Bible Lexicons

The familiar sense of γυμνός = ";with only the χιτών "; comes out well in P Magd 6.7 (iii/B.C.) ὡς ἤμην γυμνὸς ὑπ᾽ αὐ [τῶν : the complainant had been stripped of his ἱμάτιον . On the other hand, the literal sense of ";naked"; is required in P Fay 12.20 (c. B.C. 103). Here the complainant reports a similar robbery of a ἱμάτιον , which he ultimately got back from the pawnbroker for 2700 drachmae of copper (= 45 silver dr., say 33 s.). The thieves went off with it ἐ ]ξέντες γυμνόν . He meanwhile got away μετ᾽ ἐνδύματος supplied by his friends (ὑπὸ τῶν γνωρίμων ), which at least implies that he could not have done without the ἔνδυμα . (Note the substitution of this more general word, that used of the Wedding Garment in the parable (Matthew 22:11 f.), where also it is a ἱμάτιον .) It may be noted that both our citations illustrate Luke’s form of the Logion (6.29), in which the assailant snatches the outer garment; the climax in Matthew 5:40 gets a little emphasis from the high price which our papyrus shows a ἱμάτιον could fetch. But we are not deterred by Harnack from pleading out of these documents for the originality of Luke, whose version obviously describes a common form of robbery. The Matthaean form may possibly be assimilated to the OT language about taking a man’s garment as a pledge. Another instance where γ . may well have its literal force is afforded by the well-known letter of the prodigal son to his mother, BGU III. 846.9 (ii/A.D.) (= Selections, p. 94) αἴγραψά σοι ὅτι γυμνός εἰμει , ";I wrote you that I hadn’t any clothes."; Cf. for the verb P Oxy VI. 903.7 (iv/A.D.), where a woman accuses her husband of applying fire to her daughters—γυμνώσας αὐ [τὰ ]ς παντελῶς , ";having stripped them quite naked";; and for the compound, P Magd 24.7 (B.C. 217) ὥστε καὶ ἀπογυμνωθῆναί μου τὸ στῆθος , as the result of a certain woman’s ἐπισπασαμένη τῆς ἀ [ναβολῆς τοῦ ἱματίου ] according to Wilcken’s restoration (Archiv vi. p. 274). The verb is used metaphorically in a difficult papyrus letter printed from Mélanges Chatelain in Preisigke 4317 (c. A.D. 200) : l. .25 (best taken as beginning a sentence) has γεγύμνωμαι καὶ ὕβρισμαι (-μαι repeated) παρὰ πάντων τῶν συνπολιτῶν . The adj. is MGr, and has the corresponding verb γυμνώνω .

 

 

γυμνα γυμνά γυμνὰ γυμναί γυμνή γυμνην γυμνήν γυμνοι γυμνοί γυμνοὶ γυμνον γυμνόν γυμνὸν γυμνος γυμνός γυμνὸς γυμνότερος γυμνου γυμνού γυμνοῦ γυμνους γυμνούς γυμνοὺς γυμνών gumna gumnen gumnēn gumnoi gumnon gumnos gumnou gumnous gymna gymnà gymnen gymnēn gymnḗn gymnoi gymnoì gymnon gymnòn gymnos gymnós gymnòs gymnou gymnoû gymnous gymnoùs