Murderer
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The Greek noun phoneus means a murderer, a person culpable for unlawful killing. Acts uses it for Barabbas, for Stephen's accusation against those who killed the prophets and betrayed Jesus, and for an islanders' hasty conclusion about Paul after a snakebite.
Reader summary
Full entry for φονεύς (G5406) · Open the biblical lexicon
The Greek noun phoneus means a murderer, a person culpable for unlawful killing. Acts uses it for Barabbas, for Stephen's accusation against those who killed the prophets and betrayed Jesus, and for an islanders' hasty conclusion about Paul after a snakebite.
The BSB source-word alignment has 7 aligned rows for this entry. Common renderings include murderers (4), a murderer (3).
The source-word alignment first shows this entry at Matthew 22:7. Its strongest book concentrations include Acts (3), Revelation (2), 1 Peter (1), Matthew (1).
This entry includes 1 verse guide that explain exact original-language forms in context.
The Greek noun phoneus means a murderer, a person culpable for unlawful killing. Acts uses it for Barabbas, for Stephen's accusation against those who killed the prophets and betrayed Jesus, and for an islanders' hasty conclusion about Paul after a snakebite. First Peter distinguishes suffering for allegiance to Christ from punishment for murder and other wrongdoing.
Jesus' parable can call violent characters murderers, and Revelation includes murderers among those facing final exclusion and judgment. The term is morally severe, so it must not be attached to a person merely because a rumor, political slogan, intrusive thought, accident, military association, or unexplained event has produced suspicion. Acts 28 deliberately shows an accusation formed from inadequate evidence and then reversed.
Acts 7 records a specific prophetic confrontation within Israel's story; it must not become an accusation against Jewish people as an ethnic or religious group. A congregation should name proven violence truthfully, protect people at risk, cooperate with lawful investigation, and hold repentance together with justice. Forgiveness does not require survivors to deny facts, surrender safety, or obstruct accountability.
Phoneus identifies a murderer within narrative accusation, legal-moral instruction, parable, and apocalyptic judgment. Evidence, speaker, target, and literary setting distinguish proven culpability, rhetorical confrontation, fictional characterization, premature suspicion, and final moral warning.
You rejected the Holy and Righteous One and asked that a murderer be released to you.
Peter contrasts the rejected Holy and Righteous One with the murderer the crowd requested for release.
Which of the prophets did your fathers fail to persecute? They even killed those who foretold the coming of the Righteous One. And now you are His betrayers and murderers—
Stephen confronts his council hearers as betrayers and murderers after recounting resistance to God's messengers.
When the islanders saw the creature hanging from his hand, they said to one another, “Surely this man is a murderer. Although he was saved from the sea, Justice has not allowed him to live.”
The islanders infer that Paul is a murderer from the snakebite before later revising their conclusion.
Indeed, none of you should suffer as a murderer or thief or wrongdoer, or even as a meddler.
Peter says believers must not suffer because they committed murder, theft, wrongdoing, or meddling.
The king was enraged, and he sent his troops to destroy those murderers and burn their city.
In Jesus' wedding-banquet parable, the enraged king sends troops against servants' murderers and their city.
But to the cowardly and unbelieving and abominable and murderers and sexually immoral and sorcerers and idolaters and all liars, their place will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur. This is the second death.”
Revelation includes murderers among those assigned to the second death in the lake of fire.
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.
Verse-level guides showing how this original-language form works in its specific context, including grammar, verse function, and guarded interpretation.
Greek word. One who unlawfully kills another person; distinct from lawful execution or warfare.
Textus Receptus witness, full corpusGreek token appearances from Scrivener 1894 Textus Receptus in the full New Testament corpus.
7 Greek text appearances shown. Linked morphology labels have verse guides.
a murderer
Read versea murderer
Read versea murderer
Read versea murderer
Read versea murderer
Read versea murderer
Read versea murderer
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.
φονεύς is built from this root:
Phoneus demands both moral clarity and evidential restraint. Acts 3 places a murderer released while the Holy and Righteous One is rejected, sharpening Peter's announcement of Jesus and call to repentance. Acts 7 records Stephen's direct accusation against the council hearing him after a long covenant-history argument. The speech confronts particular hearers and patterns of resistance; it does not assign inherited collective guilt to Jewish people.
Acts 28 then supplies an important contrast. Islanders see a snake hanging from Paul and immediately decide that Justice has exposed a murderer. When he remains unharmed, their interpretation reverses just as quickly. The narrative exposes how confident moral conclusions can outrun evidence. First Peter refuses to let criminal suffering be renamed Christian persecution, so believers must not shield a murderer with religious status.
Matthew 22's murderers belong to a parable and its royal judgment scene, not a civil code for churches. Revelation's final warning entrusts ultimate judgment to God. Faithful application reports credible threats, protects potential victims, preserves evidence, cooperates with lawful authorities, refuses mob labeling, and offers spiritual care without promising immunity from consequences.
Acts.28.4
Phoneus transliterates Greek φονεύς. It is an agent noun for a person who murders, not the name of an accidental event or a general adjective for someone disliked; case and number identify its role in accusation, instruction, parable, or judgment list.
The Old Testament prohibits murder, distinguishes intentional killing from accidental death, provides refuge procedures, and condemns bloodguilt through Hebrew vocabulary. Those legal and moral distinctions illuminate phoneus, while New Testament passages retain their own speakers, audiences, and redemptive setting.