Does God repent? What does ekklesia mean? Talking about biblical words and what they mean?

Ask NT Wright Anything

Premier Unbelievable

History, Religion & Spirituality, Christianity

4.8 • 2.3K Ratings

🗓️ 27 April 2026

⏱️ 33 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

What does the Bible really mean by “soul” and “spirit”? Are they the same thing, or something very different?In this episode, Tom Wright unpacks key biblical words like psuchē, pneuma, and ekklesia, showing how modern misunderstandings can distort Christian theology.They also tackle a profound question: Does God “repent”? How do we reconcile passages where God seems to change his mind with the idea that God is unchanging?This episode is all about getting back to Scripture and avoiding the confusion that comes from some biblical terms and words.Support & Subscribe👉 Support thought-provoking conversations and help keep the show going at www.premierunbelievable.com/geolink/donate💡❓Got a question for Tom? Go to ⁠⁠⁠⁠askntwright.com⁠⁠⁠👉 Refer a friend to become a subscriber → They can get 10% off by clicking hereFollow usInstagram: https://instagram.com/premierunbelievableFacebook: https://facebook.com/premierunbelievableTik Tok: https://tiktok.com/@premier.unbelievableX: https://x.com/UnbelievableFE Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:39.4	Hello and welcome to another episode of Ask Anteeroy Anything, the program where we try to answer your questions about Jesus, the Bible and the life of faith.
0:45.8	I'm Mike Bird from Ridley College, joined by Tom Wright from Whitcliffe Hall in Oxford.
0:51.2	Tom, we've got some good questions this week. They're all about biblical words, you know,
0:55.7	words about spirit, soul, the church, repentance. Now, I've got to ask you,
1:02.2	do you have a favorite word, a word that you love to use? What, in Greek or Hebrew or English?
1:09.9	Let's go for English. Do you have a favorite English word? That's a difficult one. It's not a question I've ever asked myself.
1:12.3	People do sometimes say when they've read several of my books that I always know when you're going to use this particular word.
1:20.0	And I just can't think what they would.
1:21.3	I know what the word is. The word is precisely. The word is precisely.
1:25.7	You might just be right.
1:27.9	Yeah.
1:33.8	I know when Tom uses, yeah, when he used the word precisely, that's important stuff.
1:35.8	That's when the precisely word comes out.
1:37.6	This is the main takeaway.
1:44.0	Yeah, I have sometimes been aware, as I've reread stuff that I've drafted drafted that I've used that word too often and I've
1:45.2	sometimes gone through and taken out one in every three currencies.
	...

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