim. 27 A, cf. Arist. Cl. i. 10), as exhibiting perfection of arrangement, and standing in eternal contrast with chaos. In this, its widest application, it became employed by all writers on natural philosophy, though the meaning oscillates, with some uncertainty, between the earth and the universe generally (see Liddell and Scott, s.v., from which the quotations are taken). It is interesting to observe that ordo in Latin does not, as might have been expected, stand as an equivalent for . Its equivalent in Latin is mundus (cf. Sanskr. mund), the root idea of which again is cleanliness, neatness, or order. Thus both the Latin and the Greek pass through, with a singular exactness of analogy, the same transferences of meaning, so that Cicero (Univ. 10) identifies and mundus in that widest application of the term above referred to (see Lewis and Shorts Dict. s.v. Mundus). There is, however, a further transference of meaning in a use of mundus by classical writers not found in the corresponding use of . It is employed (Hor. Sat. i. 3. 112, cf. Luc. Pharsal. v. 469), but somewhat rarely, in a social sense to signify mankind, whereas this application is not given to except in so-called Alexandrine Greek. In a word, the conception of order covers every departmental application of the Greek and its Latin equivalent.
2. If proof on such an issue were needed by students, the use of the word would strikingly show the original way in which NT writers handle and apply such terms. Certainly, to the ancients, with the word the vision of the figure of order would be manifest in thought. Generally speaking, in the NT the ancient conception falls so far into the background as sometimes to vanish. But what the word has lost in one way it has gained in other ways, as will be seen upon a brief examination of its employment generally in NT literature.
It is interesting, however, to note that, in the transferred applications of the word, this literature follows the lines of classical usage. Thus is used of womens attire (1Pe 3:3), of the universe (Rom 1:20), of the earth (Mat 4:8 [cf. Luk 4:5 ] Luk 16:26), and of human society (Joh 1:29) In such illustrations we do not part company with the radical idea of order, but it is only faintly made apparent.
In the Synoptics the term is rarely employed, and the student of the Authorized Version must be put on his guard against supposing that, in all cases where the translation world is used, it stands for in the original. In some six cases it stands for , and in two for . But, as any confusion is sufficiently checked by (Revised Version margin) , the point need not be pursued here. The use of the word, rare as it is in the Synoptics, is largely free from Johannine or Pauline sentiment on the idea. It is difficult to find a passage in them in which the term is used absolutely in malam partem, as it is found not only in the writings of St. John and St. Paul, but also in those of St. Peter and St. James. In the parable of the Wheat and the Tares (Mat 13:24-43) the world appears in no dark or ominous colouring. It is not its cares, but the cares of the age (, Mar 4:19), that choke the word so as to render it unfruitful. When our Lord in the Sermon on the Mount speaks of His disciples as the light of the world (Mar 5:14), we find the figure interpreted by the parallel expression which precedes it: Ye are the salt of the earth (Mat 5:13). To declare that the world needs purification and illumination is not a wholesale condemnation of the world. There is in the Synoptics no violence of contrast between it and the Divine society. In its rare occurrences in the Synoptics the world is a sphere in which Christs disciples live and move and have their being. For them it has its pitfalls (Mat 18:7), its characteristic dangers, but nowhere does it appear as wholly or inherently evil.
3. When one turns from the Synoptics to St. Johns writings, for here it is impossible to separate his Gospel from his letters, the contrast appears startling. Instead of a rare appearance of the term, we find that it occurs some eighty times in the Gospel, and twenty-two times in the First Epistle (A. Plummer, Com. on the Gospel in Cambridge Bible). And with this frequently comes a change in meaning, a change, however, which in the Gospel appears gradual and climactic. For in the Prologue of the Fourth Gospel the term appears with the same lack of colour in which it is painted in the Synoptic Gospels.
