διακρίνω
to distinguish
‘to distinguish’ is one of 5 main senses fuller range ↓
Full lexicon entry — Thayer's Greek Lexicon
From Thayer's Greek Lexicon
Where this word appears
See every Present-tense verb in the Greek New Testament →
Grammar key — what these labels mean
Part of speech
- Verb
- An action or state-of-being word.
Tense
- Present
- Ongoing or general action in present time (imperfective aspect).
- Aorist
- Action viewed as a simple whole, without regard to duration — often past (perfective aspect).
- Imperfect
- Continuous or repeated action in past time (“was writing”).
Voice
- Middle
- The subject acts on or for itself, or with special interest in the action.
- Active
- The subject performs the action.
- Passive
- The subject receives the action.
Mood
- Participle
- A verbal adjective (“writing,” “having written”).
- Indicative
- States a fact or asks a factual question (the mood of reality).
- Infinitive
- A verbal noun (“to write”), unmarked for person or number.
- Subjunctive
- Expresses probability, purpose, or possibility (the mood of contingency).
- Imperative
- Expresses a command or request.
Case
- Nominative
- The case of the subject (and the predicate nominative).
- Accusative
- The case of the direct object and of extent.
Person
- 3rd person
- The one spoken about (“he / she / it / they”).
- 2nd person
- The one addressed (“you”).
- 1st person
- The speaker (“I / we”).
Gender
- Masculine
- Grammatically masculine.
Number
- Singular
- One.
- Plural
- More than one.
Grammatical forms 15 distinct
- Verb, Present, Middle, Participle, Nominative, Singular, Masculine 5 times (26%)
- Verb, Aorist, Active, Indicative, 3rd person, Singular 1 time (5%)
- Verb, Aorist, Active, Infinitive 1 time (5%)
- Verb, Aorist, Active, Participle, Accusative, Singular, Masculine 1 time (5%)
- Verb, Aorist, Passive, Indicative, 2nd person, Plural 1 time (5%)
- Verb, Aorist, Passive, Indicative, 3rd person, Singular 1 time (5%)
- Verb, Aorist, Passive, Subjunctive, 2nd person, Plural 1 time (5%)
- Verb, Aorist, Passive, Subjunctive, 3rd person, Singular 1 time (5%)
+7 more forms (7 occurrences)
Parsed forms decoded from the imported morphology (Robinson–Tischendorf, public domain), counted across 19 parsed occurrences — not distinct verses.
Every verse where G1252 appears — 18 distinct verses across 7 books. Click any verse to open its interlinear word-by-word view. Verse text shown in the World English Bible for context — . Each verse’s Greek form is shown with its reference; the English is not keyword-highlighted, since the data carries no word-level English alignment. Use “Compare translations” on any verse to read it across multiple English versions. This concordance covers the Greek New Testament; Septuagint (Greek Old Testament) occurrences of this word are not indexed here.
Matthew 2 verses
- Matthew 16:3 διακρίνειν pres act inf In the morning, 'It will be foul weather today, for the sky is red and threatening.' Hypocrites! You know how to discern the appearance of the sky, but you can't discern the signs of the times!
- Matthew 21:21 διακριθῆτε aor pass subj 2pl Jesus answered them, "Most assuredly I tell you, if you have faith, and don't doubt, you will not only do what is done to the fig tree, but even if you told this mountain, 'Be taken up and cast into the sea,' it would be done.
Mark 1 verse
Acts 4 verses
- Acts 10:20 διακρινόμενος pres mid ptcp nom sg masc But arise, get down, and go with them, doubting nothing; for I have sent them."
- Acts 11:2 διεκρίνοντο impf mid ind 3pl When Peter had come up to Jerusalem, those who were of the circumcision contended with him,
- Acts 11:12 διακρίναντα aor act ptcp acc sg masc The Spirit told me to go with them, without discriminating. These six brothers also accompanied me, and we entered into the man's house.
- Acts 15:9 διέκρινεν aor act ind 3sg He made no distinction between us and them, cleansing their hearts by faith.
