John 7:35

To the Highways and Byways

Ἕλλην (Hellēn) acquired the religio-cultural meaning of ‘outcast/gentile’ within certain Second Temple and early Christian contexts, especially in Hellenistic Jewish and early Christian literature. 

1. Original Ethnic Meaning:

In archaic and classical Greek, Ἕλλην referred strictly to Greeks—initially a tribe from Thessaly, then all Greek-speaking peoples united by language, religion, and culture.

2. Religious and Cultural Reframing (LXX and NT):

In Septuagint (LXX) and New Testament Greek, Ἕλληνες came to mean Gentiles, i.e., non-Jews. This reflects not merely an ethnic, but a religio-cultural binary:

• Ἕλληνες vs. Ἰουδαῖοι (Jews) "Casters"

  • Isaiah 9:12 LXX: "The Syrians from the east and the Hellenes from the west..."

  • 1 Maccabees 1–2: Hellenistic customs are associated with apostasy and cultural betrayal.

  • Romans 1:16: "To the Jew first and also to the Gentiles/Greek [Ἕλλην]” – here signifying non-Jews, i.e., pagans.

This binary acquired a moral-religious dimension: The Ἕλλην is not just an outsider ethnically, but spiritually alien, often associated with idolatry, licentiousness, or philosophical pride in early Christian polemic.

3. The Sense of "Outcast/Outsider"

While Ἕλλην was once a title of cultural prestige, in Jewish and early Christian thought, it would carry connotations of foreignness and alienation from divine covenant and moral distance from Jewish law or Christian gospel. In some Christian fathers: "Hellene" = unbeliever, pagan, idolater, to be distinguished from the "community of the faithful."

Thus, in this religious reconfiguration, Ἕλλην functioned semi-synonymously with:

• ἔθνη (the nations)

• ἀλλόφυλος (foreign tribes)

• ἀνόσιος (unholy)

Overall, it religiously and culturally marked a person as “outside” the "elect community."