Exploring the Meaning of Allogenes in Greek

ἀλλογενής means “foreign” and appears once in the New Testament, in Jesus’ remark about a single person who returned to honor God. In that scene, the word draws attention to the person’s status as an outsider within the immediate social and religious setting implied by the question.

Root and Related Words

ἀλλογενής is formed from two elements named in related vocabulary: allos (ἄλλος), “another” (Strong’s G243), and genos (γένος), “family: descendant” (Strong’s G1085). In combination, these roots frame the idea of someone belonging to a different “other” group, set over against the group presumed to be in view.

Occurrences

“Were there none found who returned to give glory to God, except this foreigner?” (Luke 17:18)

In Luke 17:18 the word occurs inside a pointed question: “Were there none found who returned to give glory to God, except this foreigner?” The structure of the sentence sets up a contrast between an expected set (“none found who returned”) and the single exception (“except this foreigner”). ἀλλογενής is the label that marks the exception, making the contrast sharper: the one who does the honoring act is characterized as “foreign,” that is, someone viewed as outside the assumed in-group.

The immediate action in view is “returned to give glory to God.” The adjective attaches to the person who returns, not to the act itself. In this question, ἀλλογενής therefore functions as a social descriptor that heightens the surprise of the outcome: the person described as “foreign” is the one singled out as giving glory to God, while the implied others—those who might have been expected to respond—are absent from the scene of return. The effect is not to redefine what “giving glory” means, but to spotlight who is doing it.

The verse’s wording also shows that ἀλλογενής is used in direct reference to an individual (“this foreigner”), not as a general category in the abstract. The demonstrative “this” makes the term concrete and situational: it is tied to a particular person present to the speaker’s attention, not merely to an idea. In context, the adjective becomes part of the rhetorical force of the question, where the exception stands out precisely because of the person’s perceived distance from the community implied by the conversation.

Sense and Usage

The sense “foreign” in ἀλλογενής works here as a boundary-marker. The verse assumes that some people are closer to the expected center of religious response—those for whom returning “to give glory to God” would be unsurprising—and that others are more distant from that center. By naming the only returning worshiper as “foreign,” the word strengthens the implied irony of the question: the person marked as outside is the one who performs the inside act of honoring God.

Because the word appears in a contrastive frame (“none … except”), its meaning is experienced less as a neutral demographic detail and more as an evaluative social signal within the conversation. The adjective does not supply a new action; it supplies a lens through which the action is viewed. The return and the giving of glory are already intelligible; ἀλλογενής shapes the reader’s sense of how unexpected the returning person is within the social map the speaker presumes.

The related components allos (“another”) and genos (“family: descendant”) help explain how the word can carry this boundary-marking force without needing further elaboration in the verse itself. A “family” or “descent” category implies belonging and recognized connection; “another” implies difference. In Luke 17:18, ἀλλογενής functions as a compact way to indicate that the person belongs to “another” line of belonging than the group implicitly expected to respond. The verse does not pause to define that difference; the rhetorical question depends on the audience sensing it immediately.

At the same time, Luke 17:18 also shows how ἀλλογενής can coexist with inclusion in an act of worship. The label “foreign” does not prevent the person from being the one who “returned to give glory to God.” The word therefore carries a tension that is resolved within the sentence: the outsider status is affirmed (“this foreigner”) even as the outsider is presented as the one who renders the appropriate response (“returned to give glory to God”). That combination gives the adjective a narrative punch: it is precisely the “foreign” person who is singled out for doing what others did not do.

Since the term is used in speech as a demonstrative identification (“this foreigner”), it also shows the ordinary pragmatic use of such an adjective: it can be employed to distinguish one person from others in the scene by pointing to origin or group association. In this verse, that identifying function is pressed into a moral and theological contrast: the descriptor serves the larger purpose of the question, which is to highlight the surprising alignment between the “foreigner” and the act of glorifying God.

Imagery

Luke 17:18 frames ἀλλογενής with the image of return: someone comes back and gives glory to God. The word adds the picture of distance crossed—an outsider stepping forward as the lone respondent—so that “foreigner” is not merely a static label but part of the scene’s movement from absence (“none found who returned”) to presence (“except this foreigner”).

Sources: Lexical data from Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance and the Translators Brief Lexicon of Extended Strongs for Greek (STEPBible, CC BY). Occurrence data from the Translators Amalgamated Greek New Testament (STEPBible, CC BY). Scripture quotations from the World English Bible (public domain).