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Greek Word for Compassion: What Does “Splagchnizomai” Really Mean?
Quick answer: The main Greek word for compassion in the New Testament is σπλαγχνίζομαι (splagchnizomai), pronounced splangkh-NID-zoh-my, Strong’s G4697. It’s a verb meaning to be moved with compassion, and it’s built on the noun splanchna, the inner organs: heart, lungs, liver, bowels. It appears only 12 times, all in Matthew, Mark and Luke, and it’s used almost entirely of Jesus or of characters in His parables. The KJV usually renders it “moved with compassion” or “had compassion.”
Word Study: Where “Splagchnizomai” Comes From
Start with the noun. σπλάγχνα (splanchna, G4698) was a butcher’s word before it was a feeling word. In the Greek world it meant the organs taken out of an animal at a sacrifice, the heart, lungs, liver and kidneys, which were roasted and eaten first. The New Testament still uses it that way once: when Luke describes the death of Judas, “all his bowels gushed out” (Acts 1:18). “Bowels” there is splanchna.
Over time Greek speakers started treating those organs as the place strong feeling lives, the way English speakers still talk about the heart, or about a “gut feeling.” That’s the move behind the verb. Splagchnizomai means, very literally, to be moved in the splanchna, to feel something so strongly it registers in your body before you’ve thought about it.
Here’s what most English readers never hear: the “compassion” sense of this verb is hard to find in Greek writing before the Bible’s era. Older Greek had a related verb about eating or reading the sacrificial organs. Using this word family for deep mercy owes a lot to Jewish Scripture and the Hebrew idea behind it. Hebrew’s great mercy word, rachamim, comes from rechem, the womb, so mercy in Hebrew is also something felt low in the body. When the Greek translators of the Old Testament needed a word for that inward mercy (Proverbs 12:10, for example), splanchna was the word they reached for. You can read more about that Hebrew background in our study of the Hebrew word for mercy.
So by the time Matthew, Mark and Luke use splagchnizomai, it isn’t a polite word for feeling sorry. It’s a word about the insides turning over.
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Where “Splagchnizomai” Appears in the Bible
| Reference | Text (KJV) | What it shows |
|---|---|---|
| Matthew 14:14 | “And Jesus went forth, and saw a great multitude, and was moved with compassion toward them, and he healed their sick.” | Jesus had gone looking for solitude after John the Baptist’s death (14:13). The crowd found Him anyway, and His insides turned toward them. |
| Luke 7:13 | “And when the Lord saw her, he had compassion on her, and said unto her, Weep not.” | A widow walking behind her only son’s coffin. Nobody asked Jesus for anything. Compassion moved first. |
| Luke 10:33 | “But a certain Samaritan, as he journeyed, came where he was: and when he saw him, he had compassion on him,” | The priest and the Levite saw the same man. The Samaritan is the one whose insides moved. |
| Luke 15:20 | “…But when he was yet a great way off, his father saw him, and had compassion, and ran, and fell on his neck, and kissed him.” | The father in the prodigal son story, the character who stands for God in Jesus’ parable. |
| 1 John 3:17 | “But whoso hath this world’s good, and seeth his brother have need, and shutteth up his bowels of compassion from him, how dwelleth the love of God in him?” | The noun splanchna. Outside the Gospels, the church gets the noun, and a warning about closing it off. |
Look at who does the feeling in the first four. It’s Jesus, or it’s a figure in one of Jesus’ stories: the Samaritan, the father, and the master who forgives an impossible debt (Matthew 18:27). The narrators never use this verb for the disciples, the crowds or the religious leaders. It’s the Gospels’ word for how God’s heart shows up in Jesus. (For how this verb always leads straight into action, see our article What Does the Bible Say About Empathy?)
Verse Deep Dive: Luke 15:20 — Compassion Before the Speech
Jesus tells the parable of the prodigal son to answer a complaint. The Pharisees and scribes were grumbling, “This man receiveth sinners, and eateth with them” (Luke 15:2). So Jesus tells three stories about lost things being found, and the third one uses splagchnizomai at its turning point.
