To praise (God)
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G134 is a verb for praising or commending. Its New Testament uses are directed to God and commonly pair praise with words such as saying, glorifying, or blessing, yet the verb itself does not prescribe one musical form or emotional display.
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Full entry for αἰνέω (G134) · Open the biblical lexicon
G134 is a verb for praising or commending. Its New Testament uses are directed to God and commonly pair praise with words such as saying, glorifying, or blessing, yet the verb itself does not prescribe one musical form or emotional display.
The BSB source-word alignment has 8 aligned rows for this entry. Common renderings include praising (5), Praise (2), to praise (1).
The source-word alignment first shows this entry at Luke 2:13. Its strongest book concentrations include Acts (3), Luke (3), Revelation (1), Romans (1).
G134 is a verb for praising or commending. Its New Testament uses are directed to God and commonly pair praise with words such as saying, glorifying, or blessing, yet the verb itself does not prescribe one musical form or emotional display. In Luke, praise answers God's revealed action: the heavenly host responds to Jesus' birth, a healed man returns glorifying and praising God, the crowd responds to a mighty work, and the disciples praise God after the ascension.
Acts 2:47 includes praise within the shared life of the Jerusalem church. Romans 15:11 quotes the nations' summons to praise the Lord inside Paul's appeal for Jews and Gentiles to glorify God together. Revelation 19:5 summons God's servants, small and great, to praise him. These settings make praise truthful response to God rather than a technique for producing a mood.
G134 appears in eight local New Testament occurrences. Luke and Acts show praise answering revelation, healing, resurrection hope, ascension, and communal life; Romans extends the summons to the nations; Revelation calls God's servants to praise from the throne.
And suddenly there appeared with the angel a great multitude of the heavenly host, praising God and saying:
The heavenly host praises God as it announces glory to God and peace in connection with the Messiah's birth.
Praising God continually in the temple.
After the resurrection and ascension, the disciples remain in the temple praising God.
Praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people. And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved.
The early church praises God as communal life and mission unfold.
And again: “Praise the Lord, all you Gentiles, and extol Him, all you peoples.”
Paul quotes the call for all Gentiles to praise the Lord.
Then a voice came from the throne, saying: “Praise our God, all you who serve Him, and those who fear Him, small and great alike!”
A voice from the throne summons all God's servants, small and great, to praise him within Revelation's judgment and wedding celebration.
BSB source-word alignment connects this entry to exact verse rows, English rendering, source form, transliteration, and parsing.
How English Renders ItA compact distribution from source-word alignment before the full evidence tables.
Greek word. to praise (God)
Textus Receptus witness, full corpusGreek token appearances from Scrivener 1894 Textus Receptus in the full New Testament corpus.
9 Greek text appearances shown. Linked morphology labels have verse guides.
I praise
Read verseI praise
Read verseI praise
Read verseI praise
Read verseI praise
Read verseI praise
Read verseI praise
Read verseI praise
Read verseI praise
Read verseFull New Testament corpus: 260 chapters, 7,957 verses, 140,628 tokens. Data source: honza/textus-receptus (data only), with authority check against byztxt/greektext-textus-receptus.
How mood, tense, and voice shift the force of this verb in context.
This verb appears through different tense, voice, mood, or stem patterns. Those forms help readers see how the action is presented in context.
Verse guides are not available for this word yet, so verse references remain plain evidence markers.
How this verb appears across 7 occurrences in the NT discourse index (MACULA Greek SBLGNT).
Aspect reflects grammatical form — not authorial emphasis. Participles and infinitives are verbal adjectives and nouns respectively.
Clause data: MACULA Greek (Clear Bible, CC BY 4.0) · SBLGNT (Logos/SBL, CC BY 4.0)
αἰνέω is built from this root:
Compound and idiomatic phrases that include this word. Follow a link to study the phrase and how its parts work together.
Teach G134 by naming the divine action that calls praise forth. Luke's scenes do not use praise to avoid grief, need, or bodily reality; praise follows an announcement, healing, mighty work, or the ascension. Acts places it within a community receiving food, fellowship, favor, and new believers. Romans 15 makes praise part of the scriptural hope that Jews and Gentiles glorify God together. Revelation 19 gives praise an eschatological setting after judgment and before the marriage supper.
This pattern protects congregations from treating praise as emotional pressure. A leader may invite praise, but should not imply that volume, musical style, or visible enthusiasm proves spiritual maturity. The passage supplies the reason, subject, and setting. Faithful praise can be spoken, sung, shared in testimony, or embodied in communal gratitude without making this one verb cover every biblical form of worship.
Luke.2.13
The verb means to praise or commend. In the New Testament its object is God, and several uses occur beside verbs of saying, glorifying, or blessing. Those pairings show that praise may be verbally expressed, but the lemma alone does not define a musical genre, bodily posture, or required emotional intensity.
Romans 15:11 directly cites Psalm 117:1, where all nations and peoples are summoned to praise the Lord. Luke's praise scenes also resonate with the Psalms' repeated movement from God's saving acts to public testimony, while Revelation 19's throne summons shares the canonical horizon of servants and nations praising God.