A "tooth"
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This Greek noun names a tooth or teeth. The larger expression gives it significance: Matthew 5:38 includes it in the eye-for-eye and tooth-for-tooth saying, Acts 7:54 describes the Sanhedrin's angry gnashing at Stephen, and Mark 9:18 includes teeth in a father's account of his son's distress.
Reader summary
Full entry for ὀδούς (G3599) · Open the biblical lexicon
This Greek noun names a tooth or teeth. The larger expression gives it significance: Matthew 5:38 includes it in the eye-for-eye and tooth-for-tooth saying, Acts 7:54 describes the Sanhedrin's angry gnashing at Stephen, and Mark 9:18 includes teeth in a father's account of his son's distress.
The BSB source-word alignment has 12 aligned rows for this entry. Common renderings include teeth (8), tooth (2), his teeth (1), of teeth (1).
The source-word alignment first shows this entry at Matthew 5:38. Its strongest book concentrations include Matthew (8), Acts (1), Luke (1), Mark (1).
This Greek noun names a tooth or teeth. The larger expression gives it significance: Matthew 5:38 includes it in the eye-for-eye and tooth-for-tooth saying, Acts 7:54 describes the Sanhedrin's angry gnashing at Stephen, and Mark 9:18 includes teeth in a father's account of his son's distress. Revelation 9:8 uses teeth like those of lions within a visionary description. The body part is concrete, but its presence does not make these scenes identical.
Jesus also speaks of weeping and gnashing of teeth in warnings about judgment and exclusion, including Matthew 8:12 and Luke 13:28. Those warnings have serious force in their own arguments; the noun alone does not provide a complete description of the afterlife. Likewise, Mark's account identifies a spirit harming the boy, but that narrative cannot be used as a diagnostic rule for someone with similar bodily symptoms today. Read the action, speaker and genre around the noun before proposing a theological or practical conclusion.
An injury saying, hostile gnashing, a distressed child's symptoms, judgment warnings and visionary lionlike teeth show the importance of the phrase surrounding the body-part noun.
You have heard that it was said, ‘Eye for eye and tooth for tooth.’
Jesus quotes the eye-for-eye and tooth-for-tooth saying before teaching His hearers about their response to injury. Follow the argument rather than detaching the body part as permission for private revenge.
On hearing this, the members of the Sanhedrin were enraged, and they gnashed their teeth at him.
The named Sanhedrin members are enraged and gnash their teeth at Stephen. The description exposes these hearers' hostility and must not be expanded into a claim about Jewish people generally.
Whenever it seizes him, it throws him to the ground. He foams at the mouth, gnashes his teeth, and becomes rigid. I asked Your disciples to drive it out, but they were unable.”
The father describes his son's distress and the disciples' inability to help. Mark identifies a spirit within this narrative, and the account continues to Jesus' deliverance and lifting of the boy; it does not classify every present bodily condition.
But the sons of the kingdom will be thrown into the outer darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.”
The warning about weeping and gnashing follows the centurion's faith and the promised gathering at the patriarchs' banquet. Presumed belonging is challenged without removing Abraham, Isaac and Jacob from that kingdom scene.
There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth when you see Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and all the prophets in the kingdom of God, but you yourselves are thrown out.
The warning names exclusion even among people claiming familiarity with the teacher. The following gathering from every direction reinforces the summons to respond rather than rely on proximity alone.
They had hair like that of women, and teeth like those of lions.
Teeth like those of lions are part of the locust vision's series of comparisons. The simile should be read as stated instead of converted into a biological description of ordinary creatures.
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. Literal tooth; metaphorically, gnashing of teeth signals anguish and judgment in eschatological contexts.
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.
a tooth
Read versea tooth
Read versea tooth
Read versea tooth
Read versea tooth
Read versea tooth
Read versea tooth
Read versea tooth
Read versea tooth
Read versea tooth
Read versea tooth
Read versea tooth
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 5 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 3 selected witnesses from 12 lexical occurrence verses.
ὀδούς 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.
Acts 7:54 describes a response to Stephen's speech: the Sanhedrin members are enraged and gnash their teeth at him. The surrounding narrative then turns to Stephen's vision of Jesus and the violence of those who rush at him. His final appeal to the Lord Jesus and prayer concerning his attackers keep attention on the actual people, acts and testimony in the scene. The text exposes hostility without granting a reader permission to condemn a whole ethnic community.
Other uses of teeth require other explanations. Mark's father is seeking help for a suffering child, Jesus' judgment sayings warn against presumed security, and Revelation's lionlike teeth belong to a vision. A responsible teacher should resist making the noun carry claims that belong, if anywhere, to those larger passages. Its bodily concreteness can make a scene vivid while leaving clinical diagnosis, elaborate afterlife mechanisms and private retaliation outside what the word itself establishes.
Acts.7.54
The noun names the body part; meanings such as rage or the distress of exclusion arise from the verbs and wider expressions. The English phrase gnashing of teeth should therefore be read in each passage rather than treated as one self-explanatory technical label.
Exodus 21:24 and Leviticus 24:20 contain the tooth-for-tooth wording Jesus cites in Matthew 5:38. Reading that explicit verbal connection helps locate His instruction in relation to the stated injury rule. It does not authorize a teacher to prescribe retaliation, settle a modern legal case or require a harmed person to remain exposed to danger.