A relative (by blood); by extension, a fellow countryman
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G4773 describes someone joined by natural kinship and, in extended use, a fellow member of one's people. Luke 1:36 identifies Elizabeth as Mary's relative, locating the announced births within a real family relationship while each woman receives a distinct calling.
Reader summary
Full entry for συγγενής (G4773) · Open the biblical lexicon
G4773 describes someone joined by natural kinship and, in extended use, a fellow member of one's people. Luke 1:36 identifies Elizabeth as Mary's relative, locating the announced births within a real family relationship while each woman receives a distinct calling.
The BSB source-word alignment has 12 aligned rows for this entry. Common renderings include relatives (6), fellow countrymen (2), a relative (1), fellow countryman (1), own flesh and blood (1).
The source-word alignment first shows this entry at Mark 6:4. Its strongest book concentrations include Luke (5), Romans (4), Acts (1), John (1).
G4773 describes someone joined by natural kinship and, in extended use, a fellow member of one's people. Luke 1:36 identifies Elizabeth as Mary's relative, locating the announced births within a real family relationship while each woman receives a distinct calling. Mark 6:4 includes relatives among those near a prophet who may withhold honor. Luke 21:16 warns disciples that betrayal can come even from parents, siblings, relatives, and friends.
Romans 9:3 uses the term for Paul's own flesh and blood as he expresses anguished concern for Israel. The word names genuine bonds, but it does not guarantee affection, safety, agreement, faith, or salvation. G4773 helps the church speak honestly about the gifts and limits of kinship. Relatives can share joy, hospitality, memory, and responsibility; they can also misunderstand, reject, betray, or weaponize access.
Paul models costly concern for his people without making ancestry the ground of justification. Teachers should neither despise natural family ties nor make them absolute. The gospel can deepen faithful care, establish necessary boundaries, and form a community whose love extends beyond blood without pretending that every relationship is interchangeable.
G4773 appears in announcements of shared family joy, hometown rejection, end-time betrayal, hospitality, personal accusation, and Paul's grief for his people. Its range recognizes natural and ethnic kinship while showing that proximity can support faithfulness or become a setting of pain.
Look, even Elizabeth your relative has conceived a son in her old age, and she who was called barren is in her sixth month.
Gabriel names Elizabeth as Mary's relative and points to her unexpected pregnancy as confirming evidence, joining the women by kinship without collapsing their distinct experiences and callings.
Then Jesus said to them, “Only in his hometown, among his relatives, and in his own household is a prophet without honor.”
Jesus names hometown, relatives, and household as overlapping circles in which a prophet may lack honor, warning that familiarity can become resistant unbelief.
You will be betrayed even by parents and brothers and relatives and friends, and some of you will be put to death.
Jesus soberly includes relatives among those who may betray disciples, so family proximity is never treated as an automatic guarantee of safety or loyalty.
For I could wish that I myself were cursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my brothers, my own flesh and blood,
Paul speaks with anguish for his own flesh and blood as Romans addresses Israel's privileges and God's faithfulness, expressing solidarity without grounding salvation in ethnicity alone.
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. Blood relative or tribal kinsman; emphasizes natural family connection rather than household relationship.
Textus Receptus witness, full corpusGreek token appearances from Scrivener 1894 Textus Receptus in the full New Testament corpus.
12 Greek text appearances shown. Linked morphology labels have verse guides.
akin, a relative
Read verseakin, a relative
Read verseakin, a relative
Read verseakin, a relative
Read verseakin, a relative
Read verseakin, a relative
Read verseakin, a relative
Read verseakin, a relative
Read verseakin, a relative
Read verseakin, a relative
Read verseakin, a relative
Read verseakin, a relative
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 1 selected witness from 11 lexical occurrence verses.
συγγενής is built from these roots:
Compound and idiomatic phrases that include this word. Follow a link to study the phrase and how its parts work together.
G4773 refuses sentimental accounts of kinship. Elizabeth and Mary share a family bond that becomes part of Luke's joyful opening, yet neither woman's life is reduced to her usefulness to the other. Their callings remain personal gifts under God. Mark 6 shows the harder side of familiarity: those nearest to Jesus can be among those who refuse Him honor. Luke 21 goes further and warns that relatives may betray disciples.
The gospel therefore does not require believers to call every family relationship safe or to grant unrestricted access to people who threaten them. Romans 9 gives a different tension. Paul's solidarity with his own people is profound and anguished, but the surrounding argument will not let natural descent replace God's promise, mercy, or the response of faith.
Kinship can carry history, responsibility, affection, and grief without becoming a savior. This balance matters pastorally. The church should encourage truthful care for relatives, support family hospitality, and respect cultural networks that bear burdens together. It should also protect converts facing family coercion, survivors harmed by relatives, and members whose boundaries are treated as disloyalty.
Christian community extends love beyond blood, but it must not erase natural obligations or casually rename itself as a replacement family. In Christ, kinship is received, judged, healed, and relativized under allegiance to God.
Rom.9.3
G4773 is an adjective often used substantivally for a relative or kinsman. Its association with shared origin can extend to fellow countrymen or ethnic kin, while coordinated lists in passages such as Luke 21:16 distinguish relatives from parents, siblings, and friends.
Scripture consistently recognizes extended kinship and tribal solidarity, yet both Testaments place those bonds beneath loyalty to God and concern for justice. The New Testament gathers believers across peoples without teaching that conversion erases ancestry, family grief, cultural responsibility, or the need for protective boundaries when relatives oppose or harm them.