Romans 2 verses
- Romans 4:20 διεκρίθη aor pass ind 3sg Yet, looking to the promise of God, he didn't waver through unbelief, but grew strong through faith, giving glory to God,
- Romans 14:23 διακρινόμενος pres mid ptcp nom sg masc But he who doubts is condemned if he eats, because it isn't of faith; and whatever is not of faith is sin. (14:24) Now to him who is able to establish you according to my Gospel and the preaching of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery which has been kept secret through long ages, (14:25) but now is revealed, and by the Scriptures of the prophets, according to the commandment of the eternal God, is made known for obedience of faith to all the nations; (14:26) to the only wise God, through Jesus Christ, to whom be the glory forever! Amen.
1 Corinthians 5 verses
- 1 Corinthians 4:7 διακρίνει pres act ind 3sg For who makes you different? And what do you have that you didn't receive? But if you did receive it, why do you boast as if you had not received it?
- 1 Corinthians 6:5 διακρῖναι aor act inf I say this to move you to shame. Isn't there even one wise man among you who would be able to decide between his brothers?
- 1 Corinthians 11:29 διακρίνων pres act ptcp nom sg masc For he who eats and drinks in an unworthy manner eats and drinks judgment to himself, if he doesn't discern the Lord's body.
- 1 Corinthians 11:31 διεκρίνομεν impf act ind 1pl For if we discerned ourselves, we wouldn't be judged.
- 1 Corinthians 14:29 διακρινέτωσαν pres act impv 3pl Let the prophets speak, two or three, and let the others discern.
James 2 verses
- James 1:6 διακρινόμενος διακρινόμενος pres mid ptcp nom sg masc pres mid ptcp nom sg masc But let him ask in faith, without any doubting, for he who doubts is like a wave of the sea, driven by the wind and tossed.
- James 2:4 διεκρίθητε aor pass ind 2pl haven't you shown partiality among yourselves, and become judges with evil thoughts?
Jude 2 verses
- Jude 1:9 διακρινόμενος pres mid ptcp nom sg masc But Michael, the archangel, when contending with the devil and arguing about the body of Moses, dared not bring against him an abusive condemnation, but said, "May the Lord rebuke you!"
- Jude 1:22 διακρινομένους pres mid ptcp acc pl masc On some have compassion, making a distinction,
About this entry
At a glance — auto-summarized from this page’s data, not written by a person. Every figure links to its source below. This summary describes the numbers; it doesn’t interpret them.
“to distinguish” is the headline sense of the Greek verb διακρινω (diakrínō). Catalogued under 5 senses, its meaning is not single-sense. It turns up in 18 verses across 7 books, an uncommon footprint. It concentrates in 1 Corinthians, which alone accounts for 28% of its uses. First canonically at Matthew 16:3, it enters the text early. See the sense tree, 18-verse concordance, and the renderings breakdown below.
Gloss history
Strong's 1890 vs modern scholarship
About this word
Strong's G1252 catalogs a Greek word from the Greek New Testament.
These counts are not copied from any lexicon or concordance. They are computed here, from the morphology-tagged Greek New Testament. What Lemma adds →
- 18
- distinct verses
- The word appears in 18 distinct verses.
- 7 / 27
- NT books
- The word appears in 7 of 27 New Testament books.
- #644
- by frequency
- Top 1000 most frequent Greek words (rank 644 of 5,347 Greek words by occurrence).
View all 18 occurrences in the concordance →
Most concentrated in
- 1 Corinthians 5 verses 28%
- Acts 4 verses 22%
- Matthew 2 verses 11%
By section of the New Testament
By traditional corpus
Conventional, traditional groupings — biblical authorship is debated, so this is a traditional corpus grouping, not an authorship claim. Some books belong to more than one corpus (Luke is in both the Gospels and the Lukan corpus, and so on), so these shares overlap and need not total 100%. Each figure is a share of the word’s 18 distinct verses.
- Pauline corpus 7 verses · 39%
- Lukan (Luke–Acts) 4 verses · 22%
- General (Catholic) Epistles 4 verses · 22%
- Gospels 3 verses · 17%
How translations render this word
Counts come from each version’s own published word-to-Strong’s tagging or interlinear alignment — an approximate guide to how each version renders this word, not a word-level alignment the data otherwise carries. Because each total is that version’s own tagged count, the per-version totals vary from one another and need not match the appearance or distinct-verse counts above. These counts may also differ from a printed concordance because Lemma counts each distinctly tagged rendering and does not collapse phrase taggings into a single head-word total. This is a fixed set of word-tagged versions (KJV, ASV, BSB, ULT) and does not change with the reading translation you choose elsewhere. Each version’s license is shown beside its name below (and on Sources).
