G266 — ἁμαρτία (hamartia)¶

Core Data¶

Strong's: G266
Original: ἁμαρτία
Transliteration: hamartía
Pronunciation: ham-ar-tee'-ah
Part of Speech: Feminine noun
Root: from ἁμαρτάνω (G264) — "to miss the mark, to err, to sin"; ultimately from ἀ- (negative) + a base akin to μέρος ("a part") — literally "to miss one's share / miss the target"
Occurrences: ~173 NT occurrences (BLB count 174) across ~60 chapters; 18 unique KJV renderings
First NT Occurrence: Matt 1:21 — "he shall save his people from their sins"
Hapax: No (high-frequency term)

Lexicon Definition¶

(Thayer / Strong) From G264 (hamartanō); a sin (properly abstract): offence, sin(-ful). The word denotes (a) the act of missing or erring, (b) the resulting state of guilt/error, and (c) in Pauline usage, sin as an enslaving power.

Semantic Domains¶

Louw-Nida: - 88.289 — Moral and Ethical Qualities and Related Behavior: Sin, Wrongdoing, Guilt

UBS Semantic Domains: - [088] Moral and Ethical Qualities and Related Behavior

Adjacent lemmas in this cluster: ἁμαρτάνω (G264), ἁμάρτημα (G265), ἁμαρτωλός (G268), ἀνομία (G458), παράπτωμα (G3900), παράβασις (G3847), ἀδικία (G93), παρανομία (G3892)

Translation Distribution (KJV)¶

Translation	Verses	%
sin	67	38.5%
sins	58	33.3%
of sin	16	9.2%
of sins	15	8.6%
unto sin	3	1.7%
a sin	3	1.7%
(14 other minor forms)	12	~6.9%

Virtually 100% rendered as a form of "sin." Variation is almost entirely English article/preposition. Only one anomalous gloss: "an offence" (2 Cor 11:7).

Distribution by Book¶

Book	Count	Per 100 vv
1 John	17	16.2
Romans	48	11.1
Hebrews	24	7.9
James	7	6.5
1 Peter	4	3.8
2 Peter	2	3.3
2 Thessalonians	1	2.1
Galatians	3	2.0
John	17	1.9
1 Timothy	2	1.8
2 Corinthians	3	1.2
1 Thessalonians	1	1.1
Colossians	1	1.1
1 Corinthians	4	0.9
Mark	6	0.9
Luke	10	0.9
Acts	8	0.8
Revelation	3	0.7
Matthew	7	0.7
Ephesians	1	0.7

Three epistolary centers dominate by density: 1 John, Romans, Hebrews. Romans alone supplies ~28% of all NT occurrences; Rom 5–8 is the single densest theological treatment. 1 John has the highest per-verse concentration in the NT. Synoptic use is sparse and concentrated around forgiveness/remission formulas (Matt 1:21; Matt 26:28; Mark 1:4; Luke 1:77).

Semantic Categories¶

1. Sin as Concrete Act / Transgression¶

A specific wrong done, usually countable (often plural, ἁμαρτίαι). - Matt 1:21 — "he shall save his people from their sins" - Matt 26:28 — "shed for many for the remission of sins" - Mark 1:4 / Luke 3:3 / Acts 2:38 — "baptism of repentance for the remission of sins" - 1 John 1:9 — "if we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins" - James 5:16 — "Confess your faults one to another"

2. Sin as Guilt / State of Liability¶

The condition of standing under sin's charge. - John 9:41 — "if ye were blind, ye should have no sin… now ye say, We see; therefore your sin remaineth" - John 15:22, 24 — "they had not had sin: but now they have no cloke for their sin" - John 19:11 — "he that delivered me unto thee hath the greater sin" - Rom 3:9 — "they are all under sin" - Rom 3:20 — "by the law is the knowledge of sin"

3. Sin as Ruling Power (Personified) — Pauline Emphasis¶

Sin treated as an agent that reigns, dwells, enslaves, and is overthrown. Concentrated in Rom 5–8. - Rom 5:12 — "by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin" - Rom 5:21 — "as sin hath reigned unto death" - Rom 6:6 — "the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin" - Rom 6:12, 14 — "Let not sin therefore reign… sin shall not have dominion over you" - Rom 6:23 — "the wages of sin is death" - Rom 7:17, 20 — "sin that dwelleth in me" - Rom 8:2 — "the law of sin and death" - 1 Cor 15:56 — "The sting of death is sin; and the strength of sin is the law"

