Sense: law of God
n. — any representative declaration of God’s legal requirements for His creatures; whether in Scripture or in the conscience.
For whoever keeps the whole law [νόμος] but fails in one point has become accountable for all of it.
James 2:10 (NRSV)
The concept of law is a multifaceted in the New Testament. This is apparent from the secondary information in the Bible Sense Lexicon’s definition above, namely where it clarifies, “whether in Scripture or in the conscience.” In today’s example verse, the reference is to the requirements of God found in Scripture; however, the BSL concordance entry for this sense shows us examples like Hebrews 10:16 where a law is not something written in a book, but something God writes on a person’s heart: “This is the covenant that I will make with them after those days, says the Lord: I will put my laws in their hearts, and I will write them on their minds, . . .” In light of this, we can see how secondary information in definitions can give us a fuller understanding of biblical concepts.
What is the Bible Sense Lexicon?
Sense of the Day is based on content from Logos’ Bible Sense Lexicon, which organizes biblical Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek words by meaning based on a variety of semantic relationships. Sense of the Day provides examples of senses in context, along with insight into their application for theology and interpretation.
The Bible Sense Lexicon is a Logos dataset available in Logos 5 Gold and higher base packages. If you’re enrolled in the Logos Academic Discount Program, you can also find the Bible Sense Lexicon in the Biblical Languages base package. Take your studies even further by exploring semantic domains, engaging the biblical text like never before.
Learn more about the Bible Sense Lexicon.