- King James Version: Doubt 2×, Doubting 2×, Judge 2×
- American Standard Version: Distinction 2×, Doubt 2×, Doubting 2×
- Berean Standard Bible: Doubt 2×, Hesitation 2×
- unfoldingWord Literal Text: Doubt 2×, Doubting 2×, He did 2×
King James Version Public Domain
Renders G1252 across 24 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 18 renderings that appear only once — usually multi-word phrases or single function words the recovered tagging swept in, not distinct renderings.
American Standard Version Public Domain
Renders G1252 across 23 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 15 renderings that appear only once — usually multi-word phrases or single function words the recovered tagging swept in, not distinct renderings.
Berean Standard Bible Public Domain
Renders G1252 across 19 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 15 renderings that appear only once — usually multi-word phrases or single function words the recovered tagging swept in, not distinct renderings.
unfoldingWord Literal Text CC BY-SA 4.0
Renders G1252 across 26 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 18 renderings that appear only once — usually multi-word phrases or single function words the recovered tagging swept in, not distinct renderings.
Senses in Thayer's
The 5 senses Thayer's distinguishes for this word, in lexicon order (not ranked by frequency or importance). The full entry — with sub-senses — is in the Lexicon Entry tab.
- to separate, make a distinction, discriminate, to prefer
- to learn by discrimination, to try, decide
- to withdraw from one, desert
- to separate one's self in a hostile spirit, to oppose, strive with dispute, contend
- to be at variance with one's self, hesitate, doubt
Word origin
Derived from δια (diá) (G1223) — through.
From G1223 and G2919 ; to separate thoroughly that is (literally and reflexively) to withdraw from or (by implication) oppose ; figuratively to discriminate (by implication decide ) or (reflexively) hesitate : - contend make (to) differ (-ence) discern doubt judge be partial stagger waver.
— Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance (1890), public domain.
Forms in the corpus
The 15 distinct written forms G1252 takes in the Greek New Testament, most frequent first — each parse links to that tense’s occurrences in the concordance.
Same root — word family
Other Thayer's entries built from the same root as G1252, grouped by Strong’s listed origin. These share a root / origin per the lexicon — not necessarily a shared meaning. Each links to that word’s own entry.
Derives from
Shares the same root
- διαβαινω diabaínō G1224 to pass through
- διαβαλλω diabállō G1225 to slander
- διαβεβαιοομαι diabebaióomai G1226 to affirm strongly
- διαβλεπω diablépō G1227 to look through
- διαγγελλω diangéllō G1229 to proclaim
- διαγινομαι diagínomai G1230 to continue
- διαγινωσκω diaginṓskō G1231 to ascertain
- διαγογγυζω diagongýzō G1234 to murmur
- διαγρηγορεω diagrēgoréō G1235 to watch through
- διαγω diágō G1236 to lead through
- διαδεχομαι diadéchomai G1237 to receive in succession
- διαδημα diádēma G1238 diadem
- διαδιδωμι diadídōmi G1239 to distribute
- διαζωννυμι diazṓnnymi G1241 to gird around
- διαιρεω diairéō G1244 to divide
- διακαθαριζω diakatharízō G1245 to cleanse thoroughly
- διακατελεγχομαι diakatelénchomai G1246 to confute
- διακουομαι diakoúomai G1251 to hear fully
- διακωλυω diakōlýō G1254 to hinder
- διαλαλεω dialaléō G1255 to converse
- διαλεγομαι dialégomai G1256 to discuss
- διαλειπω dialeípō G1257 to intermit
- διαλλασσω diallássō G1259 to reconcile
- διαλογιζομαι dialogízomai G1260 to deliberate
+62 more words share this root (not shown).
Derived from this word
Compare all same-root words → Showing 4 of 89 — not the complete family. They share a root, not necessarily a meaning.
Septuagint usage
The same Greek word διακρινω appears 23 times in the Greek Old Testament (Septuagint), across 23 verses in 13 books.
- 23
- LXX occurrences
- Tagged occurrences of this Greek word in the Septuagint.
- 23
- verses
- Distinct Septuagint verses containing this word.
- 13 / 39
- OT books
- The word appears in 13 of the 39 Old Testament books.
