Bible Encyclopedia: Purge

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International Standard Bible Encyclopedia

PURGE

purj: A number of words in both the Old Testament and the New Testament are so rendered in the King James Version and the Revised Version (British and American), although frequently in the Revised Version (British and American) the older English word "purge" is displaced by the more applicable modern terms "cleanse" and "purify," since the emphatic and medical senses of the word, as we now use it, are not justified by some of the Hebrew and Greek originals. In older English the word was broader in meaning, today it is specific. Occurrences in the King James Version, with the changes made in the Revised Version (British and American), are as follows:

1. In the Old Testament:

(1) Taber, literally, "to be clean," used of the putting-away of idolatry from Judah by Josiah (2 Chronicles 34:3, 8), is translated "purge" in all VSS, but, in Ezekiel 24:13, the American Standard Revised Version changes to "cleanse."

(2) chaTa', literally, "to make a sin offering" (Psalm 51:7): is changed without improvement to "purify" in the American Standard Revised Version, while "purge" is retained in the English Revised Version.

(3) kaphar, "to cover" or "to make atonement," occurs in Psalm 65:3; Psalm 79:9 Ezekiel 43:20, 26; in the two passages in Psalms, the Revised Version (British and American) has "forgive" (the "expiate" of the margin is still better), and in Ezekiel the even more accurate "make atonement." In both

(4) tsaraph, "to refine" (Isaiah 1:25), and

(5) duach, literally, "to rinse" (Isaiah 4:4), "purge" is well retained in the Revised Version (British and American).

(6) barar, literally, "to be shining," the Revised Version (British and American) retains in Ezekiel 20:38, but in Daniel 11:35 changes to "purify."

(7) zaqaq, "to pour down" as molten metal (Malachi 3:3), also becomes "purify" in the Revised Version (British and American).

These occurrences are all in the figurative sense, and apply to sin, uncleanness, idolatry, etc. Most noteworthy is the American Standard Revised Version change of the familiar Psalm 51:7.

2. In the New Testament:

The Greek words rendered "purge" in the King James Version of the Apocrypha and New Testament are kathairo, and katharizo, and their compounds and derivatives. In all passages except four, the Revised Version (British and American) more properly translates "cleanse" (Matthew 3:12 Mark 7:19 Luke 3:17 John 15:2 Hebrews 9:14, 22; Hebrews 10:2). In Hebrews 1:3 "when he had by himself purged our sins" is changed to "had made purification of." But in the case of the verb compounded with the preps. apo and ek, i.e. apokathairo and ekkathairo (Job 12:9 1 Corinthians 5:7 2 Timothy 2:21), with strong signification to "cleanse out," the Revised Version (British and American) properly retains "purge." Most worthy of note is the change of the familiar verse in John, "Every branch, that beareth fruit, he purgeth" to "Every branch.... he cleanseth" (15:2).

Edward Mack

Greek

1571. ekkathairo -- to cleanse thoroughly
... 1571 (from 1537 , "completely out" and 2513 , "purge, cleanse") -- "cleanse ,
clean " (J. Thayer) with the of deeper sanctification. ... purge out. ...
//strongsnumbers.com/greek2/1571.htm - 7k

1245. diakatharizo -- to cleanse thoroughly
... 1245 (from 1223 , "thoroughly," which intensifies 2511 , "cleanse") -- properly,
cleanse (literally, "purge back-and-forth, all the way across"). ...
//strongsnumbers.com/greek2/1245.htm - 6k

2508. kathairo -- to cleanse
... purge. From katharos; to cleanse, ie (specially) to prune; figuratively, to expiate --
purge. see GREEK katharos. (kathairei) -- 1 Occurrence. 2507, 2508. ...
//strongsnumbers.com/greek2/2508.htm - 6k

2511. katharizo -- to cleanse
... cleanse, purge, purify. From katharos; to cleanse (literally or figuratively) --
(make) clean(-se), purge, purify. see GREEK katharos. ...
//strongsnumbers.com/greek2/2511.htm - 8k

2512. katharismos -- a cleansing
... Cognate: 2512 (a noun derived from 2511 , "to purge") -- , which results from
removing undesirable admixtures (eliminating impurities). ...
//strongsnumbers.com/greek2/2512.htm - 7k

Strong's Hebrew

2891. taher -- to be clean or pure
... 1), pronounce him clean (6), pronounce the clean (1), pronounce clean (2), pronounces
him clean (1), pronouncing it clean (1), pure (2), purge (1), purged (2 ...
/hebrew/2891.htm - 6k

1305. barar -- to purify, select
... root Definition to purify, select NASB Word Usage choice (2), chosen (2), cleanse
(1), pure you show (2), purge (2), purged (1), purified (1), purify (1 ...
/hebrew/1305.htm - 6k

