In the New Testament it is the translation of the Greek word
ecclesia, which is synonymous with the Hebrew _kahal_ of the Old Testament, both words meaning simply an assembly, the character of which can only be known from the connection in which the word is found.
Greek
kyriakon (κυριακόν
, "thing belonging to the Lord"; also
ekklesia (ἐκκλησία
(Latinized as
ecclesia,
"assembly"
There is some uncertainty on the exact development of the word "church." The Compact Oxford English Dictionary says its origin is "from Greek
kuriakon doma Lords house."
Kuriakon is from
kurios master or lord.1 According to The Online Etymology Dictionary, it is from the Old English
cirice, from West Germanic
kirika, and from Greek
kyriake, meaning Lords, and the Greek adjective
kyriakon, of the Lord.2
Another source identifies "church" from the Old English
chirche and
cherche, and from the Anglo-Saxon
circe, cirice, and
cyrice. It also compares to the Scottish word
kirk, the Dutch
kerk, the Danish
kirke, and the German
kirche.
Christian meeting places: people came to speak of these buildings as "the lords"
(kyriakon) "house"
(doma). They used the term
kuriaka when speaking of articles associated with these buildings.
Eventually, the term
kyriakon came to mean the people who meet within these buildings. The word itself gradually evolved to become the English word "church." People came to accept it as part of our religious vocabulary. It stands to reason that some scholars might want to use "church" in passages that speak of believers.
For the most part, there is no comparison. The inspired writings do not use the Greek word kyriakon. In every passage where the word church appears, the manuscripts from which we get our English translations read ekklesia (ek-klay-see'-ah). Unlike
kyriakon (church),
ekklesia is not a religious word. It simply refers to people who answer a summons or calling. Their assembling or grouping together was for a particular cause. In none of the Greek writings, divinely inspired or otherwise, did any writer ever use
ekklesia exclusively to refer to a religious gathering. It was a called out or assembly of individuals.
Church as you know it today and use it isn't a biblical thought or term... A gathering is.
It is impossible to translate church into New Testament Greek because there is no Greek word to convey the same equivalent understanding that people today have of the English word church. If these two words were synonymous, then they would have the same or similar meanings. In most cases, we should be able to use them interchangeably but we cannot.
So can we please stop throwing the word "church" around like it means anything special? Thank you.
(biblegateway, wikipedia, our lord's ekklesia)