Sample Septuagint occurrences
- Exodus 18:16 διακρίνω
- Leviticus 24:12 διακρίνω
- Deuteronomy 33:7 διακρίνω
- 1 Kings 3:9 διακρίνω
- 1 Chronicles 26:29 διακρίνω
- Job 9:14 διακρίνω
- Psalms 49:4 διακρίνω
- Proverbs 31:9 διακρίνω
- Ecclesiastes 3:18 διακρίνω
- Jeremiah 15:10 διακρίνω
- Ezekiel 20:35 διακρίνω
- Joel 4:2 διακρίνω
Septuagint occurrences (same lexeme)
Every verse where the same Strong’s number (G1252) appears in the Greek Septuagint. Verse text shown in the World English Bible for context; the Greek form is the matched word — the English is not keyword-highlighted.
- Exodus 18:16 διακρίνω When they have a matter, they come to me, and I judge between a man and his neighbor, and I make them know the statutes of God, and his laws."
- Leviticus 24:12 διακρίνω They put him in custody, until the will of Yahweh should be declared to them.
- Deuteronomy 33:7 διακρίνω This is [the blessing] of Judah: and he said, Hear, Yahweh, the voice of Judah, Bring him in to his people. With his hands he contended for himself; You shall be a help against his adversaries.
- 1 Kings 3:9 διακρίνω Give your servant therefore an understanding heart to judge your people, that I may discern between good and evil; for who is able to judge this your great people?
- 1 Chronicles 26:29 διακρίνω Of the Izharites, Chenaniah and his sons were for the outward business over Israel, for officers and judges.
- Job 9:14 διακρίνω How much less shall I answer him, Choose my words to argue with him?
- Job 12:11 διακρίνω Doesn't the ear try words, Even as the palate tastes its food?
- Job 15:5 διακρίνω For your iniquity teaches your mouth, And you choose the language of the crafty.
- Job 21:22 διακρίνω "Shall any teach God knowledge, Seeing he judges those who are high?
- Job 23:10 διακρίνω But he knows the way that I take. When he has tried me, I shall come forth like gold.
- Psalms 49:4 διακρίνω I will incline my ear to a proverb. I will open my riddle on the harp.
- Psalms 81:1 διακρίνω Sing aloud to God, our strength! Make a joyful shout to the God of Jacob!
- Proverbs 31:9 διακρίνω Open your mouth, judge righteously, And serve justice to the poor and needy."
- Ecclesiastes 3:18 διακρίνω I said in my heart, "As for the sons of men, God tests them, so that they may see that they themselves are like animals.
- Jeremiah 15:10 διακρίνω Woe is me, my mother, that you have borne me a man of strife and a man of contention to the whole earth! I have not lent, neither have men lent to me; [yet] everyone of them does curse me.
- Ezekiel 20:35 διακρίνω and I will bring you into the wilderness of the peoples, and there will I enter into judgment with you face to face.
- Ezekiel 20:36 διακρίνω Like as I entered into judgment with your fathers in the wilderness of the land of Egypt, so will I enter into judgment with you, says the Lord Yahweh.
- Ezekiel 34:17 διακρίνω As for you, O my flock, thus says the Lord Yahweh: Behold, I judge between sheep and sheep, the rams and the male goats.
- Ezekiel 34:20 διακρίνω Therefore thus says the Lord Yahweh to them: Behold, I, even I, will judge between the fat sheep and the lean sheep.
- Ezekiel 44:24 διακρίνω In a controversy they shall stand to judge; according to my ordinances shall they judge it: and they shall keep my laws and my statutes in all my appointed feasts; and they shall make my Sabbaths holy.
- Joel 4:2 διακρίνω
- Joel 4:12 διακρίνω
- Zechariah 3:7 διακρίνω "Thus says Yahweh of hosts: 'If you will walk in my ways, and if you will keep my charge, then you also shall judge my house, and shall also keep my courts, and I will give you a place of access among these who stand by.
These are occurrences of the same Greek lexeme (G1252) in the Septuagint — not a translation of any one Hebrew word. The store carries no word-level Hebrew↔Greek alignment, so no Hebrew original is asserted here. Counts come from the recovered LXX Strong's tagging — high-frequency vocabulary is well covered, while rare or late forms may be untagged — so they reflect tagged occurrences and may slightly undercount.
