The meaning of Deed in the Bible
(From International Standard Bible Encyclopedia)
ded: Used in its ordinary modern sense in EV. In the Old Testament it is used to translates five Hebrew words: gemylah, literally, "recompense" (Isaiah 59:18); dabhar, literally, "word," "thing" (II Chronicles 35:27 the King James Version, the Revised Version (British and American) "acts"; Esther 1:17-18; Jeremiah 5:28); ma'aseh (Genesis 20:9; Genesis 44:15; Ezra 9:13); 'alilah (I Chronicles 16:8 the King James Version, the Revised Version (British and American) "doings"; Psalms 105:1 the King James Version, the Revised Version (British and American) "doings"); po'al (Psalms 28:4 the King James Version, the Revised Version (British and American) "work"; Jeremiah 25:14). In the New Testament "deed" very frequently translates ergon (same root as English "work"; compare "energy"), which is still more frequently (espescially in the Revised Version (British and American)) rendered "work." In Luke 23:51; Acts 19:18; Romans 8:13; Colossians 3:9 the King James Version, the Revised Version (British and American) "doings," it stands for Greek praxis (literally, "a doing," "transaction"), each time in a bad sense, equivalent to wicked deed, crime, a meaning which is frequently associated with the plural of praxis (compare English "practices" in the sense of trickery; so often in Polybius; Deissmann maintains that praxis was a technical term in magic), although in Matthew 16:27 (the King James Version "works") and Romans 12:4 the same Greek word has a neutral meaning. In James 1:25 the King James Version "deed" is the translation of Greek poiesis, more correctly rendered "doing" in the Revised Version (British and American).
D. Miall Edwards
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