To make room for
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G5562 names room, capacity, or the ability to hold something. John uses it concretely for stone jars that can hold water, sharply for hearts where Jesus' word has no place, and expansively for a world that could not contain the books that would be written about all Jesus did.
Reader summary
Full entry for χωρέω (G5562) · Open the biblical lexicon
G5562 names room, capacity, or the ability to hold something. John uses it concretely for stone jars that can hold water, sharply for hearts where Jesus' word has no place, and expansively for a world that could not contain the books that would be written about all Jesus did.
The BSB source-word alignment has 10 aligned rows for this entry. Common renderings include [Each] could hold (1), accept [this] (1), can accept (1), goes (1), has no place (1).
The source-word alignment first shows this entry at Matthew 15:17. Its strongest book concentrations include Matthew (4), John (3), 2 Corinthians (1), 2 Peter (1).
G5562 names room, capacity, or the ability to hold something. John uses it concretely for stone jars that can hold water, sharply for hearts where Jesus' word has no place, and expansively for a world that could not contain the books that would be written about all Jesus did. The word is useful because it moves from physical capacity to spiritual receptivity without losing its basic sense. In John 8:37, the issue is not lack of information. Jesus' opponents hear Him, but His word does not have room in them. That distinction gives the word pastoral force.
For John-focused use, the safest path is to let the immediate passage set the claim, then let the word clarify how the scene moves toward witness, faith, resistance, or worship.
G5562 moves through John from measurable physical capacity to the deeper question of whether Jesus' word has room in a person. It also frames the Gospel's closing claim that the works of Jesus exceed the world's capacity to record them.
Now six stone water jars had been set there for the Jewish rites of purification. Each could hold from twenty to thirty gallons.
The water jars have measurable capacity. John uses the word in a plain physical sense before later metaphorical uses.
I know you are Abraham’s descendants, but you are trying to kill Me because My word has no place within you.
Jesus says His word has no place within His hearers. The capacity language becomes morally and spiritually searching in context.
There are many more things that Jesus did. If all of them were written down, I suppose that not even the world itself would have space for the books that would be written.
John closes by saying the world itself could not contain all the books if everything Jesus did were written. The word stretches from physical capacity to literary impossibility.
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. To hold or make room for, literally in space or metaphorically in heart and mind.
Textus Receptus witness, full corpus Greek token appearances from Scrivener 1894 Textus Receptus in the full New Testament corpus.
10 Greek text appearances shown. Linked morphology labels have verse guides.
I make room, go, receive
Read verseI make room, go, receive
Read verseI make room, go, receive
Read verseI make room, go, receive
Read verseI make room, go, receive
Read verseI make room, go, receive
Read verseI make room, go, receive
Read verseI make room, go, receive
Read verseI make room, go, receive
Read verseI make room, go, receive
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 mood, tense, and voice shift the force of this verb in context.
This verb appears through different tense, voice, mood, or stem patterns. Those forms help readers see how the action is presented in context.
Verse guides are not available for this word yet, so verse references remain plain evidence markers.
How this verb appears across 10 occurrences in the NT discourse index (MACULA Greek SBLGNT).
Aspect reflects grammatical form — not authorial emphasis. Participles and infinitives are verbal adjectives and nouns respectively.
Clause data: MACULA Greek (Clear Bible, CC BY 4.0) · SBLGNT (Logos/SBL, CC BY 4.0)
χωρέω is built from this root:
Compound and idiomatic phrases that include this word. Follow a link to study the phrase and how its parts work together.
This word lets teachers name a difference John cares about deeply: hearing words and making room for them are not the same thing. The jars in John 2 can hold water. The opponents in John 8 cannot receive Jesus' word because they are already committed to killing Him. The world in John 21 cannot contain the full account of Jesus' works. Capacity language therefore becomes more than a physical detail.
It becomes a pastoral question: what has room in us, and what have we crowded out? The preacher should let the plain sense lead, then show how John uses that sense to expose spiritual resistance and to magnify the abundance of Christ.
John.8.37
To have room, make room, or contain is a reviewed display gloss for G5562. In this John-focused companion, the local discourse foregrounding data shows 3 John use(s), with tense patterns summarized as present 2, future 1. Use these grammar signals as support for reading the passage, not as a replacement for context.
The broader Scripture connection should remain modest: capacity, room, and receiving the word is visible in the cited passages, while the full theological claim must come from each passage's context rather than from the word alone.
MorphGNT Strong's Dictionary XML — CC0 1.0 Public Domain
Open Scriptures Hebrew Bible (morphhb/OSHB) — CC BY 4.0
Open Scriptures Hebrew Lexicon — CC BY 4.0
Berean Standard Bible (BSB) source-word alignment - CC0 Public Domain