Gate
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G4439, pýlē, is a Greek feminine noun for a gate or entrance opening. It names literal town, city, and temple gates, and it also appears in figurative sayings where an entrance represents a decisive way or where gates stand for the power of Hades.
Reader summary
Full entry for πύλη (G4439) · Open the biblical lexicon
G4439, pýlē, is a Greek feminine noun for a gate or entrance opening. It names literal town, city, and temple gates, and it also appears in figurative sayings where an entrance represents a decisive way or where gates stand for the power of Hades.
The BSB source-word alignment has 10 aligned rows for this entry. Common renderings include gate (6), [city] gate (1), [city] gates (1), [the] gates (1), city gate (1).
The source-word alignment first shows this entry at Matthew 7:13. Its strongest book concentrations include Acts (4), Matthew (4), Hebrews (1), Luke (1).
G4439, pýlē, is a Greek feminine noun for a gate or entrance opening. It names literal town, city, and temple gates, and it also appears in figurative sayings where an entrance represents a decisive way or where gates stand for the power of Hades. In Matthew 7 Jesus commands entry through the narrow gate and immediately joins the gate to a way leading toward life or destruction.
The saying concerns discipleship under His teaching; it does not make difficulty, small numbers, social isolation, or institutional strictness proof of faithfulness. In Matthew 16 the gates of Hades cannot prevail against Christ's church. The image announces Christ's effective promise in the face of death, not a map of demonic portals or immunity for every church institution.
Luke 7 places Jesus at Nain's town gate as a widow's only son is carried out, and Acts 3 remembers a disabled beggar at the temple's Beautiful Gate after he is healed and enters praising God. These scenes foreground compassion, public recognition, and God's power, but the noun itself neither blames disability nor promises identical healing outcomes. Hebrews 13 says Jesus suffered outside the city gate to sanctify His people by His own blood, connecting shame, sacrifice, atonement, and faithful identification with Him.
That text must not be used to praise abusive exclusion or contempt for Jewish people. G4439 helps readers follow gate language through choice, death, public vulnerability, deliverance, worship, and costly allegiance while letting each passage govern the image.
G4439 appears at literal city and temple entrances and in concentrated figurative sayings about the way to life and the gates of Hades. Its nine direct local BSB verses place gates beside discipleship, death, compassion, disability, danger, prayer, deliverance, and Christ's suffering. The surrounding discourse, not the gate image alone, establishes each theological claim.
Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many enter through it.
Jesus contrasts the narrow gate with the wide gate and joins each entrance to a corresponding way and destination within His call to obedient discipleship.
And I tell you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build My church, and the gates of Hades will not prevail against it.
After Peter confesses Jesus as the Christ, Jesus promises to build His church and declares that the gates of Hades will not prevail against it.
As He approached the town gate, He saw a dead man being carried out, the only son of his mother, and she was a widow. And a large crowd from the town was with her.
At Nain's town gate, Jesus meets a funeral procession, sees a widowed mother, and responds with compassion before raising her only son.
They recognized him as the man who used to sit begging at the Beautiful Gate of the temple, and they were filled with wonder and amazement at what had happened to him.
The crowd recognizes the healed man as the person formerly placed at the temple's Beautiful Gate, and his changed condition produces wonder rather than credit to human power.
And so Jesus also suffered outside the city gate, to sanctify the people by His own blood.
Jesus suffers outside the city gate to sanctify His people by His blood, grounding the following call to bear His reproach in His atoning work.
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. Gate as entry point to a city or sacred space; metaphorically, a way or path in Jesus's teaching.
Gate as entry point to a city or sacred space; metaphorically, a way or path in Jesus's teaching.
a gate: Luk.7:12, Act.9:24 12:10 16:13, Heb.13:12; ἡ Ὡραία Π. τ. ἱεροῦ, Act.3:10. Metaphorical, Mat.7:13-14; πύλαι ᾅδου (Wis.16:13, 3Ma.5:51, and cf. κλαῖς ᾅδου Rev.1:18): Mat.16:18.
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.
a door, gate
Read versea door, gate
Read versea door, gate
Read versea door, gate
Read versea door, gate
Read versea door, gate
Read versea door, gate
Read versea door, gate
Read versea door, gate
Read versea door, gate
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 6 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.
Selected passage-level study witnesses for this word. This section is not the full occurrence list.
Showing 4 selected witnesses from 10 lexical occurrence verses.
πύλη is a primary word - no further derivation.
Compound and idiomatic phrases that include this word. Follow a link to study the phrase and how its parts work together.
Matthew 7:13 does not praise narrowness for its own sake. Jesus commands entry through the narrow gate within the Sermon on the Mount, where hearing and doing His words, discerning fruit, seeking the Father's kingdom, and refusing lawlessness define the way. A demanding rule, unpopular leader, isolated group, or painful experience is not thereby the gate to life.
Matthew 16 uses the same noun differently: the gates of Hades cannot prevail against the church Christ promises to build. The confidence rests in Christ and His word, not in an institution's reputation or invulnerability to correction. Literal gate scenes deepen the pastoral picture. At Nain's gate Jesus meets death and a widow's grief with compassion. At the Beautiful Gate, a man known for begging is publicly recognized after healing and enters the temple praising God; the narrative refuses both invisibility and human self-glory.
Hebrews 13 then locates Jesus' sanctifying suffering outside the city gate and calls believers to identify with Him while seeking the city to come. G4439 therefore connects entrance, destination, public vulnerability, death, worship, and allegiance without making them one formula. Faithful preaching invites people to Christ's way, trusts His victory over death, honors disabled and grieving neighbors, and bears reproach without manufacturing exclusion or coercion.
Matt.7.13
G4439 is a feminine noun for a gate or entrance opening. Singular and plural forms occur literally, while context supports figurative uses in Matthew 7 and Matthew 16. The noun identifies the gate image, but the associated way, destination, or realm supplies its theological force.
Old Testament gates can mark civic justice, sanctuary approach, defended cities, death, and worship. G4439 receives that broad biblical background but develops it in distinct New Testament scenes: Jesus' gate and way saying, His promise against Hades, compassionate encounters at city and temple entrances, and His sanctifying suffering outside the gate.