Exploring the Meaning of Helkos in Greek

ἕλκος means “sore” and appears in Luke’s account of Lazarus’s misery and in Revelation’s portrayal of bodily affliction under divine judgment. In each setting it names a visible, painful condition that marks a person’s distress.

Root and Related Words

ἕλκος is related to the verb helkyo (ἕλκω), “to draw/persuade.”

Occurrences

“and desiring to be fed with the crumbs that fell from the rich man’s table. Yes, even the dogs came and licked his sores.” (Luke 16:21)

Here ἕλκος belongs to a tightly drawn scene of deprivation. Lazarus is pictured at the edge of another man’s abundance, “desiring to be fed with the crumbs” that fall from a table he does not share. The mention of “dogs” coming close enough to lick his sores adds a stark bodily detail to the portrait: Lazarus’s suffering is not only hunger and exclusion but also a condition of the skin that is exposed and persistent. The sore functions as an outward sign of his low state—something that draws attention because it can be seen, approached, and touched (in this case, by animals). In the narrative, the sores are part of how Lazarus’s need is made concrete; they render his misery unmistakably physical and public rather than merely emotional or economic.

“The first went, and poured out his bowl into the earth, and it became a harmful and evil sore on the people who had the mark of the beast, and who worshiped his image.” (Revelation 16:2)

In Revelation 16:2 ἕλκος is the specific bodily effect produced when “the first” pours out a bowl “into the earth.” The sore is characterized in the verse as “harmful and evil,” intensifying the impression of an affliction that is not minor or hidden. The wording ties the sore to a defined group: it comes “on the people who had the mark of the beast, and who worshiped his image.” In this scene ἕλκος is not presented as a background condition, as in Luke, but as an event—something that “became” upon the bowl’s outpouring. The sore marks the recipients of judgment in a way that is tangible, immediate, and corporeal. It is a bodily blow that corresponds to the moral and religious stance described in the same sentence, branding their experience with pain that is as real as their allegiance is public.

“and they blasphemed the God of heaven because of their pains and their sores. They didn’t repent of their works.” (Revelation 16:11)

Revelation 16:11 returns to ἕλκος as an ongoing element of torment: “their pains and their sores.” The plural phrasing joins the sores to “pains,” presenting them as part of a broader suffering that presses on the afflicted. The verse also shows how the sores function in the narrative’s moral drama: the sufferers “blasphemed the God of heaven because of” these afflictions, and “didn’t repent of their works.” ἕλκος thus stands not only for physical damage but for a pressure point that exposes the response of the heart under distress. In the logic of the verse, sores contribute to the felt experience that becomes an occasion for hostile speech toward God rather than a turning away from “works.” The sores are therefore not incidental detail; they are named as one of the direct reasons given for the reaction described.

Sense and Usage

Across these passages, ἕλκος designates a bodily sore that is severe enough to be noticed and to shape behavior around it. In Luke, the sore is part of the visible misery of a poor man lying near a rich man’s table; it invites the unsettling image of dogs licking it, implying vulnerability and exposure in a setting where Lazarus has little protection or care. The sores are not explained or diagnosed; their narrative role is to make Lazarus’s suffering concrete and undeniable in the small details of a daily scene—hunger, crumbs, dogs, and the surface of the body.

In Revelation, ἕλκος shifts from a sign of personal destitution to an instrument within a sequence of calamities. The sore “became” when the bowl was poured out, so the word participates in cause-and-effect storytelling: an act in heaven’s judgments yields a condition on earth. The adjectives “harmful and evil” push the reader to hear ἕλκος as an affliction with an oppressive character—one that hurts and one that is associated with what is morally repugnant in the same breath as idolatrous worship. In that setting, the sore is not only visible; it is part of a targeted judgment upon people defined by “the mark of the beast” and worship of “his image.”

Revelation 16:11 further shows the sore as something that can persist and accumulate in experience (“pains and… sores”), and it highlights its psychological and spiritual effect: it becomes a stated reason for blasphemy. ἕλκος thus functions as a term for bodily suffering that can intensify conflict with God rather than soften it. The sores are not presented as mere symptoms; they are part of the burden that drives speech (“they blasphemed”) and frames refusal (“They didn’t repent”). Taken together, the occurrences show ἕλκος operating at the intersection of the physical and the moral: a sore is felt on the body, seen by others, and in Revelation becomes part of a larger account of judgment and human response.

Imagery

The imagery attached to ἕλκος is deliberately concrete. Luke places it in a street-level vignette: a man longing for crumbs while animals lick his sores, a picture that presses the reader to see suffering up close. Revelation places the same kind of bodily reality into apocalyptic action: a sore breaks out as a result of a bowl poured into the earth, and later those bearing sores speak against “the God of heaven” and remain fixed in their “works.” In both, ἕλκος anchors the scene in the undeniable vulnerability of the human body.

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).