3:5; 1 Thessalonians 4:3; Revelation 2:21; 9:21; 14:8; 17:2, 4; 18:3; 19:2.

The related verb por·neuʹo, rendered in the New World Translation as “practice fornication” or “commit fornication,” occurs in the following eight places: 1 Corinthians 6:18; 10:8, 8; Revelation 2:14, 20; 17:2; 18:3, 9.

The related verb ek·por·neuʹo, rendered in the New World Translation as “commit fornication excessively,” occurs once, in Jude 7.

The related noun porʹne, rendered in the New World Translation as “harlot,” occurs in the following 12 places: Matthew 21:31, 32; Luke 15:30; 1 Corinthians 6:15, 16; Hebrews 11:31; James 2:25; Revelation 17:1, 5, 15, 16; 19:2.

The related noun porʹnos, rendered in the New World Translation as “fornicator,” occurs in the following ten places: 1 Corinthians 5:9, 10, 11; 6:9; Ephesians 5:5; 1 Timothy 1:10; Hebrews 12:16; 13:4; Revelation 21:8; 22:15. A Greek-English Lexicon, by H. Liddell and R. Scott, 1968, p. 1450, defines this word as meaning “catamite, sodomite, fornicator, idolater.”

Matthew 24:3—Gr., τὸ σημεῖον τῆς σῆς παρουσίας

(to se·meiʹon tes ses pa·rou·siʹas)

The Greek noun pa·rou·siʹa literally means a “being alongside,” the expression being drawn from the preposition pa·raʹ (alongside) and ou·siʹa (a “being”). The word pa·rou·siʹa occurs 24 times in the Christian Greek Scriptures, namely, in Matthew 24:3, 27, 37, 39; 1 Corinthians 15:23; 16:17; 2 Corinthians 7:6, 7; 10:10; Philippians 1:26; 2:12; 1 Thessalonians 2:19; 3:13; 4:15; 5:23; 2 Thessalonians 2:1, 8, 9; James 5:7, 8; 2 Peter 1:16; 3:4, 12; 1 John 2:28. In these 24 places the New World Translation renders pa·rou·siʹa as “presence.”

The related verb paʹrei·mi literally means “be alongside.” It occurs 24 times in the Christian Greek Scriptures, namely, in Matthew 26:50; Luke 13:1; John 7:6; 11:28; Acts 10:21, 33; 12:20 (ftn); Ac 17:6; 24:19; 1 Corinthians 5:3, 3; 2 Corinthians 10:2, 11; 11:9; 13:2, 10; Galatians 4:18, 20; Colossians 1:6; Hebrews 12:11; 13:5; 2 Peter 1:9, 12; Revelation 17:8. In these places the New World Translation renders paʹrei·mi as “(be) present” or “present himself.”

From the contrast that is made between the presence and the absence of Paul both in 2 Corinthians 10:10, 11 and in Philippians 2:12, the meaning of pa·rou·siʹa is plain. Also, from the comparison of the pa·rou·siʹa of the Son of man with “the days of Noah,” in Matthew 24:37-39, it is evident that this word means “presence.”

Liddell and Scott’s A Greek-English Lexicon, 1968, p. 1343, gives as the first definition of pa·rou·siʹa the English word presence. Likewise the Theological Dictionary of the New Testament, Vol. V, p. 859, states under the subheading “The General Meaning”: “παρουσία [pa·rou·siʹa] denotes esp[ecially] active presence.”

The word pa·rou·siʹa, “presence,” is different from the Greek word eʹleu·sis, “coming,” which occurs once in the Greek text, in Acts 7:52, as e·leuʹse·os (Lat., ad·venʹtu). The words pa·rou·siʹa and eʹleu·sis are not used interchangeably. The Theological Dictionary of the New Testament, Vol. V, p. 865, noted that “the terms [paʹrei·mi and pa·rou·siʹa] are never used for the coming of Christ in the flesh, and παρουσία never has the sense of return. The idea of more than one parousia is first found only in the later Church [not before Justine, second century C.E.] . . . A basic prerequisite for understanding the world of thought of primitive Christianity is that we should fully free ourselves from this notion [of more than one parousia].”

Concerning the meaning of this word, Israel P. Warren, D.D., wrote in his work The Parousia, Portland, Maine (1879), pp. 12-15: “We often speak of the ‘second advent,’ the ‘second coming,’ etc., but the Scriptures never speak of a ‘second Parousia.’ Whatever was to be its nature, it was something peculiar, having never occurred before, and being never to occur again. It was to be a presence differing from and superior to all other manifestations of himself to men, so that its designation should properly stand by itself, without any qualifying epithet other than the article,—THE PRESENCE.

