Lexicon

G5046 - teleios

Strong's: G5046 · BLB lookup Pronunciation: tel'-i-os Part of speech: adjective Root: from G5056 - telos, τέλος, "end, goal, completion" NT occurrences: ~19

Semantic range (Thayer / BDAG)

The semantic core is completion / having reached the goal, telos (end / goal) being the root. Teleios describes a thing that has arrived at its intended end-state:

Brought to completion, finished, fulfilled, having reached its proper end (Philippians 3:12, Paul "not yet teleioumai" / not yet brought to completion).
Lacking nothing necessary, complete, whole, entire; nothing missing for its purpose (James 1:4).
Mature, full-grown, of full age (vs nēpios, infant / immature), developmental sense (1 Corinthians 14:20; Hebrews 5:14; Ephesians 4:13).
Morally / spiritually mature, complete in character, the ethical-spiritual application (Matthew 5:48; James 1:4).
(Of God) absolutely perfect, lacking nothing, divine completeness (Matthew 5:48 of the Father).

Theological force, Matthew 5:48

The verse Jesus speaks to His disciples in the Sermon on the Mount:

Esesthe oun hymeis teleioi hōs ho patēr hymōn ho ouranios teleios estin, "You shall be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect" (Matthew 5:48)

The verse generates a major theological dispute: what level of perfection is commanded?

Three readings:

Sinless perfection / perfectionism (some Wesleyan-holiness traditions; perfectionism in Pentecostalism). Jesus literally commands sinlessness. Defended by appeal to "be perfect" as imperative.
Completeness / wholeness in love (the Wesleyan "Christian perfection" doctrine, rightly understood, Wesley's A Plain Account of Christian Perfection, 1766). The verse commands love-perfected, a heart wholly given over to God in love. Not sinless flawlessness but complete devotion. The context (Matthew 5:43-47, love of enemies) supports this reading.
Goal-direction / aspirational (most Reformed). The verse commands the direction of the Christian life (full conformity to God's character) without claiming this is achievable in this life. Sanctification is real but progressive; perfection awaits glorification (1 John 3:2).

The lexical case: teleios primarily means complete / mature / having reached the goal, not "sinless flawlessness." Jewish-Greek usage (LXX, Philo, Josephus) uses teleios for sacrificial animals "without blemish" (Leviticus 22:21 LXX), for fully-developed humans, for completed buildings, etc. The semantic range tilts toward completeness-fitting-purpose rather than flawless-perfection-in-the-abstract.

The Matthew 5:48 immediate context (love of enemies, vv. 43-47) frames it: "be teleios in love as your Father is teleios in love", His love covers both the just and unjust (v. 45); ours should too.

Wider NT applications

Maturity vs infancy (developmental sense):

1 Corinthians 14:20, "do not be children (paidia) in your thinking; yet in evil be infants (nēpiazete), but in your thinking be mature (teleioi)"
Ephesians 4:13, "until we all attain… to a mature (teleion) man"
Philippians 3:15, "as many as are perfect (teleioi), have this attitude"
Hebrews 5:14, "solid food is for the mature (teleiōn)"
Hebrews 6:1, "let us press on to maturity (teleiotēta, the cognate noun)"

Completeness lacking nothing:

James 1:4, "let endurance have its perfect (teleion) result, so that you may be perfect (teleioi) and complete (holoklēroi), lacking in nothing"
James 1:17, every "perfect (teleion) gift is from above"
James 1:25, "the perfect (teleion) law"
James 3:2, "if anyone does not stumble in word, he is a perfect (teleios) man"
1 John 4:18, "perfect (teleia) love casts out fear"

Christological / ultimate:

Hebrews 7:28, Christ as the high priest "made perfect (teteleiōmenon) forever"
Hebrews 9:11, "the greater and more perfect (teleioteras) tabernacle"
Hebrews 12:23, "the spirits of the righteous made perfect (teteleiōmenōn)"

Eschatological / final:

1 Corinthians 13:10, "when the perfect (to teleion) comes, the partial will be done away", most read as the eschatological consummation; cessationist/charismatic dispute over whether to teleion refers to the canon's completion or the parousia.

The telos connection

The root G5056 - telos (end / goal / fulfillment) gives the word its character. Christian teleios is purpose-directed completeness, being what God designed humans to be. The Aristotelian background (every thing has its proper telos) feeds into Christian ethics: humans are teleioi when they fulfill their imago-Dei design, which is conformity to Christ.

Patristic / scholarly note

Athanasius (On the Incarnation 54): the believer's teleios-direction is participation in Christ's perfection, the doctrine of theosis. Augustine (Confessions 10): the believer pursues teleios love throughout this life, never fully attaining it until the resurrection. Aquinas (Summa Theologiae II-II, q.184): the religious life is the status perfectionis, the way of life ordered to teleios love.

Wesley's A Plain Account of Christian Perfection (1766) is the classical Wesleyan-holiness treatment. B. B. Warfield's Studies in Perfectionism (2 vols., 1932) is the classical Reformed critique. Modern conservative: J. I. Packer (Knowing God, 1973); Sinclair Ferguson (The Whole Christ, 2016); the Reformed tradition treats teleios as goal-direction rather than achievable-in-this-life.

Verses in this codex

See Obsidian's backlinks pane for every verse page linking here.