Greek word · G3717

ὀρθός

orthos

upright

Upright, erect (of posture); straight (of lines and roads); correct, right (of judgment or conduct). Of a road it means direct and even, free of bends and obstacles.

Appears 2 times in 2 verses of the Greek New Testament. ·

What it means

ὀρθός, -ή, -όν

[in LXX chiefly for יָשָׁר ;]

straight;

(a) in height, straight, upright: Acts 14:10;

(b) in line, straight, direct: figuratively, Hebrews 12:13 (LXX).†

(AS)

From G. Abbott-Smith, A Manual Greek Lexicon of the New Testament (1922), via STEPBible.org (CC BY 4.0).

In depth

From the study of Hebrews 12:13

Range of meaning

Upright, erect (of posture); straight (of lines and roads); correct, right (of judgment or conduct). Of a road it means direct and even, free of bends and obstacles.

Against the English

'Straight' can suggest only 'not curved,' or the moral idiom 'the straight and narrow.' Here the main idea is level and unobstructed, a surface a lame foot can manage. The NIV's 'level paths' brings this out.

How it drifted

English 'straight' as a moral word ('go straight,' 'straight and narrow') pulls the reader toward personal rule-keeping, away from the picture of preparing a safe road.

Used elsewhere in the period

The Hebrew behind Proverbs 4:26, pallēs, means 'make level, weigh out evenly.' The Greek translators rendered it orthas. Isaiah 40:3–4 LXX, which speaks of making the roads straight (eutheias) and the rough places smooth, belongs to the same family of road-building images. Hebrews' main background passage, Isaiah 35, describes a highway for the redeemed where even fools will not go astray (35:8).

Similar words

Where it appears

Acts · 1

  1. Acts 14:10 ὀρθός. upright!

    In a loud voice Paul called out, “Stand up on your feet!” And the man jumped up and began to walk.

Hebrews · 1

  1. Hebrews 12:13 ὀρθὰς straight

    Make straight paths for your feet, so that the lame may not be disabled, but rather healed.

    Here: Straight and even: a track without twists or broken ground. It echoes 'lift up / set upright' (anorthōsate) in v.12, so the wordplay runs 'set upright your knees … make upright tracks.'

Word data: STEPBible.org (CC BY 4.0), main text only.