International Standard Bible Encyclopedia: Virtue

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International Standard Bible Encyclopedia: Virtue


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vûr´t̬u: This word has two quite distinct meanings in the King James Version: (1) It was formerly often used in the now obsolete sense of “manly power,” “valor,” “efficacy” (Latin, virtus, “manly strength” or “excellence,” from vir, “man”):

“Trust in thy single virtue; for thy soldiers

All levied in thy name, have in thy name

Took their discharge.”

- Shakespeare, King Lear, V, iii, 103 ff.

It was also used in the sense of a mighty work, a miracle. Thus Wycliffe translates : “Thanne Jhesus bigan to saye repreef to cities in whiche ful many vertues of him weren don.” So in the King James Version, ; ; , in the sense of “power,” “miraculous energy or influence” (δύναμις, dúnamis, “inherent power, residing in the nature of a thing”; contrast ἐξουσία, exousı́a, “power arising from external opportunity or liberty of action”). In these passages it is translated in the Revised Version (British and American) “power” (as elsewhere in the King James Version; compare , etc.). (2) In its ordinary modern meaning of “moral goodness” it occurs in the King James Version and the Revised Version (British and American) The Wisdom of Solomon 4:1; 5:13; 8:7; ; , . In these passages it stands for ἀρετή, aretḗ, the usual classical term for “moral excellence” (originally “fitness” of any sort), used in Septuagint to translate words meaning “glory,” “praiseworthiness,” as in ; ; (of God); (of the Messiah). The Septuagint sense may color the meaning of the word as applied to God in the Revised Version (British and American); as also in its plural use (of God) in (the King James Version “praises,” the Revised Version (British and American) “excellencies”).

The adjective “virtuous” occurs in the King James Version, the English Revised Version ; ; (the American Standard Revised Version “worthy”), and the adverb “virtuously” in (the American Standard Revised Version “worthily”), in each case for חיל, ḥayil, “strength,” “force” (whether of body or of mind), then in a moral sense of “worth,” “virtue.”