To gaze intently
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G816 is a Greek verb for looking intently, fixing one's gaze, or examining closely. Acts 3:12 records Peter asking why the crowd stares at him and John as though their own power or godliness made a man walk, redirecting concentrated attention from human agents to the God who glorified Jesus.
Reader summary
Full entry for ἀτενίζω (G816) · Open the biblical lexicon
G816 is a Greek verb for looking intently, fixing one's gaze, or examining closely. Acts 3:12 records Peter asking why the crowd stares at him and John as though their own power or godliness made a man walk, redirecting concentrated attention from human agents to the God who glorified Jesus.
The BSB source-word alignment has 14 aligned rows for this entry. Common renderings include looked directly (3), looked intently (3), [Cornelius] stared (1), do you stare (1), fixed on (1).
The source-word alignment first shows this entry at Luke 4:20. Its strongest book concentrations include Acts (10), 2 Corinthians (2), Luke (2).
G816 is a Greek verb for looking intently, fixing one's gaze, or examining closely. Acts 3:12 records Peter asking why the crowd stares at him and John as though their own power or godliness made a man walk, redirecting concentrated attention from human agents to the God who glorified Jesus. Luke 4:20 shows every eye in the synagogue fixed on Jesus after He reads Isaiah, preparing for His announcement that the Scripture is fulfilled.
Acts 7:55 portrays Stephen, full of the Holy Spirit, looking into heaven and seeing God's glory and Jesus standing at God's right hand amid violent opposition. Other uses describe careful observation, direct courtroom attention, fearful staring, recognition, and faces under public scrutiny. G816 opens attention, witness, discernment, power, spectacle, fear, and courage.
It corrects personality-centered ministry and the misuse of intense observation as proof that an observer understands another person's body, faith, motives, or needs.
G816 names sustained or concentrated visual attention. A person may gaze at Jesus, heaven, another speaker, a startling vision, a disabled man, an accused witness, or a radiant face. The gaze can be receptive, fearful, discerning, accusatory, or misdirected.
And when Peter saw this, he addressed the people: “Men of Israel, why are you surprised by this? Why do you stare at us as if by our own power or godliness we had made this man walk?
Peter challenges a crowd's stare and denies that human power or piety produced the man's healing.
Then He rolled up the scroll, returned it to the attendant, and sat down. The eyes of everyone in the synagogue were fixed on Him,
The synagogue fixes its attention on Jesus after the Isaiah reading and before His fulfillment announcement.
But Stephen, full of the Holy Spirit, looked intently into heaven and saw the glory of God and Jesus standing at the right hand of God.
Stephen looks into heaven and sees God's glory and the exalted Jesus while facing lethal hostility.
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 gaze intently
(ἀτενής, strained, intent; τείνω), [in LXX: I Est.6:28, 3Ma.2:26 * ;] to look fixedly, gaze (MM, see word): with dative of person(s), gaze upon: Luk.4:20 22:56, Act.3:12 10:4 14:9 23:1; before εἰς, with accusative of person(s), Act.3:4 6:15 13:9; metaphorically, Act.1:10 7:55 11:6, 2Co.3:7 3:13.
Textus Receptus witness, full corpusGreek token appearances from Scrivener 1894 Textus Receptus in the full New Testament corpus.
14 Greek text appearances shown. Linked morphology labels have verse guides.
I direct my gaze, look steadily
Read verseI direct my gaze, look steadily
Read verseI direct my gaze, look steadily
Read verseI direct my gaze, look steadily
Read verseI direct my gaze, look steadily
Read verseI direct my gaze, look steadily
Read verseI direct my gaze, look steadily
Read verseI direct my gaze, look steadily
Read verseI direct my gaze, look steadily
Read verseI direct my gaze, look steadily
Read verseI direct my gaze, look steadily
Read verseI direct my gaze, look steadily
Read verseI direct my gaze, look steadily
Read verseI direct my gaze, look steadily
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 verb appears across 12 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)
ἀτενίζω is built from this root:
G816 shows that attention can honor truth or distort it. In Acts 3 the healed man's public presence draws astonished eyes toward Peter and John. Peter immediately refuses the interpretation that their private power or godliness explains what happened. Faithful ministers redirect fascination toward Jesus and refuse to make another person's body proof of their status.
Luke 4 presents concentrated listening at a decisive scriptural moment, while Stephen's upward gaze locates courage in God's glory when hostile leaders are closing in. Elsewhere, direct looking can support careful observation or become scrutiny of an accused and vulnerable person. Churches need an ethics of attention. People should be listened to without being stared at, photographed, diagnosed, or turned into illustrations without consent.
Leaders should accept examination without cultivating celebrity surveillance of everyone else. Concentration is valuable when it serves presence, evidence, prayer, and truthful response. It becomes harmful when the observer claims mastery over another person or when spectacle eclipses the Lord to whom witness points.
Acts.3.12
G816 denotes a strained or intent gaze and can take a person directly or a prepositional phrase naming the object of attention. The verb describes intensity of looking, not by itself the accuracy or morality of the observer's conclusion.
Prophets and worshipers look toward God's acts and glory, while Scripture also warns against judging by outward appearance. In the Gospels and Acts, attention centers on Jesus and witness, yet observers repeatedly need their interpretations corrected.