Servant
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Ὑπηρέτης names an attendant, assistant, subordinate servant, or officer acting under another's direction. Court officers receive prisoners, high-priestly attendants guard and question Jesus, temple officers are dispatched to arrest Him, and jail officers carry out official duties.
Reader summary
Full entry for ὑπηρέτης (G5257) · Open the biblical lexicon
Ὑπηρέτης names an attendant, assistant, subordinate servant, or officer acting under another's direction. Court officers receive prisoners, high-priestly attendants guard and question Jesus, temple officers are dispatched to arrest Him, and jail officers carry out official duties.
The BSB source-word alignment has 20 aligned rows for this entry. Common renderings include officers (12), servants (3), as a servant (1), as their helper (1), attendant (1).
The source-word alignment first shows this entry at Matthew 5:25. Its strongest book concentrations include John (9), Acts (4), Luke (2), Mark (2).
Ὑπηρέτης names an attendant, assistant, subordinate servant, or officer acting under another's direction. Court officers receive prisoners, high-priestly attendants guard and question Jesus, temple officers are dispatched to arrest Him, and jail officers carry out official duties. Luke also honors the first witnesses as servants of the word whose testimony was handed down carefully.
The noun indicates delegated service rather than defining the master's righteousness or the servant's character. An officer can enforce an unjust purpose, while a servant of the word can faithfully steward received testimony. The task, sender, authority, message, and conduct determine whether subordinate agency serves justice, institutional fear, or gospel witness.
Ὑπηρέτης describes service under delegated authority. Judicial and temple officers contrast with eyewitness servants of the word, making allegiance and stewardship central to faithful service.
Reconcile quickly with your adversary, while you are still on the way to court. Otherwise, he may hand you over to the judge, and the judge may hand you over to the officer, and you may be thrown into prison.
Jesus' courtroom warning traces how an unresolved adversary can hand a person through judge and officer into confinement, urging timely reconciliation before judgment advances.
Peter followed Him at a distance, right into the courtyard of the high priest. And he sat with the officers and warmed himself by the fire.
Peter sits among the high priest's officers while following Jesus at a distance, a dangerous setting that frames his coming denial and divided allegiance.
Just as they were handed down to us by the initial eyewitnesses and servants of the word.
Luke identifies eyewitnesses as servants of the word, joining firsthand testimony to humble stewardship rather than personal ownership of the gospel account.
When the Pharisees heard the crowd whispering these things about Jesus, they and the chief priests sent officers to arrest Him.
Temple officers are sent under elite authority to arrest Jesus, but His teaching soon disrupts their assignment and reveals the conflict around His identity.
But on arriving at the jail, the officers did not find them there. So they returned with the report:
The jail officers faithfully report an empty prison despite secured doors, becoming witnesses to a fact that the council's authority cannot explain away.
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. A subordinate who actively serves under authority; distinct from δοῦλος by implying official function rather than ownership status.
Textus Receptus witness, full corpusGreek token appearances from Scrivener 1894 Textus Receptus in the full New Testament corpus.
16 of 20 Greek text appearances shown. Linked morphology labels have verse guides.
a servant, an attendant
Read versea servant, an attendant
Read versea servant, an attendant
Read versea servant, an attendant
Read versea servant, an attendant
Read versea servant, an attendant
Read versea servant, an attendant
Read versea servant, an attendant
Read versea servant, an attendant
Read versea servant, an attendant
Read versea servant, an attendant
Read versea servant, an attendant
Read versea servant, an attendant
Read versea servant, an attendant
Read versea servant, an attendant
Read versea servant, an attendant
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 20 lexical occurrence verses.
Defines Paul’s appointed role under Christ’s authority.Acts 26:9-18
Compound and idiomatic phrases that include this word. Follow a link to study the phrase and how its parts work together.
Subordinate service is real agency under authority. Court and temple officers stand within systems that can confine, guard, and attempt to arrest, yet their delegated role does not make every purpose just. Peter's place among the officers underscores the pressure of proximity to hostile power. Luke offers a different allegiance: eyewitnesses become servants of the word, transmitting testimony they received rather than reshaping it for status.
Acts shows jail officers reporting facts that unsettle their superiors' control. Churches need faithful assistants, administrators, and ministers who do not confuse humble service with voiceless compliance. A servant honors legitimate direction, tells the truth about what occurred, recognizes moral limits, and treats the gospel as a trust belonging to its Lord.
Matt.5.25
Ὑπηρέτης originally evokes service under direction and develops as a flexible noun for assistant, attendant, or official. Context identifies whether the role is judicial, religious, administrative, or ministerial.
Kings, priests, and courts employ attendants, while prophets serve the word entrusted by God. The New Testament dignifies subordinate ministry while placing every servant under Christ's judgment.