Stumbling block
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G4625 names a stumbling block, trap, obstacle, or cause of falling. Its fifteen governed forms describe causes of sin and lawlessness, Peter's resistance to Jesus' path, dangers through which people fall, teaching that leads into idolatry and sexual immorality, obstacles placed before another believer, and divisions contrary to received teaching.
Reader summary
Full entry for σκάνδαλον (G4625) · Open the biblical lexicon
G4625 names a stumbling block, trap, obstacle, or cause of falling. Its fifteen governed forms describe causes of sin and lawlessness, Peter's resistance to Jesus' path, dangers through which people fall, teaching that leads into idolatry and sexual immorality, obstacles placed before another believer, and divisions contrary to received teaching.
The BSB source-word alignment has 15 aligned rows for this entry. Common renderings include a stumbling block (4), of offense (2), stumbling blocks (2), [they] (1), cause of sin (1).
The source-word alignment first shows this entry at Matthew 13:41. Its strongest book concentrations include Matthew (5), Romans (4), 1 Corinthians (1), 1 John (1).
G4625 names a stumbling block, trap, obstacle, or cause of falling. Its fifteen governed forms describe causes of sin and lawlessness, Peter's resistance to Jesus' path, dangers through which people fall, teaching that leads into idolatry and sexual immorality, obstacles placed before another believer, and divisions contrary to received teaching. The noun also describes the crucified Messiah or cross as an offense to expectations and appears in Scripture citations about a stone of stumbling and a table becoming a trap. Context determines whether the obstacle is sinful conduct, a moral trap, or resistance to God's saving work.
The cross as a stumbling block must not be confused with avoidable harm caused by Christian speech or behavior. Paul refuses to remove Christ crucified from the gospel, yet he also commands believers not to place an obstacle in another person's way. Jesus pronounces woe on the person through whom stumbling comes. A claim to biblical offense cannot sanctify cruelty, manipulation, abuse, reckless liberty, misinformation, inaccessible practice, or failure to protect vulnerable people.
Israel-related uses require explicit care. Paul's statements about Jews and Gentiles in 1 Corinthians 1, the stone in Romans 9, the table in Romans 11, and the citation in 1 Peter 2 cannot support contempt, collective blame, antisemitism, or violence. Romans warns Gentile believers against arrogance, and the cross confronts every human claim to wisdom or status. Pastoral accountability should identify observable teaching and conduct, protect children and adults at risk, distinguish allegation from finding, preserve fair process, and never blame the person harmed for another's stumbling block.
Fifteen governed forms distinguish sinful traps and obstacles from the offense encountered when the crucified Messiah contradicts human expectations.
Woe to the man through whom they come
The presence of stumbling blocks does not erase the responsibility of those who create them.
Not to put any stumbling block or obstacle
Christian freedom is limited by love for another believer's faithful participation.
Christ crucified, a stumbling block
The crucified Messiah confronts demanded signs and human wisdom without excusing harmful Christian behavior.
To place a stumbling block before the Israelites
Teaching becomes a trap when it directs people into idolatry and sexual immorality.
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. An obstacle causing spiritual failure or offense, especially the stumbling block of Christ's crucifixion.
Textus Receptus witness, full corpus Greek token appearances from Scrivener 1894 Textus Receptus in the full New Testament corpus.
15 Greek text appearances shown. Linked morphology labels have verse guides.
a snare, stumbling-block
Read versea snare, stumbling-block
Read versea snare, stumbling-block
Read versea snare, stumbling-block
Read versea snare, stumbling-block
Read versea snare, stumbling-block
Read versea snare, stumbling-block
Read versea snare, stumbling-block
Read versea snare, stumbling-block
Read versea snare, stumbling-block
Read versea snare, stumbling-block
Read versea snare, stumbling-block
Read versea snare, stumbling-block
Read versea snare, stumbling-block
Read versea snare, stumbling-block
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 15 lexical occurrence verses.
σκάνδαλον is built from this root:
Describes traps that lead others into sin.
Love preserves stability and guards against moral collapse, while hatred fosters blindness.
Compound and idiomatic phrases that include this word. Follow a link to study the phrase and how its parts work together.
A faithful church does not aim to be inoffensive at any cost, and it does not celebrate being offensive. It proclaims Christ crucified even when that message overturns pride and expectation. At the same time, it removes obstacles created by sin, distorted teaching, contempt, coercion, inaccessible practice, and selfish use of freedom. Matthew 18 and Luke 17 preserve responsibility for those through whom stumbling comes, especially where vulnerable people are concerned.
Romans 14 makes love relevant to liberty without granting a controlling person permanent veto power. Romans 16 does not turn honest correction or reporting into divisiveness. The pastoral question is therefore concrete: Is resistance directed at the scriptural message of Christ crucified, or at preventable harm attached to our manner, policy, prejudice, secrecy, or conduct?
Evidence, listening, repentance, protection, and fair accountability help answer that question.
Rom.14.13
The fifteen neuter-noun forms include four accusative singulars, four nominative singulars, two genitive singulars, four accusative plurals, and one genitive plural. Matthew 18:7 contains three forms. Number and case organize each clause; they do not decide whether a stumbling block is sinful or whether people are stumbling over God's work.
The New Testament draws on Isaiah's stone imagery and the Psalms' trap language. Leviticus 19:14 forbids placing a stumbling block before a blind person, grounding the metaphor in concrete protection rather than contempt for disability.
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