Greek word · G5365
φιλαργυρία
philargyria
love of money
A compound of phil- (fond of, attached to) and argyrion (silver, money). It names avarice: a settled attachment to money and the craving for more. It is a vice word, the opposite of aphilargyros, 'not a lover of money', which this letter requires of overseers (1 Tim 3:3; compare Heb 13:5).
Appears once in the Greek New Testament.
What it means
φιλαργυρία, -ας, ἡ
(φιλάργυρος), [in LXX: 4Ma.1:26 4Mac 2:15 א1 * ;]
love of money, avarice: 1 Timothy 6:1.†
SYN.: πλεονεξία, covetousness (see Tr., Syn., § xxiv) (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 1 Timothy 6:10
- Range of meaning
A compound of phil- (fond of, attached to) and argyrion (silver, money). It names avarice: a settled attachment to money and the craving for more. It is a vice word, the opposite of aphilargyros, 'not a lover of money', which this letter requires of overseers (1 Tim 3:3; compare Heb 13:5).
- Against the English
'Love of money' is accurate. The danger is that people drop 'love of' and quote 'money is the root of all evil'. The Greek points at the person's disposition, not at coins.
- How it drifted
The English phrase has not drifted. The popular misquotation has, by shortening it.
- Used elsewhere in the period
The noun occurs only here in the NT. The adjective philargyros describes the Pharisees in Luke 16:14 and people of the last days in 2 Tim 3:2. In 4 Maccabees 1:26 and 2:15 it appears among the passions reason must master. Philo calls love of money a starting point of the greatest wrongs (Special Laws 4.65). The Testament of Judah 18–19 warns that love of money leads to idolatry. Greek moralists made it a stock target (see the proverb under ῥίζα).
Similar words
Where it appears
1 Timothy · 1
-
1 Timothy 6:10 φιλαργυρία, love of money,
For the love of money is the root of all kinds of evil. By craving it, some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many sorrows.
Here: Literally 'fondness for silver': greed or avarice, a standard item on Greek and Jewish lists of vices. The fault is the attachment to money, not the possession of money.
Word data: STEPBible.org (CC BY 4.0), main text only.