ἀπέχω
to hold off
‘to hold off’ is one of 3 main senses fuller range ↓
Full lexicon entry — Thayer's Greek Lexicon
From Thayer's Greek Lexicon
Where this word appears
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).
Voice
- Middle
- The subject acts on or for itself, or with special interest in the action.
- Active
- The subject performs the action.
Mood
- Infinitive
- A verbal noun (“to write”), unmarked for person or number.
- Indicative
- States a fact or asks a factual question (the mood of reality).
- Participle
- A verbal adjective (“writing,” “having written”).
- Subjunctive
- Expresses probability, purpose, or possibility (the mood of contingency).
- Imperative
- Expresses a command or request.
Case
- Genitive
- The case of source, possession, or “of” — answers “whose / from what.”
- Accusative
- The case of the direct object and of extent.
Person
- 3rd person
- The one spoken about (“he / she / it / they”).
- 1st person
- The speaker (“I / we”).
- 2nd person
- The one addressed (“you”).
Gender
- Masculine
- Grammatically masculine.
- Feminine
- Grammatically feminine.
Number
- Plural
- More than one.
- Singular
- One.
Grammatical forms 9 distinct
- Verb, Present, Middle, Infinitive 5 times (28%)
- Verb, Present, Active, Indicative, 3rd person, Plural 3 times (17%)
- Verb, Present, Active, Indicative, 3rd person, Singular 3 times (17%)
- Verb, Present, Active, Participle, Genitive, Singular, Masculine 2 times (11%)
- Verb, Present, Active, Indicative, 1st person, Singular 1 time (6%)
- Verb, Present, Active, Indicative, 2nd person, Plural 1 time (6%)
- Verb, Present, Active, Participle, Accusative, Singular, Feminine 1 time (6%)
- Verb, Present, Active, Subjunctive, 2nd person, Singular 1 time (6%)
+1 more form (1 occurrence)
Parsed forms decoded from the imported morphology (Robinson–Tischendorf, public domain), counted across 18 parsed occurrences — not distinct verses.
Every verse where G568 appears — 18 distinct verses across 9 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 4 verses
- Matthew 6:2 ἀπέχουσιν pres act ind 3pl Therefore when you do merciful deeds, don't sound a trumpet before yourself, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, that they may get glory from men. Most assuredly I tell you, they have received their reward.
- Matthew 6:5 ἀπέχουσιν pres act ind 3pl "When you pray, you shall not be as the hypocrites, for they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and in the corners of the streets, that they may be seen by men. Most assuredly, I tell you, they have received their reward.
- Matthew 6:16 ἀπέχουσιν pres act ind 3pl "Moreover when you fast, don't be like the hypocrites, with sad faces. For they disfigure their faces, that they may be seen by men to be fasting. Most assuredly I tell you, they have received their reward.
- Matthew 15:8 ἀπέχει pres act ind 3sg 'These people draw near to me with their mouth, And honor me with their lips; But their heart is far from me.
Mark 2 verses
- Mark 7:6 ἀπέχει pres act ind 3sg He answered them, "Well did Isaiah prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written, 'This people honors me with their lips, But their heart is far from me.
- Mark 14:41 ἀπέχει pres act ind 3sg He came the third time, and said to them, "Sleep on now, and take your rest. It is enough. The hour has come. Behold, the Son of Man is betrayed into the hands of sinners.
Luke 4 verses
- Luke 6:24 ἀπέχετε pres act ind 2pl "But woe to you who are rich! For you have received your consolation.
- Luke 7:6 ἀπέχοντος pres act ptcp gen sg masc Jesus went with them. When he was now not far from the house, the centurion sent friends to him, saying to him, "Lord, don't trouble yourself, for I am not worthy for you to come under my roof.
- Luke 15:20 ἀπέχοντος pres act ptcp gen sg masc "He arose, and came to his father. But while he was still far off, his father saw him, and was moved with compassion, and ran, and fell on his neck, and kissed him.
- Luke 24:13 ἀπέχουσαν pres act ptcp acc sg fem Behold, two of them were going that very day to a village named Emmaus, which was sixty stadia from Jerusalem.
Acts 2 verses
- Acts 15:20 ἀπέχεσθαι pres mid inf but that we write to them that they abstain from the pollution of idols, from sexual immorality, from what is strangled, and from blood.
- Acts 15:29 ἀπέχεσθαι pres mid inf that you abstain from things sacrificed to idols, from blood, from things strangled, and from sexual immorality, from which if you keep yourselves, it will be well with you. Farewell."
Philippians 1 verse
1 Thessalonians 2 verses
1 Timothy 1 verse
Philemon 1 verse
1 Peter 1 verse
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.
At its core, απεχω (apéchō) means “to hold off.” It first appears in Matthew 6:2. It turns up in 18 verses across 9 books, an uncommon footprint. Ranging over 3 senses, it is not a single-sense word. It clusters with απο, απαγγελλω and απαγχομαι under a shared root. Each statement above links to its evidence; the full detail follows below.
