The word λóγō has an extremely extensive range of meanings. Those which most concern us here are the two which the Stoics distinguished as λóγō γδιθετō and λóγō πρōōρικó—the λóγō in the mind and the uttered λóγō—i.e. ‘thought’ and ‘word’. For us these concepts are distinct as they were not for Greek-speaking persons. Λóγō as ‘word’ is never the mere word as an assemblage of sounds (ωγ) but the word as determined by a meaning and conveying a meaning (ωγ σημαγτική, Aristotle, De Interp. 4). Λóγō as ‘thought’ is neither the faculty nor the process of thinking as such, but an articulate unit of thought, capable of intelligible utterance, whether as a single word (= fjjμα), a phrase or sentence, or a prolonged discourse, or even a book. Whether or not it is actually uttered (or written) is a secondary matter, almost an accident; in any case it is λóγō. Behind it lies the idea of that which is rationally ordered, such as ‘proportion’ in mathematics or what we call ‘law’ in nature. These are examples of the same thing that we experience as articulate thought or meaningful speech.

In the LXX λóγō almost always renders *\T\ (or its Aramaic equivalent H∧tt), a term whose range of meaning overlaps that of λóγō but is not co-extensive with it. It is derived from the root IT? which means to speak, and 1OT is essentially the spoken word as means of communication. In the Old Testament flirt1 111* is frequently used of God's communication with men, His self-revelation, especially through the prophets, to whom ‘the word of the Lord came’.