Greek word · G4994
σωφρονίζω
sōphronizō
to train
Built on sōphrōn, 'of sound mind': sensible, moderate, self-controlled, and for women especially modest and chaste. The verb means to make someone sōphrōn: to bring them to their senses, to correct, to discipline, to advise and urge toward prudent behaviour.
Appears once in the Greek New Testament.
What it means
σωφρονίζω
[in Aq.: Isaiah 38:16 * ;]
to make σώφρων, recall one to his senses, control (RV, train): with accusative of person(s), Titus 2:4.†
(AS)
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
Built on sōphrōn, 'of sound mind': sensible, moderate, self-controlled, and for women especially modest and chaste. The verb means to make someone sōphrōn: to bring them to their senses, to correct, to discipline, to advise and urge toward prudent behaviour. BDAG glosses it 'to instruct someone to behave in a prudent or appropriate manner, encourage, advise, urge'. In classical usage it could also mean 'chasten' or 'call to order'.
- Against the English
'Train' (BSB, ESV, WEB, NLT), 'urge' (NIV) and 'encourage' (NASB) each cover part of it. 'Teach … to be sober' (KJV) keeps the root idea but splits it into two English words, and 'sober' now misleads (see drift). YLT's 'make … sober-minded' is closest to the shape of the Greek. None of the smooth modern renderings shows that this verb shares its root with 'self-controlled' in vv.2, 5, 6 and 'sensibly' in v.12.
- How it drifted
Not a drift in the word itself. The problem is that most English versions flatten it into general 'training' and so hide the self-control theme the Greek keeps repeating.
- Used elsewhere in the period
The verb is rare in the Greek Bible and occurs only here in the New Testament. The word family is central in Greek moral philosophy: sōphrosynē is one of the four classical virtues (Plato, Aristotle), and Hellenistic moralists and funeral inscriptions treat it as the defining virtue of a respectable woman. Philo and Josephus use the family for moral discipline and restraint. In the Pastoral Letters it is a keyword: 1 Tim 2:9, 15; 3:2; Titus 1:8; 2:2, 5, 6, 12.
Similar words
Where it appears
Titus · 1
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Titus 2:4 σωφρονίζωσιν they may train
In this way they can train the young women to love their husbands and children,
Here: Literally 'to make someone sōphrōn', meaning sensible, self-controlled and modest. The present tense pictures an ongoing process of coaching and correction by people who have lived it, not a single lesson. It comes from the same root as the word for self-control that runs through the whole chapter (vv.2, 5, 6, 12).
Word data: STEPBible.org (CC BY 4.0), main text only.