Sacrificed to idols
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Eidolothyton refers to food connected with idol sacrifice, especially meat associated with pagan worship settings. The word sits at the intersection of worship, conscience, love, fellowship, and holiness.
Reader summary
Full entry for εἰδωλόθυτον (G1494) · Open the biblical lexicon
Eidolothyton refers to food connected with idol sacrifice, especially meat associated with pagan worship settings. The word sits at the intersection of worship, conscience, love, fellowship, and holiness.
The BSB source-word alignment has 10 aligned rows for this entry. Common renderings include food sacrificed to idols (3), sacrificed to idols (3), food sacrificed to an idol (1), from food sacrificed to idols (1), it were sacrificed to an idol (1).
The source-word alignment first shows this entry at Acts 15:29. Its strongest book concentrations include 1 Corinthians (6), Acts (2), Revelation (2).
Eidolothyton refers to food connected with idol sacrifice, especially meat associated with pagan worship settings. The word sits at the intersection of worship, conscience, love, fellowship, and holiness. Acts uses it in instructions to Gentile believers so table fellowship and separation from idolatry would be guarded. Paul treats the matter with careful theological balance: an idol is nothing, but knowledge must be governed by love, and a weak conscience can be wounded.
He refuses both superstition and careless liberty. Revelation uses the word negatively when false teaching leads Christ's servants into idolatrous compromise and sexual immorality. Eidolothyton therefore helps readers see that Christian freedom is never permission to participate in idolatry or to ignore the conscience and holiness of others.
Eidolothyton names food associated with idol sacrifice. The selected passages address Gentile fellowship, conscience, Christian liberty, idolatrous compromise, love, and holiness.
You must abstain from food sacrificed to idols, from blood, from the meat of strangled animals, and from sexual immorality. You will do well to avoid these things. Farewell.
Acts 15 includes food sacrificed to idols among instructions given to Gentile believers.
As for the Gentile believers, we have written to them our decision that they must abstain from food sacrificed to idols, from blood, from the meat of strangled animals, and from sexual immorality.”
Acts 21 repeats the instruction as a settled concern for Gentile Christians.
Now about food sacrificed to idols: We know that we all have knowledge. Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up.
Paul begins the Corinthian discussion by warning that knowledge puffs up but love builds up.
But not everyone has this knowledge. Some people are still so accustomed to idols that they eat such food as if it were sacrificed to an idol. And since their conscience is weak, it is defiled.
Paul recognizes that some believers' conscience is defiled when they eat as if the food remains tied to idol worship.
Am I suggesting, then, that food sacrificed to an idol is anything, or that an idol is anything?
Paul denies that an idol is anything while still refusing participation that compromises worship.
But I have a few things against you, because some of you hold to the teaching of Balaam, who taught Balak to place a stumbling block before the Israelites so they would eat food sacrificed to idols and commit sexual immorality.
Revelation rebukes teaching that leads believers to eat food sacrificed to idols and commit sexual immorality.
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. sacrificed to idols
Textus Receptus witness, full corpusGreek token appearances from Scrivener 1894 Textus Receptus in the full New Testament corpus.
10 Greek text appearances shown. Linked morphology labels have verse guides.
sacrificed to an image
Read versesacrificed to an image
Read versesacrificed to an image
Read versesacrificed to an image
Read versesacrificed to an image
Read versesacrificed to an image
Read versesacrificed to an image
Read versesacrificed to an image
Read versesacrificed to an image
Read versesacrificed to an image
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 this word appears across different grammatical cases and numbers.
This word appears as a noun across 4 case and number patterns. The form changes show how the word functions in a sentence; they do not change the basic lexical meaning by themselves.
Verse guides are not available for this word yet, so verse references remain plain evidence markers.
εἰδωλόθυτον is built from these roots:
Eidolothyton is not mainly about menu choices. It is about whether the people of Christ will treat idolatry, conscience, and fellowship with holy seriousness. Acts places the concern in Gentile inclusion and table fellowship. Paul can say that an idol is nothing, but he will not let knowledge become loveless. The conscience of a brother or sister matters, and participation in idolatrous settings cannot be baptized as freedom.
Revelation intensifies the warning when false teaching normalizes idol food alongside sexual immorality. The word therefore presses a mature Christian ethic: truth matters, love matters, worship matters, and liberty must not become a cover for compromise or for wounding those Christ has redeemed.
1Cor.8.1
Eidolothyton is a compound idea: idol-related sacrificial food. In context it may function adjectivally or substantively, but the concern is food tied to idol worship rather than ordinary meat in isolation.
The Old Testament consistently warns against idolatry and covenant compromise, while also treating food and table fellowship as communal matters. The New Testament applies those concerns among Gentile believers by distinguishing empty idols from real dangers of worship, conscience, and fellowship.