The Ekklesia – Church or Congregation

One thing all Messianic / Hebrew Roots people have in common is our habit of linguistically cleaning up the language, putting Yeshua for Jesus, YHWH for Jehovah etc. Well! here is one more for the correction file Congregation for Church.

Church is a very imprecise translation of the Greek word ekklesia which is literally a called out assembly.  It means a group of people, however it is not exclusively a group of people of faith.  It is also translated in Acts 19 as the mob in Ephesus that was in danger of being charged with rioting [Acts 19:40]

The word church comes from the Scottish kirk meaning the place of meeting, it referred to the temples, groves, or high places of ancient paganism.  It really means the building or place and not the people in it.

In Tyndale’s Translation he choose to use congregation for ekklesia.  A far superior choice.