Some time ago, I bought a reverse interlinear New Testament. The day I got it our half-French, half-greek intern (David!!) at our office pointed out the different types of the Greek word ‘love’ is used when Jesus spoke with Peter on the shores of the Galilee after His resurrection (John 21:15-19).
A quick summary of the passage:
After eating Jesus asks Peter: “Do you love me more than these?”
Peter: “Lord, you know that I love you.”
Jesus: “Then feed my sheep.”
Repeat the 3 lines above three times.
Looking into it myself later, I discovered that not only were there different types of ‘love’ used by Jesus, Peter answered with a different type of love too. Not only that, when Jesus responded back with the command to feed His sheep, He asked Peter in different ways.
So here it is again, with the actual greek word inserted for love and feed:
Round 1
Jesus: “Do you agapas me more than these?”
Peter: “Lord, you know that I philo you.”
Jesus: “Then boske my sheep.”
Round 2
Jesus: “Do you agapas me?”
Peter: “Lord, you know that I philo you.”
Jesus: “Then poimaine my sheep.”
Round 3
Jesus: “Do you phileis me?”
Peter: “Lord, you know that I philo you.”
Jesus: “Then boske my sheep.”
Before continuing, looking into all this reminded me of when I was a young teenager. The pastor of the small church my family went to gave a sermon about this. I don’t remember much about it, but what I remember was he saying that he heard there were different types of the word “love” used in the passage then proceeded to explain what they were, and didn’t really go back to its significance in the text. I also remember Him not sounding too sure if there really were different words used. Am not trying to bash the pastor – I remember him being a great guy – what I am trying to say is that reading the text again with an interlinear Bible and seeing the original Greek next to the English words gave me joy and excitement in discovering treasure in the Bible. I really enjoyed discovering it by ‘myself.’ Also, I never really studied the Bible by myself in this way before and am really hoping God will speak and teach me as I do this.
ok, back to the topic on hand…
So what do these Greek words mean?
Love Words
agapas: To prefer, a discriminating affection which involves choice and selection. To love in a social or moral sense, to take pleasure in, long for; denotes the love of reason, esteem. (agapaó)
philo: love of friendship, regard with affection, to show warm affection in intimate friendship, to be friendly to. (phileó)
phileis: same as philo.
Sheep Words
boske: feed (graze). The stress of this word is on feeding. (boskó)
poimaine: To act as a shepherd, to shepherd, caring for (protecting) the flock. (poimainó)
(Am no Biblical or Greek scholar, so I may miss the actual literal meanings by miles!)
Something I find interesting is how Jesus asked Peter twice if he agapas Him and Peter answered that he philo Jesus. I feel that Jesus asking if Peter loved him with the ‘bigger, grander’ type of love and Peter answering with a ‘smaller, not as big’ kind of love shows such a picture of the state that Peter is in at the time. After all of his big talk, failing (denying) Jesus, not seeing Him for awhile – Peter really misses Jesus and wants things to be like ‘old times’ yet he’s so ashamed and broken at the same time. He wants to be close and back in Jesus’ inner-circle of three, yet he feels so unworthy of the honor. He’s extremely humbled by everything, such that he’s no longer doing the big talk, overstating his abilities and over-zealous; now he’s careful of his words and choosing not to overstate anything, he’s purposefully keeping himself small. He’s at such a loss for the forgivess and welcome-ness of Jesus.
It’s also interesting that in the 3rd round, Jesus went down a level and asked Peter if he phileis Him. To me, it just shows how Jesus came down to be fully human (and still fully God) and put on all human weakness and frailties for our sake. Jesus asking Peter in the 3rd round, seems like the “forgiveness, because I love you” round. The feeling reminds me of times when I’ve played with children after winning or going even with them, that I then ‘go easy’ and let them win because I love them and want to see them smile. I don’t know if that’s what Jesus had in mind, but it’s what comes to me with all the forgiveness and humbling going on in the scene.
The deeper meanings of the “love” words truly paint a colorful and character-ful portait of what’s going on, so much more than just using the same word “love” over and over.
I don’t have as many thoughts about the sheep words. It is interesting that two different words were used: one ‘to feed,’ the other ‘to care for.’ Those are the two main roles in caring for someone/some pet. One can’t truly pastor a flock without doing both. I can’t think of what the signifigance might be with the different ‘love’ words. Perhaps because ‘feeding’ is mentioned twice it is more important than the caring. That might be, since one needs to be dependent on God and not dependent on a pastor/shepherd. Being fed the Word of God leads to more relationship with God. Anyway, I might update this in the future if God gives me more insight into what the significance of this might be.