Gloss history
Strong's 1890 vs modern scholarship
About this word
Strong's G568 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.
- 9 / 27
- NT books
- The word appears in 9 of 27 New Testament books.
- #664
- by frequency
- Top 1000 most frequent Greek words (rank 664 of 5,347 Greek words by occurrence).
View all 18 occurrences in the concordance →
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.
- Gospels 10 verses · 56%
- Lukan (Luke–Acts) 6 verses · 33%
- Pauline corpus 5 verses · 28%
- General (Catholic) Epistles 1 verse · 6%
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: They have 3×, Is 2×, Was 2×
- American Standard Version: They have 3×, Was 3×, Is 2×
- Berean Standard Bible: Abstain 3×, They already have 3×
- unfoldingWord Literal Text: Abstain 4×, Full 4×, They have 3×
King James Version Public Domain
Renders G568 across 11 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 4 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 G568 across 11 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 3 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 G568 across 18 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 12 renderings that appear only once — usually multi-word phrases or single function words the recovered tagging swept in, not distinct renderings. Not rendered by a distinct English word in 1 further occurrence.
unfoldingWord Literal Text CC BY-SA 4.0
Renders G568 across 26 tagged occurrences — most commonly:
Plus 7 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 3 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.
- have
- to be away, absent, distant
- to hold one's self off…
Word origin
Derived from απο (apó) (G575) — from.
Forms in the corpus
The 9 distinct written forms G568 takes in the Greek New Testament, most frequent first — each parse links to that tense’s occurrences in the concordance.
| Form | Parsing | Example | Uses |
|---|---|---|---|
| ἀπέχεσθαι apéchesthai | Verb, Present, Middle, Infinitive | Acts 15:20 | 5 |
| ἀπέχει apéchei | Verb, Present, Active, Indicative, 3rd person, Singular | Matthew 15:8 | 3 |
| ἀπέχουσιν apéchousin | Verb, Present, Active, Indicative, 3rd person, Plural | Matthew 6:2 | 3 |
| ἀπέχοντος apéchontos | Verb, Present, Active, Participle, Genitive, Singular, Masculine | Luke 7:6 | 2 |
| ἀπέχεσθε apéchesthe | Verb, Present, Middle, Imperative, 2nd person, Plural | 1 Thessalonians 5:22 | 1 |
| ἀπέχετε apéchete | Verb, Present, Active, Indicative, 2nd person, Plural | Luke 6:24 | 1 |
| ἀπέχουσαν apéchousan | Verb, Present, Active, Participle, Accusative, Singular, Feminine | Luke 24:13 | 1 |
| ἀπέχω apéchō | Verb, Present, Active, Indicative, 1st person, Singular | Philippians 4:18 | 1 |
| ἀπέχῃς apéchēs | Verb, Present, Active, Subjunctive, 2nd person, Singular | Philemon 1:15 | 1 |
Same root — word family
Other Thayer's entries built from the same root as G568, 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
- απαγγελλω apangéllō G518 to report
- απαγχομαι apánchomai G519 to strangle
- απαγω apágō G520 to lead away
- απαιρω apaírō G522 to take away
- απαιτεω apaitéō G523 to demand back
- απαλγεω apalgéō G524 to cease grieving
- απαλλασσω apallássō G525 to depart
- απαλλοτριοω apallotrióō G526 to estrange
- απανταω apantáō G528 to meet
- απαρνεομαι aparnéomai G533 to deny
- απαρτι apárti G534 henceforth
- απαρχη aparchḗ G536 to offer firstfruits
- απαυγασμα apaúgasma G541 brightness
- απειδω apeídō G542 to look away
- απειμι ápeimi G548 to depart
- απειμι ápeimi G549 to depart
- απειπομην apeipómēn G550 to declare
- απεκδεχομαι apekdéchomai G553 waiting for
- απεκδυομαι apekdýomai G554 to despoil
- απελαυνω apelaúnō G556 to drive away
- απελεγμος apelegmós G557 censure
- απελευθερος apeleútheros G558 freedman
- απελπιζω apelpízō G560 not despairing
- απεναντι apénanti G561 opposite
+85 more words share this root (not shown).
Derived from this word
Compare all same-root words → Showing 4 of 113 — not the complete family. They share a root, not necessarily a meaning.
Septuagint usage
The same Greek word απεχω appears 30 times in the Greek Old Testament (Septuagint), across 29 verses in 12 books.
- 30
- LXX occurrences
- Tagged occurrences of this Greek word in the Septuagint.
- 29
- verses
- Distinct Septuagint verses containing this word.
- 12 / 39
- OT books
- The word appears in 12 of the 39 Old Testament books.
Sample Septuagint occurrences
- Genesis 43:23 ἀποἔχω
- Numbers 32:19 ἀποἔχω
- Deuteronomy 12:21 ἀποἔχω
- 1 Samuel 21:6 ἀποἔχω
- Job 1:1 ἀποἔχω
- Psalms 102:12 ἀποἔχω
- Proverbs 3:27 ἀποἔχω
- Isaiah 29:13 ἀποἔχω
- Jeremiah 7:10 ἀποἔχω
- Ezekiel 8:6 ἀποἔχω
- Joel 1:13 ἀποἔχω
- Malachi 3:6 ἀποἔχω
Septuagint occurrences (same lexeme)
Every verse where the same Strong’s number (G568) 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.
