WW_Love_Greek Words for Love

I. Greek Words for Love

01. Agapao / αγαπάω: Pronunciation: ag-ap-ah'-o; verb; Description: to love (in a social or moral sense): --(be-)love(-ed). To love, indicates a direction of the will and finding one’s joy in anything. [Unlike phileo, to be contented with, denoting common interests, hence befriending.] Agapao is used of God’s love toward man and vice versa, but phileo is never used of the love of men toward God. Agapao and never phileo is used of love toward our enemies. The range of phileo is wider than that of agapao, which stands higher above phileo because of its moral import; love that expresses compassion. As used of God, it expresses the deep and constant love and interest of a perfect Being toward entirely unworthy objects, producing and fostering a reverential love in them towards the Giver and a practical love towards those who are partakers of the same, and a desire to help others to seek the Giver. It is an unselfish love, ready to serve

02. Agape / αγάπη: Pronunciation: ag-ah'-pay; noun; Description: Love, i.e. affection or benevolence; specially (plural) a love-feast: --(feast of) charity([-ably]), dear, love. A word only found in revealed religion. Translated “charity”, meaning benevolent love. Its benevolence, however, is not shown by doing what the person loved desires but what the one who loves deems as needed by the one loved. “For God so loved…” What He gave man was not what man wanted but needed. It is God’s willful direction toward man. But for man to show love to God, he must first appropriate God’s agape. For only God has such an unselfish love. Philia [noun for phileo] is friendship based on having common interests.
Both agapao and agape are used to describe the attitude of God toward His Son; to convey His will to His children concerning their attitude one toward another; and to express the essential nature of God. It is an exercise of the Divine will in deliberate choice. Love had its perfect expression among men in the Lord Jesus; and Christian love is the fruit of His Spirit in the Christian. It is not an impulse from feelings. It doesn’t always run with natural inclinations.

03. Phileo / φιλέω: Pronunciation: fil-eh'-o; verb; Description: To be a friend to (fond of [an individual or an object]), i.e. have affection for (denoting personal attachment, as a matter of sentiment or feeling. While agapao is wider, embracing especially the judgment and the deliberate assent of the will as a matter of principle, duty and propriety: the two thus stand related; phileo being chiefly of the heart and agapao of the head); specifically, to kiss (as a mark of tenderness): --kiss, love. To be distinguished from agapao in this, that phileo more nearly represents tender affection. Both words are used for the love of the Father for the Son. Phileo conveys the thought of cherishing the Object above all else, of manifesting an affection characterized by constancy, from the motive of the highest veneration.

04. Philagathos / φιλάγαθος: Pronunciation: fil-ag'-ath-os; noun; Description: Fond of good, i.e. a promoter of virtue: love of good.

05. Philandros / φίλανδρος: Pronunciation: fil'-an-dros; adj.; Description: Fond of man, i.e. affectionate as a wife: love for their husbands.

06. Philanthropia / φιλανθρωπία: Pronunciation: fil-an-thro-pee'-ah; noun; Description: Love for man; hence, kindness.

07. Philostorgos / φιλόστοργος: Pronunciation: fil-os'-tor-gos; adj.; Description: Cherishing one's kindred, especially parents or children; fond of natural relatives, i.e. fraternal towards fellow Christian; kindly affectioned.

08. Philoteknos / φιλότεκνος: Pronunciation: fil-ot'-ek-nos; adj.; Description: Fond of one's children, i.e. maternal: love for their children.

09. Philotheos / φιλόθεος: Pronunciation: fil-oth'-eh-os; noun; Description: Fond of God, i.e. pious: lover of God.

10. Philoxenos / φιλόξενος: Pronunciation: fil-ox'-en-os; noun; Description: Lover of hospitality; loving strangers; fond of guests, i.e. hospitable, given to hospitality.

11. Philadelphia / φιλαδελφία: Pronunciation: fē-lä-del-fē'-ä; noun; Description: Love of brothers or sisters, brotherly love, brotherly kindness

12. Philoxenia / φιλοξενία: Pronunciation: fē-lo-kse-nē'-ä; noun; Description: love to strangers, hospitality