Evangelium

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. A term often denoting the Christian gospel or the proclamation of the good news of Jesus Christ
2. A word used to refer to a teaching or doctrine of salvation, especially in a religious context
3. An expression that signifies the message of redemption and spiritual truth in Christianity

Etymology: "Evangelium" is the Latin form of a Greek word, "euangelion," built from "eu" ("good") and "angelos" ("messenger" or "announcement"). Its original sense was the reward given to a messenger who brought good tidings, and the Greeks used the plural form for good news of a victory or a happy event. The same pattern gives English "angel," which came from "angelos" as a word for a messenger, and the messenger sense was preserved in the Greek Bible. The word passed into Latin as "evangelium" and then into Old English, where it entered as "godspel," a native compound meaning "good story" or "good tale." English thus has two layers for the same idea: "gospel" is the older Germanic version, while "evangelism" and "evangelical" came later as learned borrowings from the Latin form. Early Christian writers used "evangelium" for the message of Jesus's life and teaching, and the term came to name the four accounts of that life in the New Testament. The Old English rendering "godspel" was later reshaped in Middle English, and the modern noun "gospel" still reflects that medieval tradition.

Synonyms: gospel, good news, message