Greek word · G2340
θηρεύω
thēreuō
to hunt/catch
To hunt, to catch in hunting; figuratively, to go after something or someone in order to seize or trap them. Thayer and BDAG both treat Luke 11:54 as figurative: catching at something he might say.
Appears once in the Greek New Testament. ·
What it means
From G. Abbott-Smith, A Manual Greek Lexicon of the New Testament (1922), via STEPBible.org (CC BY 4.0).
In depth
- Range of meaning
To hunt, to catch in hunting; figuratively, to go after something or someone in order to seize or trap them. Thayer and BDAG both treat Luke 11:54 as figurative: catching at something he might say.
- Against the English
Almost every English version says "catch," and NLT says "trap." "Catch" is accurate, and "catch him out" is a fair modern idiom, but it loses the hunter's picture. "Catch" can be a passing act; this word implies a chase with prey at the end of it.
- Used elsewhere in the period
This is the only New Testament use. In the Greek Old Testament it is Esau's word for hunting game (Genesis 27:3, 5) and is used of hunting animals in Leviticus 17:13. Lamentations 3:52 applies it to people: "my enemies hunted me like a bird." Greek writers also used hunting language for pursuing people, as in Plato's Sophist, which pictures the sophist as a hunter of young men. Matthew and Mark use different trapping words for a later attempt to snare Jesus in his speech: "entrap" (Matthew 22:15) and "catch, as a hunter catches prey" (Mark 12:13).
Where it appears
Luke · 1
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Luke 11:54 θηρεῦσαί to catch
waiting to catch Him in something He might say.
Here: This gives the goal of the ambush: to bag something as a hunter bags game. It occurs only here in the New Testament, and the picture is vivid and deliberate.
Word data: STEPBible.org (CC BY 4.0), main text only.