The world is indeed seen to be beset by the grave fault of indifference to its own darkness. The light came, but it was not recognized. Yet in this lack of welcome His own were involved (Joh 1:11; cf. Joh 8:12). The testimony of the Baptist advances the issue a step farther. His recognition of Jesus as the Lamb of God (Joh 1:29; Joh 1:36) implies his recognition of the purpose of His mission as the worlds Saviour from its sin. Later, our Lords testimony to Nicodemus informs him of the gracious fact of His love towards the world. His deliberate intention in regard to the world was not its condemnation but its salvation. Life, not death, through Him was the Fathers eternal purpose (Joh 3:16; Joh 3:13, cf. Joh 4:42, Joh 12:47). Through the type of the manna, our Lord brings Himself, if it may be so expressed, into still closer touch with the world. He is the Bread of heaven which gives life to the world (Joh 6:33). Later, with more awful explicitness, the bread is identified with His flesh, and its offering is on the worlds behalf (Joh 6:51).
So gracious, indeed, are the Lords utterances in regard to the world, that twice the group of the disciples appeared unable to distinguish themselves from it. They could not understand in the earlier stage of their discipleship why any manifestation of Jesus should not be made on equal terms to the world as to themselves (Joh 7:4, cf. Joh 14:22). They omitted to see that a manifestation of Himself could be made only through the medium of love. A difference, therefore, not only in point of time but also in degree of training, explains any seeming inconsistency in our Lords teaching in respect of the attitude of the world towards His own. At an earlier stage He declared that the world could not hate His followers,there was nothing then to excite hostility either by way of their belief or their love (Joh 7:7). At a later stage the parting of the ways had come. His own had made their final choice. With the choice came the worlds hatred. The persecution which He endured was to be theirs also (Joh 15:17-20). All turned upon the identity of themselves with Him. This once established, His own exhibited love and obedience. The world was seen as penetrated by hatred and disobedience. In this awful contrast and conflict, victory was assured for His own, and with victory would come its fruit. He was their surety. Peace and triumph were their lot through Him (Joh 16:33).
But Johannine teaching on the subject of the world cannot be regarded as complete if the First Epistle be ignored. The scope, however, of this Dictionary must limit the inquiry to general references. The doctrinal differences here are explicable, as Bp. Westcott has pointed out (Gospel of St. John. Introd. lxxviii). because the Gospel is related to the Epistle, as history to its comment or application; the former is throughout presupposed in the latter. The Lords words in the Gospel have been moulded into aphorisms in the First Epistle; and in the latter document the Apostle writes, conscious that the Church must be in dire conflict with the characteristic dangers and heresies of the age. It would seem reasonable to regard the teaching of the First Epistle on the world as a commentary, in particular, on our Lords pregnant utterances on the convictions of the world (Joh 16:8-11; see Westcott, in loco.). In that passage, the world appears as separate from God, yet not past hope. Our Lord declares there, not that He will convict the world simply as sinful, etc., but that He will show that it lacks the knowledge of what sin, righteousness, and judgment really are.
We conclude that the general teaching of St. Johns Gospel on the subject of the world is that it is an order or sphere touching mans life, affecting mans life considered as apart from God; but that in the First Epistle the world is seen more darkly and ominously still: it is not merely regarded as apart from God, but as alien to Him, in direct opposition to His eternal and gracious purposes. St. John would teach us that if it is to be overcome, it must be by powers which lift us above it, and those are the twin powers of love and faith (Liddon, Easter Sermons, No. xxii.).
Literature.In addition to the Lexx. and Comm., J. H. Newman, Par. and Plain Serm. vii. (1868) p. 27; F. W. Robertson, Serm., 4th ser. (1874) p. 145; A. Maclaren, A Years Ministry, 1st ser. (1884) p. 83; B. F. Westcott, The Gospel of Life (1892), p. 20; C. J. Vaughan, Doncaster Serm. (1891) p. 225; R. W. Church, Village Serm., 2nd ser. (1894) p. 326; Stopford A. Brooke, The Ship of the Soul (1898), p. 31; R. Flint, Serm. and Addresses (1899), p. 145.