“From this view of the word it is evident, I think, that neither the English word ‘coming’ nor the Latin ‘advent’ is the best representative of the original. They do not conform to its etymology; they do not correspond to the idea of the verb from which it is derived; nor could they appropriately be substituted for the more exact word, ‘presence,’ in the cases where the translators used the latter. Nor is the radical [root] idea of them the same. ‘Coming’ and ‘advent’ give most prominently the conception of an approach to us, motion toward us; ‘parousia’ that of being with us, without reference to how it began. The force of the former ends with the arrival; that of the latter begins with it. Those are words of motion; this of rest. The space of time covered by the action of the former is limited, it may be momentary; that of the latter unlimited . . . .

“Had our translators done with this technical word ‘parousia’ as they did with ‘baptisma,’—transferring it unchanged,—or if translated using its exact etymological equivalent, presence, and had it been well understood, as it then would have been, that there is no such thing as a ‘second Presence,’ I believe that the entire doctrine would have been different from what it now is. The phrases, ‘second advent,’ and ‘second coming,’ would never have been heard of. The church would have been taught to speak of THE PRESENCE OF THE LORD, as that from which its hopes were to be realized, whether in the near future or at the remotest period,—that under which the world was to be made new, a resurrection both spiritual and corporeal should be attained, and justice and everlasting awards administered.”

Also, A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature, by W. Bauer, second English ed., by F. W. Gingrich and F. W. Danker, Chicago and London (1979), p. 630, states that pa·rou·siʹa “became the official term for a visit of a person of high rank, esp[ecially] of kings and emperors visiting a province.” In Matthew 24:3, as well as in other texts such as 1 Thessalonians 3:13 and 2 Thessalonians 2:1, the word pa·rou·siʹa refers to the royal presence of Jesus Christ since his enthronement as King in the last days of this system of things.

Gr., σταυρός (stau·rosʹ); Lat., crux

“Torture stake” in Matthew 27:40 is used in connection with the execution of Jesus at Calvary, that is, Skull Place. There is no evidence that the Greek word stau·rosʹ here meant a cross such as the pagans used as a religious symbol for many centuries before Christ.

In the classical Greek the word stau·rosʹ meant merely an upright stake, or pale, or a pile such as is used for a foundation. The verb stau·roʹo meant to fence with pales, to form a stockade, or palisade. The inspired writers of the Christian Greek Scriptures wrote in the common (koi·neʹ) Greek and used the word stau·rosʹ to mean the same thing as in the classical Greek, namely, a simple stake, or pale, without a crossbeam of any kind at any angle. There is no proof to the contrary. The apostles Peter and Paul also used the word xyʹlon to refer to the torture instrument upon which Jesus was nailed, and this shows that it was an upright stake without a crossbeam, for that is what xyʹlon in this special sense means. (Acts 5:30; 10:39; 13:29; Galatians 3:13; 1 Peter 2:24) In LXX we find xyʹlon in Ezra 6:11 (1 Esdras 6:31), and there it is spoken of as a beam on which the violator of law was to be hanged, the same as in Acts 5:30; 10:39.

Regarding the meaning of stau·rosʹ, W. E. Vine, in his work An Expository Dictionary of New Testament Words (1966 reprint), Vol. I, p. 256, states: “STAUROS (σταυρός) denotes, primarily, an upright pale or stake. On such malefactors were nailed for execution. Both the noun and the verb stauroō, to fasten to a stake or pale, are originally to be distinguished from the ecclesiastical form of a two beamed cross. The shape of the latter had its origin in ancient Chaldea, and was used as the symbol of the god Tammuz (being in the shape of the mystic Tau, the initial of his name) in that country and in adjacent lands, including Egypt. By the middle of the 3rd cent. A.D. the churches had either departed from, or had travestied, certain doctrines of the Christian faith. In order to increase the prestige of the apostate ecclesiastical system pagans were received into the churches apart from regeneration by faith, and were permitted largely to retain their pagan signs and symbols. Hence the Tau or T, in its most frequent form, with the cross-piece lowered, was adopted to stand for the cross of Christ.”

The Latin dictionary by Lewis and Short gives as the basic meaning of crux “a tree, frame, or other wooden instruments of execution, on which criminals were impaled or hanged.” In the writings of Livy, a Roman historian of the first century B.C.E., crux means a mere stake.