2212. zaqaq -- to refine, purify
... fine, pour down, purge, purify, refine. A primitive root; to strain, (figuratively)
extract, clarify -- fine, pour down, purge, purify, refine. 2211, 2212. ...
/hebrew/2212.htm - 6k

1740. duach -- to rinse, cleanse away by rinsing or washing
... cast out, purge, wash. A primitive root; to thrust away; figuratively, to cleanse --
cast out, purge, wash. 1739, 1740. duach. 1741 . Strong's Numbers.
/hebrew/1740.htm - 6k

6884. tsaraph -- to smelt, refine, test
... cast, refiner, founder, goldsmith, melt, pure, purge away, try. A primitive
root; to fuse (metal), ie Refine (literally or figuratively ...
/hebrew/6884.htm - 6k

3722. kaphar -- to cover over, pacify, make propitiation
... to expiate or condone, to placate or cancel -- appease, make (an atonement, cleanse,
disannul, forgive, be merciful, pacify, pardon, purge (away), put off ...
/hebrew/3722.htm - 5k

2398. chata -- to miss, go wrong, sin
... lead astray, condemn -- bear the blame, cleanse, commit (sin), by fault, harm he
hath done, loss, miss, (make) offend(-er), offer for sin, purge, purify (self ...
/hebrew/2398.htm - 6k

1197a. baar -- to burn, consume
... destroy (1), devoured (1), expelled (1), heated (1), kindle (2), kindled (5), light
(1), make (2), make a clean sweep (1), make fires (1), purge (9), remove (3 ...
/hebrew/1197a.htm - 6k

Library

To the End the Soul May Attain to the Supreme Internal Peace, it ...
... To the end the Soul may attain to the supreme internal peace, it is necessary, that
God purge it after his way, because the exercises and mortifications that ...
/.../the spiritual guide which disentangles the soul/chap vii to the end.htm

That God is not the Cause of Evils.
... If a man therefore purge himself from these, he shall be a vessel unto honour
sanctified, and meet for the master's use, and prepared unto every good work [2611 ...
/.../john/exposition of the orthodox faith/chapter xix that god is not.htm

He Compels to the Perpetration of Horrible Turpitudes.
... give heed to this at least, that if a part of their God is fettered by the copulation
of males and females which they profess to loose and purge by eating it ...
/.../chapter 47 name compels to.htm

Easter Sunday
... Know ye not that a little leaven leaveneth the whole lump? 7 Purge out the old
leaven, that ye may be a new lump, even as ye are unleavened. ...
//christianbookshelf.org/luther/epistle sermons vol ii/easter sunday.htm

2 Timothy ii. 20, 21
... If a man therefore purge himself from these, he shall be a vessel unto honor,
sanctified, and meet for the master's use, and prepared unto every good work.". ...
/.../homily vi 2 timothy ii.htm

They Indeed who Say that Baptism is not to be Repeated...
... If a man therefore purge himself from these, he shall be a vessel unto honor,
sanctified, and meet for the master's use, and prepared unto every good work ...
/.../writings in connection with the donatist controversy /chapter 19 25 they.htm

Good Friday
... the purifying of the flesh: How much more shall the blood of Christ, who through
the eternal Spirit offered himself without spot to God, purge your conscience ...
/.../kingsley/discipline and other sermons/sermon v good friday.htm

Sin Overcoming and Overcome
... VOLUME II: PSALMS LI to CXLV SIN OVERCOMING AND OVERCOME. 'Iniquities prevail against
me: as for our transgressions, Thou shalt purge them away.'"Psalm 65:3. ...
/.../maclaren/expositions of holy scripture j/sin overcoming and overcome.htm

How to Make Use of Christ for Cleansing of us from Our Daily Spots ...
... 6. They would put the work by faith in his hand, who hath best skill to wash a foul
soul, and to purge away all their spots; and by faith pray for and expect ...
/.../brown/christ the way the truth and the life/chapter ix how to make.htm

Acts or Disputation against Fortunatus, the Manichæan.
... Hence it is that here good souls labor, serve, err, are corrupted: that they may
see the need of a liberator, who should purge them from error, loose them from ...
/.../acts or disputation against fortunatus.htm

Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary

1. (v. t.) To cleanse, clear, or purify by separating and carrying off whatever is impure, heterogeneous, foreign, or superfluous.

2. (v. t.) To operate on as, or by means of, a cathartic medicine, or in a similar manner.

3. (v. t.) To clarify; to defecate, as liquors.

4. (v. t.) To clear of sediment, as a boiler, or of air, as a steam pipe, by driving off or permitting escape.

5. (v. t.) To clear from guilt, or from moral or ceremonial defilement; as, to purge one of guilt or crime.

6. (v. t.) To clear from accusation, or the charge of a crime or misdemeanor, as by oath or in ordeal.

7. (v. t.) To remove in cleansing; to deterge; to wash away; -- often followed by away.