The younger son has wasted everything and is starving in a pig field. He comes up with a plan, and he rehearses a speech:
“And am no more worthy to be called thy son: make me as one of thy hired servants.” (Luke 15:19)
Then he starts walking home. And before he gets anywhere near the house:
“And he arose, and came to his father. But when he was yet a great way off, his father saw him, and had compassion, and ran, and fell on his neck, and kissed him.” (Luke 15:20)
Count the verbs: saw, had compassion, ran, fell on his neck, kissed. Five things happen, and the son hasn’t said a word yet. The compassion isn’t a response to the apology. It comes before the apology. “A great way off” also tells you something: the father was looking down the road. You don’t spot someone at that distance unless you’ve been watching for them.
Many commentators point out that a respected older man running in public, robes hitched up, would have looked undignified in that culture. Whatever the father’s neighbours thought, splagchnizomai explains it. This isn’t a calm decision to be gracious. The father’s insides turned over, and his legs followed.
Now watch what happens to the speech. The son starts it in the next verse:
“And the son said unto him, Father, I have sinned against heaven, and in thy sight, and am no more worthy to be called thy son.” (Luke 15:21)
That’s where it stops. The line he practised, “make me as one of thy hired servants,” never gets said. The father cuts in, “Bring forth the best robe, and put it on him” (Luke 15:22). The son came home ready to bargain his way back in as an employee. The father’s compassion had settled the question before he reached the gate.
That’s the answer to the Pharisees’ complaint. Why does Jesus welcome sinners and eat with them? Because this is what God’s heart looks like when it sees someone coming home: not arms folded, waiting for the speech, but insides turning over and running down the road.
Not All “Compassion” Is the Same
English Bibles use “compassion,” “mercy” and “pity” fairly loosely. Greek had several distinct words, and the Gospel writers chose between them:
- σπλαγχνίζομαι (splagchnizomai, G4697) — compassion felt in the gut. It describes what happens inside someone when they see suffering.
- ἔλεος (eleos, G1656) — mercy, kindness shown to someone in need. It leans toward what you do, and it’s the word in the blind men’s cry, “have mercy on us.” See our full study of the Greek word for mercy.
- οἰκτιρμός (oiktirmos, G3628) — pity, tender mercies, often in the plural. Paul calls God “the Father of mercies” with this word (2 Corinthians 1:3).
- συμπαθέω (sympatheō, G4834) — to suffer with, to feel alongside. It’s the root of “sympathy,” and it’s the word in Hebrews 4:15: we have a high priest who can be “touched with the feeling of our infirmities.”
Matthew 18 shows two of these side by side. When the master forgives his servant’s enormous debt, the narrator says the master “was moved with compassion” (Matthew 18:27): splagchnizomai, what happened inside him. But when the master later confronts the unforgiving servant, he says, “Shouldest not thou also have had compassion on thy fellowservant, even as I had pity on thee?” (Matthew 18:33). Both verbs in that verse are from eleos, mercy shown. The master doesn’t demand that the servant feel what he felt. He demands that the servant do what he did. That difference matters for the next section.
Why the Original Word Changes the Meaning
Here’s the pattern that only shows up in Greek. The verb splagchnizomai disappears after the Gospels. It never appears in Acts, Paul’s letters, or anywhere else. But the noun, splanchna, keeps going, and it shows up in the letters to the churches.
Paul writes, “For God is my record, how greatly I long after you all in the bowels of Jesus Christ” (Philippians 1:8). He tells Philemon that “the bowels of the saints are refreshed by thee, brother” (Philemon 1:7). And he tells the Colossians, “Put on therefore, as the elect of God, holy and beloved, bowels of mercies, kindness, humbleness of mind, meekness, longsuffering” (Colossians 3:12). Even Paul’s word for “tenderhearted” in Ephesians 4:32 is eusplanchnos: literally, having good insides.