B. Whitefoord.
Fuente: A Dictionary Of Christ And The Gospels
World
WORLD
1. In OT.In general it may be said that the normal expression for such conception of the Universe as the Hebrews had reached is the heavens and the earth (Gen 1:1, Psa 89:11, 1Ch 16:31), and that world is an equivalent expression for earth. So far as there is a difference, the world is rather the fruitful, habitable earth, e.g., the earth is the Lords, and the fulness thereof; the world, and they that dwell therein (Psa 24:1; cf. Psa 50:12; Psa 90:2, Isa 34:1). The religious sentiments awakened by the contemplation of Nature appear also in references to the heavens and the sea (e.g. Psa 8:1-9; Psa 19:1-14, Job 38:1-41; Job 39:1-30). But of the ethical depreciation of the world, so prominent in some NT writings, there are in the OT few traces. The world is to be judged in righteousness (Psa 9:8; Psa 96:13; Psa 98:9), and punished for its evil (Isa 13:11). The transient character of its riches and pleasures, with the consequent folly of absorption in them, is perhaps indicated by another Hebrew word (meaning duration; cf. on below) rendered world at Psa 17:14 (men of the world, whose portion is in this life, cf. RVm [Note: Revised Version margin.] ); also by the same word at Psa 49:1 (see the whole Psalm). A word of similar meaning is rendered world in AV [Note: Authorized Version.] at Psa 73:12, Ecc 3:11, but RV [Note: Revised Version.] retains world only in the latter passage, and gives quite another turn to the sense.
The ethical aspect of the world does not receive any fresh emphasis in the Apocrypha, though in the Book of Wisdom both the scientific interest in regard to the world and the impulses of natural religion are notably quickened (Wis 7:17-22; Wis 9:9; Wis 11:17; Wis 11:22; Wis 13:1-9, cf. Sir 17:1-32; Sir 18:1-33). There is ample contrast between the stability of the righteous and the vanity of ungodly prosperity (e.g. Wis 1:1-16; Wis 2:1-24; Wis 3:1-19; Wis 4:1-20; Wis 5:1-23), but the latter is not identified with the world. It is, noticeable that in the Apocrypha the word kosmos, which in the LXX [Note: Septuagint.] means adornment, has reached its sense of world, conceived as a beautiful order; in the NT this becomes the prevalent word.
2. In NT.(1) ain (on), age, is used of the world in its time-aspect: human history is conceived as made up of ages, successive and contemporaneous, converging to and consummated in the Christ. These in their sum constitute the world: God is their Maker (Heb 1:2; Heb 11:3 [AV [Note: Authorized Version.] and RV [Note: Revised Version.] worlds, but world better represents the thought]) and their King (1Ti 1:17 RVm [Note: Revised Version margin.] , Rev 15:3 RV [Note: Revised Version.] ). Hence the phrases since the world began, lit. from the age (Luk 1:70, Joh 9:32, Act 15:18); and the end of the world, lit. the consummation of the age (Mat 13:39-40; Mat 13:49; Mat 24:3; Mat 28:20) or of the ages (Heb 9:26). All the ends of the world so conceived meet in the Christian era (1Co 10:11 [RV [Note: Revised Version.] ages], cf. Heb 11:39-40). Under this time-aspect, also, the NT writers identify their own age with the world, and this, as not merely actual but as typical, is set in new lights. As this world, this present world, it is contrasted explicitly or implicitly with the world to come (Mat 12:32, Mar 10:30, Luk 18:30; Luk 20:34-35, Eph 1:21; Eph 2:7, 2Ti 4:10, Tit 2:12, Heb 6:5).