- Genesis 43:23 ἀποἔχω He said, "Peace be to you. Don't be afraid. Your God, and the God of your father, has given you treasure in your sacks. I received your money." He brought Simeon out to them.
- Genesis 44:4 ἀποἔχω When they had gone out of the city, and were not yet far off, Joseph said to his steward, "Up, follow after the men. When you overtake them, ask them, 'Why have you rewarded evil for good?
- Numbers 32:19 ἀποἔχω For we will not inherit with them on the other side of the Jordan, and forward; because our inheritance is fallen to us on this side of the Jordan eastward.
- Deuteronomy 12:21 ἀποἔχω If the place which Yahweh your God shall choose, to put his name there, be too far from you, then you shall kill of your herd and of your flock, which Yahweh has given you, as I have commanded you; and you may eat within your gates, after all the desire of your soul.
- Deuteronomy 18:22 ἀποἔχω when a prophet speaks in the name of Yahweh, if the thing doesn't follow, nor happen, that is the thing which Yahweh has not spoken: the prophet has spoken it presumptuously, you shall not be afraid of him.
- 1 Samuel 21:6 ἀποἔχω So the priest gave him holy [bread]; for there was no bread there but the show bread, that was taken from before Yahweh, to put hot bread in the day when it was taken away.
- Job 1:1 ἀποἔχω There was a man in the land of Uz, whose name was Job. That man was blameless and upright, and one who feared God, and turned away from evil.
- Job 1:8 ἀποἔχω Yahweh said to Satan, "Have you considered my servant, Job? For there is none like him in the earth, a blameless and an upright man, one who fears God, and turns away from evil."
- Job 2:3 ἀποἔχω Yahweh said to Satan, "Have you considered my servant Job? For there is none like him in the earth, a blameless and an upright man, one who fears God, and turns away from evil. He still maintains his integrity, although you incited me against him, to ruin him without cause."
- Job 13:21 ἀποἔχω Withdraw your hand far from me; And don't let your terror make me afraid.
- Job 28:28 ἀποἔχω To man he said, 'Behold, the fear of the Lord, that is wisdom. To depart from evil is understanding.'"
- Psalms 102:12 ἀποἔχω But you, Yahweh, will abide forever; Your renown endures to all generations.
- Proverbs 3:27 ἀποἔχω Don't withhold good from those to whom it is due, When it is in the power of your hand to do it.
- Proverbs 9:18 ἀποἔχω But he doesn't know that the dead are there, That her guests are in the depths of Sheol.
- Proverbs 15:29 ἀποἔχω Yahweh is far from the wicked, But he hears the prayer of the righteous.
- Proverbs 22:5 ἀποἔχω Thorns and snares are in the path of the wicked: Whoever guards his soul stays from them.
- Proverbs 23:4 ἀποἔχω Don't weary yourself to be rich. In your wisdom, show restraint.
- Proverbs 23:13 ἀποἔχω Don't withhold correction from a child. If you punish him with the rod, he will not die.
- Isaiah 29:13 ἀποἔχω The Lord said, Because this people draw near [to me], and with their mouth and with their lips to honor me, but have removed their heart far from me, and their fear of me is a commandment of men which has been taught [them];
- Isaiah 54:14 ἀποἔχω In righteousness shall you be established: you shall be far from oppression, for you shall not be afraid; and from terror, for it shall not come near you.
- Isaiah 55:9 ἀποἔχω For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts.
- Jeremiah 7:10 ἀποἔχω and come and stand before me in this house, which is called by my name, and say, We are delivered; that you may do all these abominations?
- Ezekiel 8:6 ἀποἔχω He said to me, Son of man, see you what they do? even the great abominations that the house of Israel do commit here, that I should go far off from my sanctuary? but you shall again see yet other great abominations.
- Ezekiel 11:15 ἀποἔχω Son of man, your brothers, even your brothers, the men of your relatives, and all the house of Israel, all of them, [are they] to whom the inhabitants of Jerusalem have said, Get you far from Yahweh; to us is this land given for a possession.
- Ezekiel 22:5 ἀποἔχω Those who are near, and those who are far from you, shall mock you, you infamous one [and] full of tumult.
- Joel 1:13 ἀποἔχω Put on sackcloth and mourn, you priests! Wail, you ministers of the altar. Come, lie all night in sackcloth, you ministers of my God, For the meal offering and the drink offering are withheld from your God's house.
- Joel 2:8 ἀποἔχω Neither does one jostle another; They march everyone in his path, And they burst through the defenses, And don't break ranks.
- Joel 4:8 ἀποἔχω
- Malachi 3:6 ἀποἔχω "For I, Yahweh, don't change; therefore you, sons of Jacob, are not consumed.
These are occurrences of the same Greek lexeme (G568) 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.