8. (v. i.) To become pure, as by clarification.

9. (v. i.) To have or produce frequent evacuations from the intestines, as by means of a cathartic.

10. (n.) The act of purging.

11. (v. t.) That which purges; especially, a medicine that evacuates the intestines; a cathartic.

Thesaurus

Purge (35 Occurrences)
... 5. (vt) To clear from guilt, or from moral or ceremonial defilement; as, to purge
one of guilt or crime. ... Int. Standard Bible Encyclopedia. PURGE. ...
/p/purge.htm - 22k

Purged (19 Occurrences)
... (imp. & pp) of Purge. ... Joel 3:21 And I will purge them from the blood from which
I had not purged them: for Jehovah dwelleth in Zion. (DBY). ...
/p/purged.htm - 12k

Garner (4 Occurrences)
... Matthew 3:12 Whose fan is in his hand, and he will throughly purge his floor, and
gather his wheat into the garner; but he will burn up the chaff with ...
/g/garner.htm - 9k

Throughly (10 Occurrences)
... Matthew 3:12 Whose fan is in his hand, and he will throughly purge his floor, and
gather his wheat into the garner; but he will burn up the chaff with ...
/t/throughly.htm - 9k

Purely (4 Occurrences)
... alkali for soap) in Isaiah 1:25, the Revised Version (British and American) "thoroughly
(margin "as with lye," the King James Version "purely") purge away thy ...
/p/purely.htm - 9k

Defilement (12 Occurrences)
... (WEB ASV NAS RSV). Leviticus 14:49 And he shall take, to purge the house from the
defilement, two birds, and cedar-wood, and scarlet, and hyssop; (DBY). ...
/d/defilement.htm - 21k

Cleanse (75 Occurrences)
... It is found often (American Revised Version) instead of "purge," "purify" (the King
James Version), renders nearly the same roots, and has the same overlapping ...
/c/cleanse.htm - 36k

Yeast (48 Occurrences)
... lump? (WEB WEY NIV). 1 Corinthians 5:7 Purge out the old yeast, that you
may be a new lump, even as you are unleavened. For indeed ...
/y/yeast.htm - 21k

Unleavened (51 Occurrences)
... (WEB KJV WEY ASV BBE DBY WBS YLT NAS RSV NIV). 1 Corinthians 5:7 Purge out the old
yeast, that you may be a new lump, even as you are unleavened. ...
/u/unleavened.htm - 24k

Lye (4 Occurrences)
... Isaiah 1:25 and I will turn my hand upon thee, and thoroughly purge away thy
dross, and will take away all thy tin; (See JPS NAS RSV). ...
/l/lye.htm - 7k

Bible Concordance

Purge (35 Occurrences)

Matthew 3:12 Whose fan is in his hand, and he will throughly purge his floor, and gather his wheat into the garner; but he will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire.
(KJV DBY)

Luke 3:17 Whose fan is in his hand, and he will throughly purge his floor, and will gather the wheat into his garner; but the chaff he will burn with fire unquenchable.
(KJV DBY)

1 Corinthians 5:7 Purge out the old yeast, that you may be a new lump, even as you are unleavened. For indeed Christ, our Passover, has been sacrificed in our place.
(WEB KJV ASV DBY)

2 Timothy 2:21 If anyone therefore purges himself from these, he will be a vessel for honor, sanctified, and suitable for the master's use, prepared for every good work.
(Root in WEB KJV ASV)

Hebrews 9:14 How much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without spot to God, purge your conscience from dead works to serve the living God?
(KJV)

Leviticus 14:49 And he shall take, to purge the house from the defilement, two birds, and cedar-wood, and scarlet, and hyssop;
(DBY)

Leviticus 14:52 and he shall purge the house from the defilement with the blood of the bird, and with the running water, and with the living bird, and with the cedar-wood, and with the hyssop, and with the scarlet;
(DBY)

Deuteronomy 13:5 And that prophet or that dreamer of dreams is to be put to death; for his words were said with the purpose of turning you away from the Lord your God, who took you out of the land of Egypt and made you free from the prison-house; and of forcing you out of the way in which the Lord your God has given you orders to go. So you are to put away the evil from among you.
(See NAS RSV NIV)

Deuteronomy 17:7 The hand of the witnesses shall be first on him to put him to death, and afterward the hand of all the people. So you shall put away the evil from the midst of you.
(See NAS RSV NIV)

Deuteronomy 17:12 The man who does presumptuously, in not listening to the priest who stands to minister there before Yahweh your God, or to the judge, even that man shall die: and you shall put away the evil from Israel.
(See NAS RSV NIV)

Deuteronomy 19:13 Your eye shall not pity him, but you shall put away the innocent blood from Israel, that it may go well with you.
(See NAS RSV NIV)