In some of these passages there is implied a moral condemnation of this world; elsewhere this receives deeper emphasis. The cares of the world choke the word (Mat 13:22, Mar 4:19): the sons of this world are contrasted with the sons of light (Luk 16:8; cf. Rom 12:2, Eph 2:2 according to the transient fashion [on] of this material world [kosmos]). This world is evil (Gal 1:4), its wisdom is naught (1Co 1:20; 1Co 2:6; 1Co 3:18), its rulers crucified the Lord of glory (1Co 2:8); finally, it is the god of this world that has blinded the minds of the unhelieving (2Co 4:4). This ethical use of on = world is not found in the Johannine writings.
(2) But the most frequent term for world is kosmos, which is sometimes extended in meaning to the material universe, as in the phrases from the beginning (foundation, creation) of the world (e.g. Mat 24:21; Mat 25:34, Heb 4:6, Rom 1:20; for the implied thought of Divine creation cf. Act 14:17; Act 17:24). More commonly, however, the word is used of the earth, and especially the earth as the abode of man. To gain the whole world is to become possessed of all possible material wealth and earthly power (Mat 16:26, Mar 8:36, Luk 9:25). Because sin entered into the world (Rom 5:12), it is become the scene of the Incarnation and the object of Redemption (2Co 5:19, 1Ti 1:15, Heb 10:5, Joh 1:9-10; Joh 1:29; Joh 3:16-17; Joh 12:47), the scene also, alien but inevitable, of the Christian disciples life and discipline, mission and victory (Mat 5:14; Mat 13:38; Mat 26:13, Joh 17:16, Rom 1:8, 1Co 3:22; 1Co 4:9; 1Co 5:10; 1Co 7:31, 2Co 1:12, Php 2:16, Col 1:8, 1Pe 5:9, Rev 11:15). From this virtual identification of the world with mankind, and mankind as separated from and hostile to God, there comes the ethical signification of the word specially developed in the writings of St. Paul and St. John.
(a) The Epp. of St. Paul. To the Galatians St. Paul describes the pre-Christian life as slavery to the rudiments of the world (Gal 4:3, cf. Gal 4:9); through Christ the world is crucified to him and he to the world (Gal 6:14). Both thoughts recur in Colossians (Gal 2:8; Gal 2:20). In writing to the Corinthians he condemns the wisdom, the passing fashion, the care, the sorrow of the world (1Co 1:20-21; 1Co 3:19; 1Co 7:31; 1Co 7:33-34, 2Co 7:10; cf. ain above), and declares the Divine choice to rest upon all that the world least esteems (1Co 1:27-28, cf. Jam 2:5). This perception of the true worth of things is granted to those who received not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which is of God (1Co 2:12); hence the saints shall judge the world (1Co 6:2; cf. 1Co 11:32). In the argument of Romans the thought of the Divine judgment of the world has incidental place, but in the climax St. Paul conceives of the fall of Israel as leading to the riches of the world, and of the casting away of them as the reconciling of the world (1Co 11:12; 1Co 11:16; cf. 1Co 11:32 and 1Co 5:12-13). What. St. Paul condemns, then, is hardly the world as essentially evil, but the world-spirit which leads to evil by its neglect of the unseen and eternal, and by its blindness to the true scale of values revealed in the gospel of Christ crucified.
