Logia

The term "logia" (Greek: λόγια), plural of "logion" (Greek: λόγιον), is used variously in ancient writings and modern scholarship in reference to communications of divine origin. In pagan contexts, the principal meaning was oracles, while Jewish and Christian writings used logia in reference especially to the divinely inspired Scriptures. A famous and much-debated occurrence of the term is in the account by Papias of Hierapolis on the origins of the canonical Gospels. Since the nineteenth century, New Testament scholarship has tended to reserve the term logion for a divine saying, especially one spoken by Jesus, in contrast to narrative, and to call a collection of such sayings, as exemplified by the Gospel of Thomas, logia.

Ancient use

In pagan usage, logia was used interchangeably with chresmoi and other such terms in reference to oracles, the pronouncements of the gods obtained usually through divination.

The Septuagint adapted the term logion to mean Word of God, using it especially for translating אּמְרַת. In Philo, however, we see that the entire Old Testament was considered the Word of God and thus spoken of as the logia, with any passage of Scripture, whatever its length or content, designated a logion; the sense of the word is the same as in the Septuagint, but applied broadly to inspired Scriptures. In this sense logia is used four times in the New Testament and often among the Church Fathers, who also counted the New Testament books among inspired Scripture.