# G1080 - gennao **Strong's:** [G1080](https://www.blueletterbible.org/lexicon/g1080/) · BLB lookup **Pronunciation:** ghen-nah'-o **Part of speech:** verb **Root:** from a variation of *genos*, "race, kind, offspring" **NT occurrences:** frequent, roughly a hundred, concentrated in Matthew's genealogy ([Matt 1:2](/codex/matthew-1-2/)-16), the new-birth discourse ([John 3:3](/codex/john-3-3/)-8), and the *born of God* formula in 1 John *Gennaō* is the verb behind two doctrines that sound unrelated and are governed by the same word: the **eternal generation of the Son** ("begotten, not made") and the **new birth** of the believer ("born of God"). It is also the word the fourth-century Arian controversy turned on, because "begotten" was read by Arius as conceding that the Son had a beginning. ## Semantic range (Thayer / BDAG) 1. **To beget, to father**, of the male parent, active voice (Matthew's genealogy) 2. **To bear, to give birth**, occasionally of the mother ([Luke 1:57](/codex/luke-1-57/)) 3. **To be born**, passive voice, of natural birth ([Matt 2:1](/codex/matthew-2-1/); [John 9:2](/codex/john-9-2/)) 4. **To be begotten of God**, of spiritual regeneration ([John 3:3](/codex/john-3-3/); [1 John 5:1](/codex/1-john-5-1/)) 5. **Figuratively, to produce or cause**, of quarrels produced by foolish speculation ([2 Tim 2:23](/codex/2-timothy-2-23/)) Voice does most of the work. The active is "to beget", almost always of a father; the passive is "to be born". Both senses run through the theological uses. ## NT uses that carry doctrinal weight ### The Psalm 2:7 citation, *egō sēmeron gegennēka se* > You are My Son, Today I have begotten You. ([Psalm 2:7](/codex/psalms-2-7/), NASB95) The line is quoted three times in the NT, each time of Christ: [Acts 13:33](/codex/acts-13-33/), [Hebrews 1:5](/codex/hebrews-1-5/), and [Hebrews 5:5](/codex/hebrews-5-5/). The verb is perfect active, *gegennēka*, "I have begotten." An honest reading has to note that the *referent of the "today"* is disputed. In [Acts 13:33](/codex/acts-13-33/) Paul applies the line in a resurrection-and-enthronement context, and many commentators read all three citations declaratively: the Son is publicly *declared* to be what He eternally is (compare [Rom 1:4](/codex/romans-1-4/), "declared the Son of God with power by the resurrection"). On that reading, [Psalm 2:7](/codex/psalms-2-7/) is not the primary proof text for eternal generation, and the doctrine rests instead on [John 1.14](/codex/john-1-14/) and [John 1.18](/codex/john-1-18/) (*monogenēs*), [John 5:26](/codex/john-5-26/) (the Father "granted the Son also to have life in Himself"), and the Father-Son relation as such. ### The new birth, [John 3:3](/codex/john-3-3/)-8 > That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. ([John 3:6](/codex/john-3-6/), NASB95) *Gennaō* in the passive with *anōthen* ("from above" / "again") is the vocabulary of regeneration. The same verb that names the Son's eternal relation to the Father names the believer's derived, created sonship. The two are not the same relation, and the NT keeps them apart lexically at one crucial point: believers are *tekna*, children, while Jesus is *huios*, Son ([John 1:12](/codex/john-1-12/) against [1:14](/codex/john-1-14/)), and only Jesus is *monogenēs*. ### *Born of God*, 1 John The perfect passive participle *gegennēmenos ek tou theou* is the structural refrain of 1 John ([2:29](/codex/1-john-2-29/); [3:9](/codex/1-john-3-9/); [4:7](/codex/1-john-4-7/); [5:1](/codex/1-john-5-1/); [5:4](/codex/1-john-5-4/); [5:18](/codex/1-john-5-18/)). The perfect tense matters: a completed begetting with an abiding result, not a repeated event. ## The Nicene use, *gennēthenta ou poiēthenta* The Nicene Creed confesses the Son as *gennēthenta ou poiēthenta*, **begotten, not made**, and the whole fourth-century controversy is compressed into those four words. **The Arian argument.