What does φορτίον (phortíon) mean in the Bible?
G5413 is a noun for a load, cargo, or burden, something a person or vessel carries. Its six governed forms occur in five verses.
Greek · G5413
φορτίον
Burden
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φορτίον G5413
Pronunciation phortíon
What does φορτίον (phortíon) mean in the Bible?
G5413 is a noun for a load, cargo, or burden, something a person or vessel carries. Its six governed forms occur in five verses.
Reader summary
Full entry for φορτίον (G5413) · Open the biblical lexicon
Questions this entry answers
How does the BSB render G5413?
The BSB source-word alignment has 6 aligned rows for this entry. Common renderings include load (2), [with] heavy burdens (1), burden (1), cargo (1), loads (1).
Where does φορτίον (phortíon) appear in Scripture?
The source-word alignment first shows this entry at Matthew 11:30. Its strongest book concentrations include Luke (2), Matthew (2), Acts (1), Galatians (1).
What This Word Actually Means
G5413 is a noun for a load, cargo, or burden, something a person or vessel carries. Its six governed forms occur in five verses. Acts 27:10 refers to a ship's cargo. Galatians 6:5 speaks of each person carrying their own load after calling for honest self-examination. Matthew 11:30 describes Jesus' burden as light, while Matthew 23:4 and Luke 11:46 condemn named leaders who place heavy loads on others and refuse to help.
Galatians 6:2 uses a different burden noun, G922, and supplies important nearby context for mutual care, but the two nouns do not establish a fixed lexical rule in which one always means a manageable personal duty and the other always means a crushing burden. The passages, their modifiers, and their arguments must govern the distinction. Teachers should preserve both personal responsibility and shared care without using Galatians 6:5 to abandon people under grief, disability, poverty, trauma, abuse, or spiritual crisis.
Jesus' light burden must not be used to claim that faithful people will feel little pain or require no practical help.
How the Bible Uses It
Six G5413 forms in five verses refer to ship cargo, an individual's load, Jesus' light burden, and heavy obligations imposed by leaders who will not help carry them. The noun itself does not determine whether a load is just, manageable, oppressive, material, or figurative.
- Gal.6.5
For each one should carry his own load.
Paul follows the command to restore gently and carry one another's burdens with a warning against self-deception and comparison. Each person must examine their own work and carry their own load. The verse establishes personal responsibility inside a community of mutual care, not independence from that care.
- Matt.11.30
For My yoke is easy and My burden is light.”
Jesus identifies his burden as light within his invitation to learn from him because he is gentle and humble in heart. The text grounds rest in Jesus' character and invitation; it does not explicitly say that he shares one side of the yoke or promise a pain-free life.
- Acts.27.10
Men, I can see that our voyage will be filled with disaster and great loss, not only to ship and cargo, but to our own lives as well.
The noun refers directly to the ship's cargo. This material use prevents the lexical field from being reduced to spiritual or psychological burdens.
- Matt.23.4
They tie up heavy, burdensome loads and lay them on men’s shoulders, but they themselves are not willing to lift a finger to move them.
Jesus addresses scribes and Pharisees who tie up heavy loads for others while refusing to help move them. The charge concerns hypocritical leadership in this scene and must not be generalized to Jewish people or Judaism.
- Luke.11.46
“Woe to you as well, experts in the law!” He replied. “For you weigh men down with heavy burdens, but you yourselves will not lift a finger to lighten their load.
Jesus condemns experts in the law who load people with burdens and do not help. The rebuke exposes leaders who impose obligations without sharing their cost; it is not a verdict on an ethnicity, every legal teacher, or an entire religious tradition.
Source Word Evidence
BSB source-word alignment connects this entry to exact verse rows, English rendering, source form, transliteration, and parsing.
How English Renders It load 2× Luke 11:46, Galatians 6:5
[with] heavy burdens 1× Luke 11:46
burden 1× Matthew 11:30
cargo 1× Acts 27:10
loads 1× Matthew 23:4
Show sample aligned rows
Matthew 11:30 φορτίον to burden Noun - Nominative Neuter Singular Matthew 23:4 φορτία to loads Noun - Accusative Neuter Plural Luke 11:46 φορτία to [with] heavy burdens Noun - Accusative Neuter Plural Luke 11:46 φορτίοις to load Noun - Dative Neuter Plural Acts 27:10 φορτίου to cargo Noun - Genitive Neuter Singular Galatians 6:5 φορτίον to load Noun - Accusative Neuter Singular
Usage map
A compact distribution from source-word alignment before the full evidence tables.
First aligned row Matthew 11:30
Aligned rows 6
Books represented 4
Matthew 2 Luke 2 Acts 1 Galatians 1
Source forms
φορτία 2x phortia Matthew 23:4, Luke 11:46
φορτίον 2x phortion Matthew 11:30, Galatians 6:5
φορτίοις 1x phortiois Luke 11:46
φορτίου 1x phortiou Acts 27:10
Parsing patterns
Noun - Accusative Neuter Plural 2x Matthew 23:4, Luke 11:46
Noun - Accusative Neuter Singular 1x Galatians 6:5
Noun - Dative Neuter Plural 1x Luke 11:46
Noun - Genitive Neuter Singular 1x Acts 27:10
Noun - Nominative Neuter Singular 1x Matthew 11:30
Using This Word Well
Be careful not to...
- Read Galatians 6:5 inside the paragraph's commands to restore gently and carry one another's burdens. Personal responsibility does not cancel practical care, accessibility, protection, or material help.
