[xupybd]

Really there is Greek specific to Christian use? That's interesting.

I'll have to look into that. It makes sense that different groups used different worlds. There are English terms like sanctification that you don't hear outside Christian circles.

[twic]

The word 'agape' existed before Christianity, and meant something broadly similar - some kind of love, not necessarily romantic or sexual.

It seems to me that the precise nuance varied a lot over time. For example, the Septuagint, the translation of the Hebrew scriptures into Greek in ~200 BC, uses it for all forms of love, including in the extremely saucy Song of Solomon [1]. The 20th Delphic maxim (~600 BC) is "Φιλίαν ἀγάπα", which means something like "desire friendship" [2]. In the Odyssey (~700 BC), Eurycleia describes Telemachus as "μοῦνος ἐὼν ἀγαπητός", meaning Odysseus's "only and beloved" son [3].

[1] https://www.patheos.com/blogs/tomhobson/2018/04/how-did-agap...

[2] https://www.hellenion.org/essays-on-hellenic-polytheism/delp...

[3] https://www.loebclassics.com/view/homer-odyssey/1919/pb_LCL1...

[RichardCA]

The basic rule is that if the subject of debate is in the Old Testament you look at the Hebrew, and in the New Testament you look at the Greek.

I was fortunate to have a teacher in High School who explained this to the class. He was my Physics teacher.

[haunter]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greek_words_for_love