Sense: of little faith
a. — characterized by a very weak belief, trust, and reliance (on someone or something). understood in numerical terms as a faith of small quantity.
And he said to them, “Why are you afraid, O you of little faith?” Then he rose and rebuked the winds and the sea, and there was a great calm.
Matthew 8:26
Describing abstract entities is a difficult task. We often use more concrete descriptors in order to convey our feelings about the abstract entity in question. For example, in English, we convey the potency or strength of someone’s faith or trust using terms relative to size, such as “your faith is great.” But in Greek, someone’s faith can be described using metaphors from size or quantity. Most likely, Jesus’ choice of words here connotes a faith of small numerical quantity, rather than a faith of small size. But what does that mean? Jesus was not only rebuking the disciples for their lack of trust in him, he is also quantifying how very great that lack is. Just as someone could be numerically rich in faith, so also here the disciples are numerically poor in faith.
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.