Original Word: στίγμα, ατος, τό
Part of Speech: Noun, Neuter
Transliteration: stigma
Phonetic Spelling: (stig'-mah)
Short Definition: a mark or brand
Definition: a mark or brand.

4742 stígma – properly, a brand mark burned into the skin; (figuratively) "holy scars" that go with serving Jesus as Lord (used only in Gal 6:17).

4742 /stígma ("brand-mark") refers to the literal scars on Paul from the lictor's rods at Pisidian Antioch, the stoning at Lystra, etc. These "marked Paul off" as the slave of Jesus (bearing "holy scars for Christ").

[Brand-marks (4742 /stígma), like "tatoos" (Gk stigmata), were burned into the skin of slaves in NT times – proving they belonged to a particular owner.]

STRONGS NT 4742: στίγμα

στίγμα, στιγματος, τό (from στίζω to prick; (cf. Latinstimulus, etc.; German stechen, English stick, sting, etc.; Curtius, § 226)), a mark pricked in or branded upon the body. According to ancient oriental usage, slaves and soldiers bore the name or stamp of their master or commander branded or pricked (cut) into their bodies to indicate what master or general they belonged to, and there were even some devotees who stamped themselves in this way with the token of their gods (cf. Deyling, Observations, iii., p. 423ff); hence, τά στίγματα τοῦ (κυρίου so Rec.) Ἰησοῦ, the marks of (the Lord) Jesus, which Paul in Galatians 6:17 says he bears branded on his body, are the traces left there by the perils, hardships, imprisonments, scourgings, endured by him for the cause of Christ, and which mark him as Christ's faithful and approved votary, servant, soldier (see Lightfoots Commentary on Galatians, the passage cited). (Herodotus 7, 233; Aristotle, Aelian, Plutarch, Lcian, others.)

Strong's Exhaustive Concordance

mark, brand

From a primary stizo (to "stick", i.e. Prick); a mark incised or punched (for recognition of ownership), i.e. (figuratively) scar of service -- mark.

Forms and Transliterations

στιγματα στίγματα στιγμάτων stigmata stígmata

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