(b) The Gospel and First Ep. of St. John. In these two writings occur more than half the NT instances of the word we are considering. That is, the term kosmos is characteristic of St. John, and, setting aside his frequent use of it in the non-ethical sense, especially as the sphere of the incarnation and saving work of Christ, we find an ethical conception of the world deeper in its shadows than that of St. Paul. It is true that Jesus is the Light of the world (Joh 1:9; Joh 3:19; Joh 8:12; Joh 9:5; Joh 12:46), its Life-giver (Joh 6:33; Joh 6:51), its Saviour (Joh 3:17, Joh 4:42, Joh 12:47); yet the world knew him not (Joh 1:10), and the Fourth Gospel sets out its story of His persistent rejection by the world, in language which at times seems to pass beyond a mere record of contemporary unbelief, and almost to assert an essential dualism of good and evil (Joh 7:7, Joh 8:23, Joh 9:39, Joh 12:31, Joh 14:17; Joh 14:30, Joh 16:11; Joh 16:20). Here the world is not simply the worldly spirit, but the great mass of mankind in deadly hostility to Christ and His teaching. In contrast stand His disciples, his own which were in the world (Joh 13:1), chosen out of the world (Joh 15:18, cf. Joh 17:6), but not of it, and therefore hated as He was hated (Joh 15:18-19, Joh 17:14; Joh 17:16). For them He intercedes as He does not for the world (Joh 17:8). In the 1st Ep. of St. John the same sharp contrasts meet us. The world lies within the scope of Gods redemptive purpose in Jesus Christ (Joh 2:2, Joh 4:14), yet it stands opposed to His followers as a thing wholly evil, with which they may hold no traffic (Joh 2:15-17, cf. Jam 4:4), knowing them not and hating them (Jam 3:1; Jam 3:13). It is conceived as under the sway of a power essentially hostile to God,the antichrist (Jam 2:18; Jam 2:22, Jam 4:3; cf. the prince of this world Joh 12:31; Joh 14:30; Joh 16:11)and is therefore not to be entreated and persuaded, but fought and overcome by the greater one who is in the disciple of Christ (Joh 4:4, Joh 5:4-5). Faith overcometh the world, but St. John reserves for his closing words his darkest expression of a persistent dualism of good and evil, light and darkness: We know that we are of God, and the whole world lieth in the evil one (Joh 5:19).
The idiomatic uses of the term world in Joh 7:4; Joh 12:19, 1Jn 3:17 are sufficiently obvious. For the difficult expression the world of iniquity applied to the tongue (Jam 3:6), see the Commentaries.
S. W. Green.
Fuente: Hastings’ Dictionary of the Bible
World
The Scriptures not only mean by this word to describe the heavens and the earth, but not unfrequently it is put for the people. Hence the apostle saith, “the world (that is, mankind) by wisdom knew not God.” (1Co 1:21) The term by which the Hebrews marked the universe, was Thebel.
Fuente: The Poor Mans Concordance and Dictionary to the Sacred Scriptures
World
See Earth
Earth
Fuente: Nave’s Topical Bible
World
World. This word in the A. V. is the translation of five Hebrew and four Greek words. It is therefore not always plain in what sense it is used. The Hebrew terms have these literal meanings: “The earth,” “rest,” “the grave,” Isa 38:11; “the world,” corresponding to aion in the New Testament, or that which is finite, temporary, Job 11:17; “the veiled,” unlimited time, whether past or future; used very frequently, and generally translated “forever;” and, finally, the poetical term for “world,” which occurs some 37 times, but in various meanings which are easily understood. When the Hebrews desired to express the universe they employed a phrase like “heaven and earth and the sea, and all that in them is.” Exo 20:11. In the New Testament the Greek words are equally diverse: 1. Aion, “duration,” thus used of time past, Luk 1:70, of time present, with the idea of evil, both moral and physical. Mar 4:19. Hence “children of this world,” or worldly men, Luk 16:8; and so Satan is called “the god of this world.” 2Co 4:4 Aion is also put for endless duration, eternity, 1Ti 6:16, to signify the material world as created by the deity, Heb 11:3; also the world to come, the kingdom of the Messiah. 2. Ge, the earth, in contrast to the heavens. Rev 13:3. 3. Kosmos, used in several senses:(a) the universe, the heavens, and the earth, Mat 13:35, and thence for the inhabitants of the universe, 1Co 4:9, and an aggregate. Jam 3:6. (b) This lower world as the abode of man, Joh 16:18; the inhabitants of the earth or mankind. Mat 5:14. (c) The present world, as opposed to the kingdom of Christ, Joh 12:25; specifically, the wealth and enjoyments and cares of this world. Mat 16:26, and so for those who seek the opposite things to the kingdom of God, the worldlings. Joh 15:19. 4. Oikoumene, the inhabited earth, Mat 24:14, the people of it, Act 17:31, sometimes the Roman empire, the then civilized world, Act 17:6, including Palestine and adjacent parts. Luk 2:1; Act 11:28. The Jews distinguished two worlds, or sons, the present aeon to the appearance of the Messiah, and the future aeon, or the Messianic era, which is to last forever. The closing days of the present order of things were called “the last days.” Isa 2:2; Mic 4:1; Act 2:17. The same phraseology is found in the New Testament, but the dividing-line is marked by the second instead of the first advent of the Messiah. Mat 12:32; 1Co 10:11; Gal 4:3; Heb 1:2; Heb 6:5; Heb 9:26.