** Begetting implies a beginning. Every son is younger than his father. Therefore, if the Son is begotten, "there was when He was not" (*ēn pote hote ouk ēn*), and He is a creature, however exalted. **The Nicene reply, in three moves.** 1. **Begetting and making are different categories.** A creature is *made* by will, out of nothing, and is of a different nature than its maker. A son is *begotten* according to nature and is of the same nature as his father. Athanasius presses exactly this: creating belongs to God's will, begetting to God's nature (*Orationes contra Arianos* I.29; II.2). To make the Son a creature is to say God's nature is barren. 2. **The generation is eternal, not temporal.** Origen had already argued that the Father *always* begets the Son (*aei gennatai*), so the relation has no before and after (*De Principiis* I.2.4). Human begetting is temporal because human fathers are temporal; the argument from human analogy proves nothing about a timeless begetter. 3. **The generation is necessary, not voluntary.** The Father does not choose to have a Son the way He chooses to create a world. The Son is not contingent, so there is no possible state of affairs in which the Father is Sonless. The Arian objection therefore trades on importing the temporal and volitional features of *creaturely* begetting into a relation the creed defines by contrast with making. See [Arianism](/codex/arianism/) and [Trinity Invented at Nicaea Objection Defeater](/codex/trinity-invented-at-nicaea-objection-defeater/). ## Lexical caution *Monogenēs* ([G3439 - monogenes](/codex/g3439-monogenes/), "only begotten" in older translations) is **not** built from *gennaō*. It is *monos* ("only") plus *genos* ("kind"), so the emphasis falls on *one of a kind, unique*, not on an act of begetting. Arguments for eternal generation that lean on the etymology of *monogenēs* are leaning on the wrong root. The doctrine is better argued from the Father-Son relation itself, from [John 5:26](/codex/john-5-26/), and from the *ek tou Patros* language of [John 1:14](/codex/john-1-14/), than from a false etymology. ## Theological force - **Same nature, not lesser nature.** What a father begets is of his own kind. Begotten-language, correctly read, is an argument *for* the Son's deity, not against it. - **No divine solitude.** If the Father eternally begets, the Father was never without the Son, so love and relation are internal to God rather than acquired at creation. See [Trinity Love-Overflow Argument](/codex/trinity-love-overflow-argument/). - **Adoption is derivative.** Believers are begotten of God by the Spirit, in a created and gracious sense. The Son's sonship is the pattern, never the peer, of ours. ## See also - [G3439 - monogenes](/codex/g3439-monogenes/), only-begotten / unique, the word often confused with this one - [G5207 - huios](/codex/g5207-huios/), Son - [G3962 - pater](/codex/g3962-pater/), Father - [G3776 - ousia](/codex/g3776-ousia/), essence, the other Nicene flashpoint word - [G1607 - ekporeuomai](/codex/g1607-ekporeuomai/), to proceed, the parallel term for the Spirit's mode of origin - [G1096 - ginomai](/codex/g1096-ginomai/), to come into being, the verb John withholds from the Word in [John 1:1](/codex/john-1-1/)-3 - [Trinity](/codex/trinity/), the doctrine this verb anchors - [Arianism](/codex/arianism/), the position that read "begotten" as "created" - [John 3.3](/codex/john-3-3/), the new-birth discourse where the same verb carries the derived sense ## Notes _Lexical workspace for gennaō._ --- _Scripture quotations taken from the **New American Standard Bible®** (NASB), Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995 by **The Lockman Foundation**. Used by permission. All rights reserved. [www.lockman.org](https://www.lockman.org)_