sōma (σῶμα)
- Language: Greek
- Romanized: sōma
- Original script: σῶμα
- Gloss: body
The Eucharistic word at the heart of This Is My Body. Sōma is the noun lifted with the bread at the Last Supper and carried through the institution narratives and Pauline tradition.
Concordance Aid
Reading Note
Example passages: Luke 22:19; 1 Corinthians 10:16-17; 1 Corinthians 11:24; Romans 12:1.
Sōma gives the Supper its embodied grammar. “This is my body” is not a nutrition claim and not a mere ornament. It gathers bread, personhood, memory, and presence into one sentence.
Translation Range
Body, embodied person, bodily self.
Not To Be Confused With
Sōma is not identical with sarx. The first can name the body as a whole; the second often foregrounds fleshly, mortal, or vulnerable life.
Translator’s Choice
“Body” is straightforward, but the interpretive question is not the dictionary gloss. The question is how bread, body, remembrance, and presence are held together in Christian reading.
Related entries
- Sarx — flesh
- Eucharisteo — to give thanks
- Artos — bread, loaf
- Prosphora — offering loaves