Fuente: People’s Dictionary of the Bible
World
kosmos (G2889) World
aion (G165) Age
The Authorized Version translates kosmos as “world” everywhere except in 1Pe 3:3. And this is also the Authorized Version’s usual translation of aion. The Authorized Version translates kosmos as “age” only in Eph 2:7 and in Col 1:26. Although “age” may sound inadequate now, had it been used more frequently, it might have expanded gradually so that it adapted itself to the larger meaning of kosmos. It is unfortunate that the translators of the Authorized Version did not devise some means to distinguish between kosmos and aion. Indeed the Latin, no less than the Greek, has two words where we have used only one. This deficiency is evident in all of those passages that refer to the end or consummation of the aion, as well as in those that speak of “the wisdom of this world” (1Co 2:6), “the god of this world” (2Co 4:4), and “the children of this world” (Luk 16:8). The New King James Version improved many of these passages by translating aion as “age.”
Kosmos has an interesting history for several reasons. Suidas traced its development through four successive meanings: “Ho kosmos signifies in Scripture four things: goodly appearance, the whole, orderliness, magnitude.” Originally kosmos meant “ornament,” which is its primary meaning in the Old Testament and a meaning it has once in the New Testament (1Pe 3:3). Next kosmos came to mean “order” or “arrangement” and then “beauty”as springing out of these”goodly appearance,” and “orderliness” (according to Suidas) or (according to Hesychius) kallopismos, kataskeue, taxis (G5010), katastasis, and kallos. Pythagoras was the first to use kosmos to refer to the sum total of the material universe, and according to Plutarch, he did this to express his sense of the universe’s beauty and order. According to others, Pythagoras only used kosmos to refer to heaven because of its well-ordered arrangement, not to the whole material universe. This is often the way kosmos is used in Xenophon, Isocrates, Plato, and Aristotle.Augustine described the Latin mundus (world) as “the arrangement and regulation of each single thing formed and distinguished,” which is nearly the same as the Greek kosmos. This similarity gave rise to Augustine’s profound play on words: “O munde immunde”(O filthy clean). Thus Pliny stated: “What the Greeks with a name of embellishment have called kosmon, we have termed mundum from its perfect and absolute elegance.” And Cicero said: “The Greeks well name it kosmon as noted for its variety, we refer to it as a shining mundum.”
From its use as referring to the material universe, kosmos came to refer to the external framework of things where man lives and moves and is himself the moral center. In that sense, kosmos is nearly equivalent to oikoumene, and then to the people themselves, to the sum total of persons living in the world. From that meaning an ethical use of kosmos developed that referred to all who were not of the ekklesia (G1577) and who therefore were alienated from the life of God and were his enemies because of their wicked deeds. It is hardly necessary to remind the reader of the immense role that this sense of kosmos plays in John’s theology, both in his record of Jesus’ sayings and in his own writings. This last sense of kosmos was utterly unknown to the entire heathen world, which had no sense of the opposition between God and man, the holy and unholy, though this sense was latent but not distinct in the Old Testament.
