G570 — ἀπιστία (apistia)¶

Core Data¶

Strong's: G570
Original: ἀπιστία
Transliteration: apistia
Pronunciation: ap-is-tee'-ah
Part of Speech: Feminine noun
Root: α-privative + πίστις (pistis, G4102) — the negation of faith/trust
Occurrences: 12 unique verses (12 tokens) across 5 books
First Occurrence: Mat 13:58 — "And he did not many mighty works there because of their unbelief."
Hapax Legomenon: No

Lexicon Definition¶

Faithlessness, i.e. (negatively) disbelief (lack of Christian faith), or (positively) unfaithfulness (disobedience). From G571 (apistos); alpha-privative compound negating pistis.

Louw-Nida Semantic Domain¶

Domain: 31 — Hold a View, Believe, Trust
Subdomain: 31.009 — Trust, Rely; 31.010 — Be a Believer, Christian Faith
Other words in 31.010: πιστεύω (G4100), πίστις (G4102), πιστός (G4103), ἀπειθέω (G544), ἀπιστέω (G569), ἄπιστος (G571)
Louw-Nida Glosses: lacking in trustworthiness; unfaithfulness; to not believe (in)

Translation Distribution (KJV)¶

Translation	Count	%
unbelief	7	58.3%
of unbelief	2	16.7%
because of unbelief	1	8.3%
still in unbelief	1	8.3%
through unbelief	1	8.3%

KJV renders apistia exclusively as "unbelief" with varying prepositional constructions. No alternative translations appear.

Distribution by Book¶

Book	Count	Per 100 Verses
Romans	4	0.9
1 Timothy	1	0.9
Hebrews	2	0.7
Mark	3	0.4
Matthew	2	0.2

Pauline and Hebrews usage accounts for 7 of 12 occurrences (58%). The Synoptic uses (5 total) are concentrated in Jesus's direct rebukes. Absent entirely from Luke, John, Acts, and all other epistles.

Semantic Categories¶

1. Unbelief That Limits Divine Power¶

Mat 13:58 — "And he did not many mighty works there because of their unbelief."
Mark 6:6 — "And he marvelled because of their unbelief."
Mat 17:20 — "Because of your unbelief: for verily I say unto you, If ye have faith as a grain of mustard seed..."

In the Synoptics, apistia names the condition that prevents God from acting. At Nazareth, Jesus's own townspeople limit his works by their unbelief. In Mat 17:20, the disciples' failure to cast out the demon is diagnosed as apistia — even a mustard-seed measure of pistis would have sufficed.

2. Unbelief as Rebukable Hardness¶

Mark 9:24 — "Lord, I believe; help thou mine unbelief."
Mark 16:14 — "upbraided them with their unbelief and hardness of heart, because they believed not them which had seen him after he was risen"

Here apistia is paired with moral hardness (sklerokardia). The father's cry in Mark 9:24 treats apistia as something that can coexist with partial belief — a condition requiring divine help to overcome.

3. Israel's Corporate Unbelief (Romans)¶

Rom 3:3 — "shall their unbelief make the faith of God without effect?"
Rom 11:20 — "because of unbelief they were broken off, and thou standest by faith"
Rom 11:23 — "if they abide not still in unbelief, shall be graffed in"

Paul uses apistia for Israel's national failure to respond to God's covenant faithfulness. In Rom 3:3, apistia stands opposite "the faith (pistis) of God" — human unfaithfulness versus divine faithfulness. In Rom 11:20-23, apistia is the reason the natural branches were cut off, and its reversal is the condition for regrafting.

4. Unbelief as Pre-Conversion State¶

1 Tim 1:13 — "but I obtained mercy, because I did it ignorantly in unbelief"

Paul describes his former persecuting life as conducted "in unbelief" — apistia as the encompassing condition of life before faith. Paired with ignorance (agnoeo, G50).

5. Unbelief as Apostasy Warning¶

Heb 3:12 — "lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief, in departing from the living God"
Heb 3:19 — "So we see that they could not enter in because of unbelief."

