Burden or weight describes something borne, imposed or compared, and the passage identifies its character. Galatians calls believers to carry one another's burdens within teaching about gentle restoration and attention to one's own conduct.
Reading a lexicon entry
What this page is: Each lexicon entry shows the original Hebrew or Greek word behind the English translation: its meaning, its range of use, and where it appears in Scripture.
Strong's number: The Strong's code (H- or G-) is the standard reference number for this word. It connects this entry to chapter and passage language tabs.
Where it appears: The witness passages show where this word is used in context. Click any to open the study page for that passage.
This lexicon entry is part of our ongoing editorial review. If you notice missing content, unclear wording, or a possible correction, please send us a note through theConnect page. Screenshots are helpful.
Reader summary
Full entry for βάρος (G922) · Open the biblical lexicon
Burden or weight describes something borne, imposed or compared, and the passage identifies its character. Galatians calls believers to carry one another's burdens within teaching about gentle restoration and attention to one's own conduct.
The BSB source-word alignment has 6 aligned rows for this entry. Common renderings include burden (2), burdens (1), to burden (1), to demand [it] (1), weight (1).
The source-word alignment first shows this entry at Matthew 20:12. Its strongest book concentrations include 1 Thessalonians (1), 2 Corinthians (1), Acts (1), Galatians (1).
Burden or weight describes something borne, imposed or compared, and the passage identifies its character. Galatians calls believers to carry one another's burdens within teaching about gentle restoration and attention to one's own conduct. The Jerusalem letter declines to impose a burden beyond its named essential requirements. Paul contrasts present affliction with an eternal weight of glory, while also describing real pressure, persecution and bodily weakness.
In another letter his apostolic authority is acknowledged beside gentle care rather than a pursuit of praise. The noun therefore cannot make every burden evil, every imposed demand legitimate or every suffered injury trivial. Ask who carries or places the weight and what the text says it requires or promises. Shared help belongs beside personal responsibility, and a comparison with future glory must not become a leader's excuse to withhold practical care or minimize a person's suffering.
Mutual burden-bearing, limited requirements, glory's weight, laborers' complaint and restraint in apostolic authority show different objects. Each account evaluates the burden through its actor, recipient and surrounding argument.
Carry one another’s burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ.
Mutual burden-bearing follows gentle restoration and watchfulness against temptation, while verses 4-5 also retain examination of one's work and personal responsibility.
It seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us not to burden you with anything beyond these essential requirements:
The letter says no burden beyond the essential requirements it then names, so both the limit and the actual instructions must remain visible.
For our light and momentary affliction is producing for us an eternal weight of glory that is far beyond comparison.
Affliction is compared with an eternal weight of glory within Paul's account of pressure, persecution and wasting outward life, not a denial that present suffering is real.
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. Weight as moral burden or responsibility; conveys heaviness of obligation rather than mere physical load
Textus Receptus witness, full corpusGreek token appearances from Scrivener 1894 Textus Receptus in the full New Testament corpus.
6 Greek text appearances shown. Linked morphology labels have verse guides.
a weight, burden
Read versea weight, burden
Read versea weight, burden
Read versea weight, burden
Read versea weight, burden
Read versea weight, burden
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 3 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 1 selected witness from 6 lexical occurrence verses.
βάρος is built from these roots:
Affirms that no additional salvific burden is placed upon Gentile believers.Acts 15:22-29
Compound and idiomatic phrases that include this word. Follow a link to study the phrase and how its parts work together.
A weight must be interpreted through what is carried and who places it. Galatians' mutual burden-bearing belongs to gentle restoration, watchfulness and examination of one's own work, not unbounded responsibility for another person's every choice. Acts names essential requirements while explicitly refusing an additional burden. Second Corinthians measures present affliction against future glory but does so within an honest account of persecution and bodily weakness; the comparison must not erase the suffering it compares.
First Thessalonians likewise recognizes apostolic authority while describing gentle care and refusing a pursuit of praise. Teach the help, restraint or hope the passage supplies without turning one noun into a universal leadership entitlement. Encourage shared support with accountable conduct, preserve stated requirements without inventing more, and refuse the claim that a person must accept preventable harm because glory is promised.
Gal.6.2
The licensed Greek range includes burden, weight and authority-related use. The six witnesses name different objects and relationships. Galatians also uses a different Greek word for each one's own load nearby; that wording should be read with the shared-responsibility argument rather than made into a rigid rule that forbids asking for help.
Numbers 11:14-17 records Moses saying he cannot carry the people alone and the Lord directing him to bring seventy known elders. This separate Hebrew account is not the Greek noun. Its actual response recognizes a need for shared responsibility, while Galatians retains gentle restoration and one's own conduct; neither passage makes solitary exhaustion the standard of faithful care or authorizes harm when a caregiver is overwhelmed.