Favoritism
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Prosopolepsia names favoritism or partiality, especially judgment that changes according to a person’s status, appearance, power, wealth, or usefulness. Its four New Testament occurrences place the issue before God’s impartial judgment, the accountability of earthly masters, the certainty that wrongdoing will be repaid, and the church’s treatment of rich and poor.
Reader summary
Full entry for προσωποληψία (G4382) · Open the biblical lexicon
Prosopolepsia names favoritism or partiality, especially judgment that changes according to a person’s status, appearance, power, wealth, or usefulness. Its four New Testament occurrences place the issue before God’s impartial judgment, the accountability of earthly masters, the certainty that wrongdoing will be repaid, and the church’s treatment of rich.
The BSB source-word alignment has 4 aligned rows for this entry. Common renderings include favoritism (4).
The source-word alignment first shows this entry at Romans 2:11. Its strongest book concentrations include Colossians (1), Ephesians (1), James (1), Romans (1).
Prosopolepsia names favoritism or partiality, especially judgment that changes according to a person’s status, appearance, power, wealth, or usefulness. Its four New Testament occurrences place the issue before God’s impartial judgment, the accountability of earthly masters, the certainty that wrongdoing will be repaid, and the church’s treatment of rich and poor.
The word does not forbid every distinction of office, responsibility, maturity, need, or conduct. It condemns respect of persons that bends truth and righteousness for advantage. Pastorally, it exposes both visible preference and quieter systems that grant honor, access, patience, or protection according to worldly measures. Faithful application begins with God’s character and the lordship of Christ, then examines how congregations, households, leaders, and individual believers evaluate and treat people.
Prosopolepsia names favoritism that bends judgment or treatment according to a person’s face, status, or advantage. Its New Testament uses place human conduct under God’s impartial lordship.
For God does not show favoritism.
Paul grounds the statement in God’s righteous judgment of both Jew and Gentile. Divine impartiality serves universal accountability rather than moral indifference.
And masters, do the same for your slaves. Give up your use of threats, because you know that He who is both their Master and yours is in heaven, and there is no favoritism with Him.
Earthly masters stand under the same heavenly Master as those beneath their authority. God’s impartiality forbids threatening abuse and status-based exemption.
Whoever does wrong will be repaid for his wrong, and there is no favoritism.
Paul places every wrongdoer under divine accountability. Position cannot shield a person from the Lord’s just assessment.
My brothers, as you hold out your faith in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ, do not show favoritism.
James declares favoritism incompatible with faith in the Lord of glory. The following assembly scene exposes preference for wealth and contempt for the poor.
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. Unjust bias showing partiality to some persons over others based on external status or appearance.
Textus Receptus witness, full corpus Greek token appearances from Scrivener 1894 Textus Receptus in the full New Testament corpus.
4 Greek text appearances shown. Linked morphology labels have verse guides.
partiality, favoritism
Read versepartiality, favoritism
Read versepartiality, favoritism
Read versepartiality, favoritism
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.
Representative Scripture witnesses for this entry: passage, original form, and sense in context.
προσωποληψία is built from this root:
Identifies discrimination rooted in external status, which contradicts gospel faith. Acts 10:24-48
Peter affirms that God does not grant salvation based on ethnic status. James 2:1–7
Compound and idiomatic phrases that include this word. Follow a link to study the phrase and how its parts work together.
Prosopolepsia exposes a contradiction between confession and treatment. Romans 2 declares that God judges without favoritism, so neither covenant privilege nor moral comparison provides shelter from His righteous assessment. Ephesians 6 and Colossians 3 bring household power under the heavenly Master, removing any idea that status excuses threats or wrongdoing.
James 2 carries the issue into the gathered church: honoring the wealthy visitor while humiliating the poor is incompatible with faith in the Lord of glory and violates the royal law of neighbor-love. Biblical impartiality is not blindness to truth, need, office, or conduct. It is refusal to bend righteousness because of face, influence, wealth, ethnicity, usefulness, or fear.
Faithful teaching moves from God’s character to honest examination of welcome, discipline, leadership, care, access, and honor among His people.
Jas.2.1
Prosopolepsia is a noun formed around the idea of receiving or regarding a face, an idiom for judging by outward standing or personal advantage. The local BSB source-word table contains four aligned occurrences, all represented here. The passages define the moral issue through divine judgment, authority, and assembly conduct.
The law forbids partiality toward either rich or poor in judgment and confesses that the Lord shows no partiality. The New Testament applies that same character of God to final judgment, household authority, and church practice under Christ. Grace creates a people who honor others without selling justice to status.
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