Aristotle’s etymology of aion “receiving its name from aei einai [always being]” must be rejected as incorrect. It is more likely that aion derives from ao and aemi (to breathe). Like kosmos, aion has a primary and physical meaning and an additional secondary and ethical meaning. Aion’s primary meaning refers to timeshort or longin its unbroken duration. In classical Greek, aion often refers to the duration of a human life. But the essential meaning of aion is time as the condition for all created things and as the measure of their existence. Thus Theodoret wrote:
Ho aion is not any substance, but it is an irresistible thing, accompanying those who have a mortal nature; for the interval from the constituting of the world [kosmou] to its consummation is called aionaion then is the interval yoked to created nature.
Aion came to mean all that exists in the world under conditions of time: “The totality of what is discernible in the passage of time, the world inasmuch as it is active in time.” Ethically speaking, aion refers to the course and current of this world’s affairs. But since the world’s course of affairs is sinful, it is not surprising that “this age”as contrasted with “that age” (Luk 20:35) and “the coming age” (Mar 10:30) and “the age about to come” (Mat 12:32) like kosmos soon acquired an unfavorable meaning. The “kingdoms of the world [kosmou]”in Mat 4:8 are the “kingdoms of this age [aionos]” in Ignatius. God delivered us by his Son “from the present evil age [aionos]”(Gal 1:4); Satan is “god of this age [aionos]” (2Co 4:4); and sinners walk kata ton aiona tou kosmou toutou (Eph 2:2). This last phrase is translated too weakly in our Authorized Version as “according to the course of this world.” Eph 2:2 is particularly instructive since kosmos and aion are both used. Bengel’s excellent remarks are worth noting:
Aion and kosmos are different. The former controls and as it were shapes the later; kosmos is more outward and aion is more subtle. Aion is a term used not only physically, but also morally, denoting a quality of people living in it; and thus aion refers to a long succession of times when an evil age succeeds an evil age.
Compare Windischmann’s remarks:
Aion dare never be taken to denote only time, but rather as embracing everything caught up in time, the world and its glory, people and their natural unredeemed doings and strivings, in contrast to yonder eternal kingdom of the Messiah, which only begins in the here and now and yearns to be perfected.
We attach an ethical meaning to “the times,” as well as to “the age,” “the spirit or genius of the age,” and der Zeitgeist (the spirit of the time). Aion includes all the thoughts, opinions, maxims, speculations, impulses, and aspirations present in the world at any given time, which may be impossible to accurately define but which still constitute a real and effective powerthe moral or immoral atmosphere we breathe. Bengel called it the subtle shaping spirit of the kosmos, or world of people, who are living alienated and apart from God. Saeculum (age/spirit of the age) in Latin acquired the same sense, as in the familiar epigram of Tacitus: “Saeculum [age] is said to corrupt and to be corrupted.”
The use of aiones in Heb 1:2; Heb 11:3, however, does not follow the preceding distinction between aion and kosmos. In both of these passages aiones refers to the worlds as seen in other than temporal terms. Some expositorsespecially modern Socinian oneshave attempted to explain aiones in Heb 1:2 as the successive dispensations, the chronoi kai kairoi of the divine management. However plausible this explanation might be if we take the verse in isolation, the use of aiones in Heb 11:3 is decisive. In both passages aiones can only mean “the world,” not “the ages.” I have called the Hebrews passages the only exceptions, for I do not believe that 1Ti 1:17 is a third. In that passage aiones does not refer to “the worlds” in the usual concrete meaning of the term but to the “the ages,” the temporal periods whose sum and aggregate foreshadow the conception of eternity. This usage agrees with the more common temporal meaning of aion in the New Testament. The “King of ton aionon” thus refers to the sovereign dispenser and disposer of the ages, where the mystery of God’s purpose with man unfolds.Etymologically our English world more nearly represents aion than does the Greek kosmos. The old Weralt (in modern German Welt) is composed of two words, Wer (man) and Alt (age or generation). Thus the basic meaning of Weralt is “generation of men.” The notion of space unfolds from this expression of time, as aion passed into the meaning of kosmos. In the earliest German records, however, Weralt is used first as an expression of time and only derivatively as one of space. Grimm, however, thought that world is equivalent to whirled. For the Hebrew equivalents of the words for time and eternity, see Conrad von Orelli. For their Greek and Latin equivalentssuch as there aresee Pott.
