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Bible Dictionaries
Bitterness
Hastings' Dictionary of the New Testament
or (πικρία)
‘Bitter’ means lit. [Note: literally, literature.] ‘biting’ (A. S. [Note: Anglo-Saxon.] bîtan, ‘to bite’), and πικρός, ‘sharp’ (from the same root as pungo, ‘pike,’ ‘peak’), τὸ πικρόν, as that which has an acrid, pungent taste, is opposed to τὸ γλυκύ (James 3:11). In Septuagint πικρία is often used to translate רֹאשׁ, a bitter and poisonous plant, which is always used figuratively. Moses says that the man or woman, family or tribe, that turns from Jahweh will be ‘a root that beareth gall and wormwood’ (ῥίζα ἄνω φύουσα ἐν χολῇ καὶ πικρίᾳ, Deuteronomy 29:18). There is an echo of this saying in Hebrews 12:15, where any member of the Church who introduces wrong doctrines or practices, and so leads others astray, becomes a ‘root of bitterness springing up’ (ῥίζα πικρίας ἄνω φύουσα); and there may be another echo of it in Acts 8:23 (Revised Version margin), where Peter predicts that Simon Magus will ‘become gall (or a gall root) of bitterness’ (εἰς χολὴν πικρίας ὁρῶ σε ὄντα) by his evil influence over others, if he remains as he now is. But χολὴν πικρίας may be a genitive of apposition and the Apostle may mean that Simon is even now ‘in Bitterkeit, Bosheit, Feindseligkeit, wie in Galle’ (H. J. Holtzmann, Apostelgeschichte3, 1901, ad loc.). In Romans 3:14 bitterness of speech is joined with cursing, and in Ephesians 4:31 πικρία is an inward disposition (cf. ζῆλον πικρόν, James 3:14) which all Christians are to put away in order that they may be ‘kind one to another, tender-hearted.’
James Strahan.
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Hastings, James. Entry for 'Bitterness'. Hastings' Dictionary of the New Testament. https://www.studylight.org/dictionaries/eng/hdn/b/bitterness.html. 1906-1918.
