Category: Precepts

PRECEPT

pre’-sept:

A commandment, an authoritative rule for action; in the Scriptures generally a divine injunction in which man’s obligation is set forth (Latin praeceptum, from praecipere, “to instruct”).

Four words are so rendered in the King James Version:

(1) mitswah, very frequently (168 times) translated “commandment,” but 4 times “precept” (in the Revised Version (British and American) only Jeremiah 35:18; Daniel 9:5);

(2) from the same root is tsaw, or tsaw (Isaiah 28:10,13);

(3) piqqudhim, only in the Psalms (21 times in Psalms 119, e.g. verses 4,15,27; also the Revised Version (British and American) Psalms 19:8; 103:18; 111:7);

(4) in the New Testament, entole, generally in the King James Version translated “commandment” (68 times), but twice “precept” (Mark 10:5; Hebrews 9:19; in both cases the Revised Version (British and American) substitutes “commandment”).