Deuteronomy 19:19 then shall ye do unto him, as he had purposed to do unto his brother; so shalt thou put away the evil from the midst of thee.
(See NAS RSV NIV)

Deuteronomy 21:9 So you shall put away the innocent blood from the midst of you, when you shall do that which is right in the eyes of Yahweh.
(See RSV NIV)

Deuteronomy 21:21 All the men of his city shall stone him to death with stones: so you shall put away the evil from the midst of you; and all Israel shall hear, and fear.
(See RSV NIV)

Deuteronomy 22:21 then they shall bring out the young lady to the door of her father's house, and the men of her city shall stone her to death with stones, because she has done folly in Israel, to play the prostitute in her father's house: so you shall put away the evil from the midst of you.
(See NAS RSV NIV)

Deuteronomy 22:22 If a man be found lying with a woman married to a husband, then they shall both of them die, the man who lay with the woman, and the woman: so you shall put away the evil from Israel.
(See NAS RSV NIV)

Deuteronomy 22:24 then you shall bring them both out to the gate of that city, and you shall stone them to death with stones; the lady, because she didn't cry, being in the city; and the man, because he has humbled his neighbor's wife: so you shall put away the evil from the midst of you.
(See NAS RSV NIV)

Deuteronomy 24:7 If a man be found stealing any of his brothers of the children of Israel, and he deal with him as a slave, or sell him; then that thief shall die: so you shall put away the evil from the midst of you.
(See NAS RSV NIV)

Judges 20:13 Now therefore deliver up the men, the base fellows, who are in Gibeah, that we may put them to death, and put away evil from Israel." But Benjamin would not listen to the voice of their brothers the children of Israel.
(See NIV)

2 Chronicles 4:6 And he maketh ten lavers, and putteth five on the right, and five on the left, to wash with them; the work of the burnt-offering they purge with them; and the sea 'is' for priests to wash with.
(YLT)

2 Chronicles 34:3 For in the eighth year of his reign, while he was yet young, he began to seek after the God of David his father; and in the twelfth year he began to purge Judah and Jerusalem from the high places, and the Asherim, and the engraved images, and the molten images.
(WEB KJV JPS ASV DBY WBS NAS RSV NIV)

Psalms 51:7 Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean: wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.
(KJV JPS DBY WBS RSV)

Psalms 65:3 Iniquities prevail against me: as for our transgressions, thou shalt purge them away.
(KJV WBS)

Psalms 79:9 Help us, O God of our salvation, for the glory of thy name: and deliver us, and purge away our sins, for thy name's sake.
(KJV WBS)

Proverbs 20:30 Wounding blows cleanse away evil, and beatings purge the innermost parts.
(WEB DBY NIV)

Isaiah 1:25 and I will turn my hand on you, thoroughly purge away your dross, and will take away all your tin.
(WEB KJV JPS ASV DBY WBS NIV)

Ezekiel 20:38 and I will purge out from among you the rebels, and those who disobey against me; I will bring them forth out of the land where they sojourn, but they shall not enter into the land of Israel: and you shall know that I am Yahweh.
(WEB KJV JPS ASV DBY WBS NAS RSV NIV)

Ezekiel 40:38 And the chamber and its opening 'is' by the posts of the gates, there they purge the burnt-offering.
(YLT)

Ezekiel 43:20 And thou shalt take of the blood thereof, and put it on the four horns of it, and on the four corners of the settle, and upon the border round about: thus shalt thou cleanse and purge it.
(KJV DBY WBS)

Ezekiel 43:22 And on the second day thou shalt present a he-goat without blemish for a sin-offering; and they shall purge the altar, as they purged it with the bullock.
(DBY)

Ezekiel 43:26 Seven days shall they purge the altar and purify it; and they shall consecrate themselves.
(KJV WBS)

Ezekiel 45:18 Thus saith the Lord Jehovah: In the first month, on the first of the month, thou shalt take a young bullock, without blemish, and thou shalt purge the sanctuary.
(DBY)

Daniel 11:35 And some of them of understanding shall fall, to try them, and to purge, and to make them white, even to the time of the end: because it is yet for a time appointed.
(KJV DBY WBS NAS)

Joel 3:21 And I will purge them from the blood from which I had not purged them: for Jehovah dwelleth in Zion.
(DBY)

Malachi 3:3 And he shall sit as a refiner and purifier of silver: and he shall purify the sons of Levi, and purge them as gold and silver, that they may offer unto the LORD an offering in righteousness.
(KJV JPS DBY WBS)

Subtopics

Purge

Related Terms

Purged (19 Occurrences)

Garner (4 Occurrences)

Throughly (10 Occurrences)

Purely (4 Occurrences)

Defilement (12 Occurrences)

Cleanse (75 Occurrences)

Yeast (48 Occurrences)

Unleavened (51 Occurrences)

Lye (4 Occurrences)