4. Sin as Cultic Category / Sin Offering¶

Echoing the LXX use of ἁμαρτία for חטאת (sin offering). - Rom 8:3 — "God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin [περὶ ἁμαρτίας]" (LXX formula for sin offering) - 2 Cor 5:21 — "he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin" (recovers the chattaah double sense) - Heb 9:26, 28 — "to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself… offered to bear the sins of many" - Heb 10:6, 8, 18 — "sacrifice for sin" / "no more offering for sin" - Heb 13:11 — "whose blood is brought into the sanctuary by the high priest for sin"

5. Sin Defined / Characterized¶

Epistolary definitions and descriptions of what sin is. - Rom 14:23 — "whatsoever is not of faith is sin" - 1 John 3:4 — "Whosoever committeth sin transgresseth also the law: for sin is the transgression of the law" (ἁμαρτία = ἀνομία) - 1 John 5:17 — "All unrighteousness is sin: and there is a sin not unto death" - James 1:15 — "when lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin: and sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death" - James 4:17 — "to him that knoweth to do good, and doeth it not, to him it is sin"

6. Sin Removed / Atoned / Cleansed¶

The Gospel counter-movement: sin as the object of Christ's redemptive action. - John 1:29 — "the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world" - 1 John 1:7 — "the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin" - 1 John 3:5 — "he was manifested to take away our sins; and in him is no sin" - Heb 10:12 — "after he had offered one sacrifice for sins for ever" - 1 Pet 2:24 — "who his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree" - Rev 1:5 — "washed us from our sins in his own blood"

Textual Variant — 2 Thessalonians 2:3¶

The phrase ὁ ἄνθρωπος τῆς ἁμαρτίας ("the man of sin") is one of the most famous textual divergences involving G266.

Text Tradition	Reading	Witnesses (representative)
Textus Receptus / Byzantine / Majority	ὁ ἄνθρωπος τῆς ἁμαρτίας — "man of sin"	Byzantine mss majority, K, L, Ψ, minuscule tradition, Vulgate, Peshitta, KJV, NKJV
Critical Text (NA28/UBS5) / Alexandrian	ὁ ἄνθρωπος τῆς ἀνομίας — "man of lawlessness"	ℵ, B, 0278, 33, 81, 1739, 1881, co (Coptic), Origen; ESV, NIV, NASB, RSV

Semantic difference: - ἁμαρτία (G266) — sin as general category; broad ethical/theological failure - ἀνομία (G458) — specifically "lawlessness," absence of/rebellion against νόμος (law)

The readings are near-synonyms in biblical usage — 1 John 3:4 explicitly equates them (ἡ ἁμαρτία ἐστὶν ἡ ἀνομία) — but ἀνομία carries a sharper connotation of antinomian rebellion, which pairs the figure in 2 Thess 2:3 with ὁ ἄνομος ("the lawless one") in 2 Thess 2:8 (where the text is undisputed). The critical text reading yields internal cohesion between v. 3 and v. 8. The Byzantine reading harmonizes with the broader NT idiom "man of X" for moral character.

Either reading preserves the same referent (an end-time figure opposed to God); the difference is rhetorical emphasis, not identity.

Common Collocations¶

Word	Strong's	Co-occ (approx)	Typical Pattern
θάνατος (death)	G2288	~18x	"sin → death" causal chain (Rom 5:12, 6:23, 7:13; Jas 1:15)
νόμος (law)	G3551	~15x	"law of sin" / "law reveals sin" (Rom 7 cluster)
ἄφεσις (forgiveness/remission)	G859	~10x	"remission of sins" (baptismal/proclamation formula)
χάρις (grace)	G5485	~7x	grace vs. sin (Rom 5:20–21, 6:1, 6:14–15)
σάρξ (flesh)	G4561	~7x	"sinful flesh," "flesh of sin" (Rom 7–8)
δικαιοσύνη (righteousness)	G1343	~9x	sin/righteousness antithesis (esp. Rom 6)
αἷμα (blood)	G129	~8x	blood atoning for sin (Heb, 1 John, Rev)
θυσία (sacrifice)	G2378	~9x	"sacrifice for sin(s)" (Heb 10 cluster)
κόσμος (world)	G2889	~5x	"sin of the world" (Johannine)
βασιλεύω (reign)	G936	~3x	"sin reigned" (Rom 5:21, 6:12)
δοῦλος/δουλεύω (slave/serve)	G1401/G1398	~5x	servants of sin vs of God (John 8:34; Rom 6)

