There are two Greek words kainos and neos translated in our New Testament by the word new. Kainos is new in kind and in contrast to what previously existed, so taking the place thereof. In that sense kainos looks backward, while its synonym neos looks forward. Kainos is equivalent to not yet having been: neos is not having long been. The conjunction of the two words occurs in Matt. 9:17. Luke 5:38, where new (neos) wine is put into new (kainos) skins and both are presented. Kainos looks backward (retrospective) in that the skins had never been used before, opposed to those which had lost their strength and elasticity through age: the new (neos) wine was of that vintage or harvest looking forward (prospective) for future use. In Luke 5:36 a new piece of cloth (kainos) is opposite to old garment. This receives emphasis in Mark 2:21 where the new unmilled piece of cloth was unsuited to patch the old, for even then the new by the grace of God was being wrought out; not for the old garment of a legal system or for the first man, but for those who by virtue of divine power were fitted to receive the blessing. In Matt. 27:60, the new (kainos) tomb had never been made ceremonially unclean by a dead body. It might have been hewn out of the rock years before, therefore it is not called neos. In Heb. 12:24, a new (neos) covenant is fresh and perennially new by virtue of the link with its mediator Jesus, looking forward it will retain eternally that youthful character. While kainos is the word mostly used for New Covenant, neos is the word here, but not in contrast to the old; it is not the old, but what God had recently given.
Posted on: Tue, 21 Oct 2014 18:09:23 +0000
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