Hebrews applies the wilderness-generation narrative to the church. "An evil heart of unbelief" (kardia ponera apistias) links apistia to the deliberate act of departing (aphistemi, G868) from God. In 3:19, apistia is the final verdict on why Israel failed to enter Canaan.

Common Collocations¶

Word	Strong's	Co-occurrences	Typical Pattern
θεός (theos)	G2316	4x (33%)	"unbelief" set against God's faithfulness or divine action
πίστις (pistis)	G4102	4x (33%)	Direct antithetical pairing: "unbelief" vs. "faith" in same verse
πιστεύω (pisteuo)	G4100	2x (17%)	Verb form reinforcing the faith/unbelief contrast
βλέπω (blepo)	G991	2x (17%)	"Take heed" / "we see" — warning language around unbelief
ποιέω (poieo)	G4160	2x (17%)	"Did not many mighty works" — unbelief preventing divine action
ἀφίστημι (aphistemi)	G868	1x (8%)	"Departing from the living God" — unbelief as apostasy
διακρίνω (diakrino)	G1252	1x (8%)	"Staggered not" — wavering as the opposite of Abraham's faith

Word Family / Cognates¶

G4102 πίστις (pistis) — faith, trust, belief (244v) — the positive noun that apistia negates
G4100 πιστεύω (pisteuo) — to believe, trust (248v) — verbal form of pistis
G4103 πιστός (pistos) — faithful, trustworthy (67v) — adjectival cognate
G571 ἄπιστος (apistos) — unbelieving, faithless (23v) — adjectival form of apistia
G569 ἀπιστέω (apisteo) — to disbelieve (8v) — verbal form of apistia
G3640 ὀλιγόπιστος (oligopistos) — of little faith (5v) — partial rather than total lack
G3982 πείθω (peitho) — to persuade, trust (55v) — root verb behind the pistis family

Synonyms¶

G543 ἀπείθεια (apeitheia) — disobedience, disbelief (7v) — overlaps in KJV "unbelief" (Rom 11:30, 32; Heb 4:6, 11); emphasizes obstinate rebellion rather than lack of trust
G570a ὀλιγοπιστία (oligopistia) — little-faith (1v, Mat 17:20 variant) — diminished faith rather than absent faith

Easily Confused Words¶

Word	Strong's	Shared Translation	Key Difference
ἀπείθεια (apeitheia)	G543	"unbelief" (KJV)	apeitheia = willful disobedience/rebellion; apistia = absence or failure of trust/faith

Domain Neighbors (Louw-Nida 31.009 Trust, Rely)¶

G949 βέβαιος (bebaios) — certain, sure, dependable (9v)
G1476 ἑδραῖος (hedraios) — firm, steadfast (3v)
G4006 πεποίθησις (pepoithesis) — confidence, trust (6v)
G114 ἀθετέω (atheteo) — to reject, set aside (15v)
G3428 μοιχαλίς (moichalis) — adulteress, unfaithful (7v)

Hebrew Source¶

No direct Hebrew sources found via LXX mapping. Apistia is a distinctively NT formation. The concept of Israel's unbelief in the OT is typically expressed through different vocabulary (e.g., H4603 ma'al "to be unfaithful," H539 aman negated "did not believe").

Morphological Note¶

Greek parser shows 11 forms across 4 cases: - Accusative (ἀπιστίαν): 4x — object of prepositions (Mat 13:58, Mark 6:6, 16:14, Heb 3:19) - Dative (ἀπιστίᾳ): 4x — instrumental/locative (Rom 4:20, 11:20, 11:23, 1 Tim 1:13) - Nominative (ἀπιστία): 1x — subject (Rom 3:3) - Genitive (ἀπιστίας): 1x — attributive (Heb 3:12 "heart of unbelief")

Mark 9:24 (dative) is absent from some manuscript traditions, accounting for the parser's 11 vs. the KJV's 12 occurrences.