Fuente: Synonyms of the New Testament
World
primarily “order, arrangement, ornament, adornment” (1Pe 3:3, see ADORN, B), is used to denote (a) the “earth,” e.g., Mat 13:35; Joh 21:25; Act 17:24; Rom 1:20 (probably here the universe: it had this meaning among the Greeks, owing to the order observable in it); 1Ti 6:7; Heb 4:3; Heb 9:26; (b) the “earth” in contrast with Heaven, 1Jo 3:17 (perhaps also Rom 4:13); (c) by metonymy, the “human race, mankind,” e.g., Mat 5:14; Joh 1:9 [here “that cometh (RV, ‘coming’) into the world” is said of Christ, not of “every man;” by His coming into the world He was the light for all men]; 1Jo 3:10; 1Jo 3:16-17 (thrice), 1Jo 3:19; 1Jo 4:42, and frequently in Rom. 1 Cor. and 1 John; (d) “Gentiles” as distinguished from Jews, e.g., Rom 11:12,Rom 11:15, where the meaning is that all who will may be reconciled (cp. 2Co 5:19); (e) the “present condition of human affairs,” in alienation from and opposition to God, e.g., Joh 7:7; Joh 8:23; Joh 14:30; 1Co 2:12; Gal 4:3; Gal 6:14; Col 2:8; Jam 1:27; 1Jo 4:5 (thrice); 1Jo 5:19; (f) the “sum of temporal possessions,” Mat 16:26; 1Co 7:31 (1st part); (g) metaphorically, of the “tongue” as “a world (of iniquity),” Jam 3:6; expressive of magnitude and variety.
“an age, a period of time,” marked in the NT usage by spiritual or moral characteristics, is sometimes translated “world;” the RV marg. always has “age.” The following are details concerning the world in this respect; its cares, Mat 13:22; its sons, Luk 16:8; Luk 20:34; its rulers, 1Co 2:6,1Co 2:8; its wisdom, 1Co 1:20; 1Co 2:6; 1Co 3:18, its fashion, Rom 12:2; its character, Gal 1:4; its god, 2Co 4:4. The phrase “the end of the world” should be rendered “the end of the age,” in most places (see END, A, No. 2); in 1Co 10:11, AV, “the ends (tele) of the world,” RV, “the ends of the ages,” probably signifies the fulfillment of the Divine purposes concerning the ages in regard to the church [this would come under END, A, No. 1, (c)]. In Heb 11:3 [lit., “the ages (have been prepared)”] the word indicates all that the successive periods contain; cp. Heb 1:2. Aion is always to be distinguished from kosmos, even where the two seem to express the same idea, e.g., 1Co 3:18, aion, 1Co 3:19, kosmos; the two are used together in Eph 2:2, lit., “the age of this world.” For a list of phrases containing aion, with their respective meanings, see EVER, B.
“the inhabited earth” (see EARTH, No. 2), is used (a) of the whole inhabited world, Mat 24:14; Luk 4:5; Luk 21:26; Rom 10:18; Heb 1:6; Rev 3:10; Rev 16:14; by metonymy, of its inhabitants, Act 17:31; Rev 12:9; (b) of the Roman Empire, the world as viewed by the writer or speaker, Luk 2:1; Act 11:28; Act 24:5; by metonymy, of its inhabitants, Act 17:6; Act 19:27; (c) the inhabited world in a coming age, Heb 2:5.
Notes: (1) In Rev 13:3, AV, ge, “the earth” (RV), is translated “world.” (2) For phrases containing aionios, e.g., Rom 16:25; 2Ti 1:9; Tit 1:2, see ETERNAL, No. 2.