Notice what nobody does. No apostle ever commands, “Be moved in your gut.” You can’t order a feeling into existence. Instead the New Testament gives two instructions about the insides. Colossians 3:12 says to put them on, like clothes you choose each morning. And 1 John 3:17 warns against the opposite: seeing a brother in need and shutting up your bowels of compassion from him. The church’s job isn’t to produce the feeling Jesus had. It’s to stop closing the door on it.
That changes how you read the English word. “Compassion” can sound like a personality trait: some people have it, some people don’t. The Greek puts it differently. The gut-deep compassion belongs first to Jesus. Paul even calls his own longing for the Philippians “the bowels of Jesus Christ,” as if the compassion he felt was Christ’s, living in him. What you’re asked to do is wear it and not lock it away.
Living It Out
Think about the last time you felt that small drop in your stomach for someone: a friend’s text, a stranger on the street, a relative who’s struggling. Then think about what you did next. If the honest answer is that you shut it off because it was inconvenient, 1 John 3:17 has a name for that, and grace for it too.
This week, try the Colossians 3:12 habit. Before you leave the house, “put on” compassion on purpose. Ask Jesus to let you see one person the way the father saw his son on the road, from a great way off, before they’ve said a word. When your insides move, don’t wait for them to make a speech. Go toward them.
Journal Prompts
- In Luke 15, the son rehearsed “make me as one of thy hired servants” but never got to say it. What speech have you been rehearsing for God, some way of earning your way back in? What would it mean to believe the compassion comes before the speech?
- 1 John 3:17 talks about shutting up your bowels of compassion. Think of a specific person you’ve closed yourself off from lately. What made you shut that door, and what would it look like to open it a little?
- Colossians 3:12 tells us to “put on” bowels of mercies like clothing. What’s one ordinary situation in your week (work, family, the drive home) where you could deliberately put on compassion before you walk in?
Prayer
Lord Jesus, when You saw the crowds, the grieving widow, the sick and the lost, Your insides turned over for them, and You moved toward them. Thank You that the father in Your story ran down the road before the son could finish his speech. I come the same way, with my rehearsed excuses, and I ask You to meet me before I get to the gate. Where I’ve shut up my compassion toward someone who needs it, open it again. Let me put on Your splanchna today, and let what moves in me move my hands and feet too. Amen.
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The Greek word for compassion in the Gospels, splagchnizomai, literally means to be moved in your gut. And it’s used almost only of Jesus. [Post URL]
In the prodigal son story, the father “had compassion, and ran” before his son said a single word. The son never got to finish his rehearsed speech. [Post URL]
FAQ
What is the Greek word for compassion in the Bible?
The main New Testament word is σπλαγχνίζομαι (splagchnizomai), pronounced splangkh-NID-zoh-my, Strong’s G4697. It means “to be moved with compassion” and comes from splanchna, the inner organs. It appears 12 times, all in Matthew, Mark and Luke, as in Matthew 14:14: Jesus “was moved with compassion toward them, and he healed their sick.”
What does “bowels of compassion” mean in the KJV?
“Bowels” translates the Greek noun splanchna, the inner organs, which Greek speakers treated as the seat of deep feeling, the way we talk about the heart. So “bowels of compassion” (1 John 3:17) and “bowels of mercies” (Colossians 3:12) mean heartfelt, gut-deep compassion. Modern translations usually render it “heart” or “compassion.”
Is splagchnizomai used of anyone besides Jesus?
Only within Jesus’ own parables and once in a request. It describes the master who forgives a debt (Matthew 18:27), the Good Samaritan (Luke 10:33) and the prodigal son’s father (Luke 15:20). In Mark 9:22 a desperate father asks Jesus to “have compassion on us.” The Gospel writers never use it to describe the disciples or anyone else’s feelings.
What is the difference between compassion and mercy in Greek?
Splagchnizomai describes compassion felt inwardly, in the gut. Eleos (G1656), usually translated “mercy,” leans toward kindness shown to someone in need. The two often go together. In Matthew 18 the master is “moved with compassion” (splagchnizomai) in verse 27, but in verse 33 he describes what he did for the servant with the verb from eleos, “I had pity on thee.”
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