Word studies · Greek · Strong's G1401
δοῦλος · doûlos · appears 130 times in the New Testament
In one line: One who belongs wholly to Christ.
Paul, a servant of Christ Jesus, called to be an apostle, and set apart for the gospel of God—
Romans 1:1
Doulos is a bondservant — someone wholly at another's disposal, and the title the apostles most often gave themselves.
Doulos is the ordinary New Testament word for a slave, used in parables, household instructions, and, strikingly, as a self-designation: Paul, James, Peter and Jude all open letters as a doulos of Jesus Christ. Paul also turns it into an image of the Christian life — freed from sin, believers become “slaves of righteousness.”
Doulos comes from deō, “to bind,” and in Greek society it named a person owned by another, without the modern sentimental softening. Translators have long wavered between “servant” and “slave,” because the word's social reality is harsher than the first and its dignity in Christ larger than the second.
Calling yourself a doulos of Christ was not modesty but a claim: your time, body and plans belong to someone else. The paradox the New Testament presses is that this ownership is where freedom is found, since the alternative masters — sin, fear, opinion — are worse.
Doulos (G1401) appears 130 times in the New Testament, and Philippians 2:7 uses its related form to say Christ Himself took “the form of a servant.”
Christ's self-emptying into the place of a slave sets the pattern for Christian status: greatness is redefined as service, and the leaders of the church take their titles from the bottom of the household rather than the top. Belonging wholly to Christ is presented not as loss of self but as rescue from lesser owners.
Ask what has actual authority over your calendar and your money. Hand one of those decisions this week to Christ as though your time were genuinely His — because the New Testament says it is.
a slave (literal or figurative, involuntary or voluntary; frequently, therefore in a qualified sense of subjection or subserviency)
For I myself am a man under authority, with soldiers under me. I tell one to go, and he goes, and another to come, and he comes. I tell my servant to do something, and he does it.
Matthew 8:9and whoever wants to be first must be the slave of all.
Mark 10:44Sovereign Lord, as You have promised, You now dismiss Your servant in peace.
Luke 2:29And while he was still on the way, his servants met him with the news that his boy was alive.
John 4:51Even on My menservants and maidservants I will pour out My Spirit in those days, and they will prophesy.
Acts 2:18Press and hold servant / slave in any chapter and this study opens on the verse you are reading, with the lexicons, every occurrence and the commentaries beside it. The Bible is free to read.
Scripture quoted from the Berean Standard Bible, public domain. Strong's definitions are public domain. Counts come from The Pillar's own tagged text.