- When leaders impose obligations, evaluate whether they share the cost, protect vulnerable people, and make room for truthful reporting rather than treating every burden as divinely required.
- Apply Jesus' light-burden promise without shaming grief, disability, trauma, poverty, mental-health distress, or people who need professional and community support.
Avoid claiming...
- Do not claim that G5413 always means a proper, manageable, or individually assigned responsibility; Acts 27:10, Matthew 23:4, and Luke 11:46 prevent that rule.
- Do not claim that continuing heaviness proves weak faith or disobedience, or that a church may leave suffering people alone under the label of carrying their own load.
Evidence Summary
Greek word. A burden designed to be carried; lighter and more bearable than the heavier βάρος.
Strong's G5413
Lexical occurrences 6 verses Greek text appearances 5 times Word forms 5 forms 6 references Verse guides 0 guides
Study link Luke 11:45–54 Source Gloss
burden
Extended definition Source: STEPBible TBESG + Abbott-Smith
A burden designed to be carried; lighter and more bearable than the heavier βάρος.
(dimin. of φόρτος), [in LXX chiefly for מַשָּׂא ;] a burden, load: of the cargo of a ship (Hdt., al.), Act.27:10; metaphorically, Mat.11:30 23:4, Luk.11:46, Gal.6:5.
Synonymsβάρος (which see), ὄγκος
Greek Text Appearances
Textus Receptus witness, full corpus Greek token appearances from Scrivener 1894 Textus Receptus in the full New Testament corpus.
5 Greek text appearances shown. Linked morphology labels have verse guides.
Matthew 11:30 Noun Nominative Singular Neuter
φορτίον fortion
a burden, freight
Read verse Matthew 23:4 Noun Accusative Plural Neuter
φορτία fortia
a burden, freight
Read verse Luke 11:46 Noun Accusative Plural Neuter
φορτία fortia
a burden, freight
Read verse Luke 11:46 Noun Dative Plural Neuter
φορτίοις. fortioiv
a burden, freight
Read verse Galatians 6:5 Noun Accusative Singular Neuter
φορτίον fortion
a burden, freight
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.
Grammatical Forms
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.
Form patterns 5 Aligned forms 6 Case pattern Accusative (3) Number pattern Plural (3)
Verse guides are not available for this word yet, so verse references remain plain evidence markers.
Nominative · Singular · Neuter Matt 11:30 1×
Genitive · Singular · Neuter Acts 27:10 1×
Dative · Plural · Neuter Luke 11:46 1×
Accusative · Plural · Neuter Matt 23:4 · Luke 11:46 2×
Accusative · Singular · Neuter Gal 6:5 1×
Selected Scripture Witnesses
Selected passage-level study witnesses for this word. This section is not the full occurrence list.
Additional Occurrences
Luke 11:45–54 φορτία phortíon
Burdens, loads
New Testament Witnesses
burdens
Showing 2 selected witnesses from 6 lexical occurrence verses.
Word Origins
φορτίον is built from this root:
φόρτος G5414
Why This Word Matters
Represents oppressive legal demands.
Part of These Phrases
Compound and idiomatic phrases that include this word. Follow a link to study the phrase and how its parts work together.
For the Preacher and Teacher
G5413 receives its force from the particular load and the sentence around it. In Acts it is cargo at risk in a storm. In Galatians it names the load each person carries while examining their own work, within the same paragraph that commands gentle restoration and mutual burden-bearing. In Matthew and Luke it exposes leaders who impose heavy obligations and refuse assistance.
Jesus, by contrast, calls the weary to learn from his gentle and humble character and says his burden is light. These uses support accountable discipleship, practical care, and scrutiny of leadership without creating a categorical semantic contrast between G5413 and G922. Teachers must not turn personal responsibility into abandonment, leader-imposed burdens into divine commands, or Jesus' promise into blame for people whose suffering remains heavy.
Anchor passage
Gal.6.5
Doctrinal connections
- Acts 27:10 - material cargo confirms that the noun is not inherently a spiritual burden.
- Galatians 6:1-5 - gentle restoration, mutual burden-bearing, self-examination, and one's own load belong to one pastoral argument.
- Matthew 11:28-30 - Jesus invites the weary to learn from his gentle and humble character and calls his burden light.
- Matthew 23:4 - named leaders are condemned for imposing heavy loads while refusing assistance.
- Luke 11:46 - experts in the law receive the parallel rebuke for loading others without helping.
- G922 in Galatians 6:2 - a related burden noun provides contextual comparison but does not establish a universal heavy-versus-manageable lexical binary.
The six governed forms include singular and plural noun forms. Modifiers and contexts determine the load's character: cargo can be endangered, a personal load can be carried, Jesus' burden can be light, and leader-imposed loads can be heavy. Word history does not justify treating every G5413 load as small or manageable, nor every occurrence of G922 as crushing.
From Old to New Testament
Israel's Scriptures repeatedly distinguish material loads, assigned responsibilities, oppressive burdens, and God's sustaining care. Those themes can illuminate the New Testament passages, but they do not replace the immediate evidence for G5413 or prove that every burden image works identically.
Sources
MorphGNT Strong's Dictionary XML — CC0 1.0 Public Domain
Open Scriptures Hebrew Bible (morphhb/OSHB) — CC BY 4.0
Open Scriptures Hebrew Lexicon — CC BY 4.0
Berean Standard Bible (BSB) source-word alignment - CC0 Public Domain