Word Family (ἁμαρτ- root)¶

G264 ἁμαρτάνω — verb: to sin, miss the mark (~43x)
G265 ἁμάρτημα — concrete sin / a specific sinful act (~4x; e.g., Mark 3:28; Rom 3:25; 1 Cor 6:18)
G268 ἁμαρτωλός — adjective/noun: sinful, sinner (~47x)
G361 ἀναμάρτητος — without sin (1x, John 8:7)
G4258 προαμαρτάνω — to have sinned previously (2 Cor 12:21; 13:2)

Synonyms¶

search_relationships.py did not surface additional close lexical synonyms beyond the ἁμαρτ- word family already listed above. Its clearest non-cognate overlap was: - G763 ἀσέβεια (asebeia) — ungodliness, impiety; overlaps with hamartia in vice-list and judgment contexts, but stresses irreverence toward God more specifically than the broader category "sin"

Antonyms¶

G1343 δικαιοσύνη (dikaiosynē) — righteousness; the primary moral and forensic opposite of sin
G5218 ὑπακοή (hupakoē) — obedience; practical covenantal opposite to sin's rebellion
G1654 ἐλεημοσύνη (eleēmosynē) — almsgiving, mercy-deed; a concrete act of righteousness in Jewish ethical usage

Easily Confused / Overlapping Near-Synonyms¶

Word	Strong's	Shared KJV Gloss	Key Difference
ἀνομία	G458	"iniquity," "transgression of the law"	specifically lawlessness / absence of law; sharper antinomian edge (the 2 Thess 2:3 variant)
παράπτωμα	G3900	"trespass," "offence," "fall"	a "side-slip" — lapse/stumble; accidental or unintentional deviation; central in Rom 5:15–20 in parallel with ἁμαρτία
παράβασις	G3847	"transgression"	specifically overstepping a defined boundary; presumes an explicit command (Rom 4:15; Gal 3:19)
ἀδικία	G93	"unrighteousness," "iniquity"	unrighteousness/injustice; moral-relational wrong; 1 John 5:17 "all unrighteousness is sin"
παρανομία	G3892	"iniquity" (1x, 2 Pet 2:16)	law-breaking (a near-hapax)
κακία	G2549	"malice," "evil"	moral badness as a disposition, not the act
πονηρία	G4189	"wickedness"	active evil/malignity

Hebrew / LXX Source¶

G266 ἁμαρτία is the workhorse Greek rendering for the Hebrew sin-word cluster in the LXX.

Hebrew Source	Strong's	LXX Co-occ	PMI	Notes
חַטָּאָה / חַטָּאת (chaṭṭâʼâh)	H2403	242	5.82	Primary source — sin + sin offering
עָוֺן (ʿāvôn)	H5771	93	4.78	"Iniquity / guilt / punishment" — conflated with chattaah under hamartia
חָטָא (ḥāṭāʼ, verb)	H2398	62	4.14	The root verb; its cognate noun forms feed G266
פֶּשַׁע (peshaʿ)	H6588	34	4.55	"Rebellion/transgression" — third member of prophetic triad
חֵטְא (ḥēṭ)	H2399	28	5.67	Closely related Hebrew sin noun
חֲטָאָה (chăṭāʼâh)	H2401	8	5.95	Feminine of chet; offence/sin offering
אָשָׁם (ʼāshām)	H817	15	4.50	Guilt / guilt offering

Also cross-maps in atonement/sacrifice contexts: - H3722 כָּפַר (kāphar, "atone") — 41 co-occurrences - H5930 עֹלָה (ʿôlâh, "burnt offering") — 49 co-occurrences - H8163 שָׂעִיר (śāʿîr, "goat") — 42 co-occurrences (the sin-offering animal)

Translation pattern: The LXX overwhelmingly uses ἁμαρτία as a flat equivalent for the Hebrew sin-nouns. The Hebrew triad חטאת / עון / פשע (sin / iniquity / rebellion) is routinely collapsed into ἁμαρτία (+ ἀνομία, ἀδικία, παράπτωμα as secondary options), dissolving finer Hebrew distinctions. The Hebrew "sin offering" sense of חַטָּאת survives in NT formulas like περὶ ἁμαρτίας (Rom 8:3; Heb 10 cluster).

First Occurrence¶

NT: Matt 1:21 — "thou shalt call his name JESUS: for he shall save his people from their sins."

The NT opens the word's usage by placing sin directly opposite the name "Jesus" (Ἰησοῦς / Yeshua, "YHWH saves"). Salvation is defined as salvation from sins, framing the entire NT's use of G266 around a rescue verb.