have been expected to use.
"It is striking that Jesus' followers did not describe their meetings and the community represented by them as a "synagogue" for the word would have been natural for a group which sprang from Jewish roots."
Jesus' zeal for teaching the "equal footing" that He intended to be present within the scope of His community is seen in His choice of the Greek term ecclesia. Today however, there is no greater "un-equal footing" seen within the modern institutional churches than the repression of speech!
Authority, let alone, the privilege to speak within the “institutional churches” is granted solely by the "church leadership" and it is given only to those that will stay within the boundaries of their particular orthodoxy. This current practice is totally foreign to the essence and spirit of parresia and against the will of the Savior for his ecclesia. Speaking from a context of controversy and persecution, the Hebrew writer admonishes the brethren,
"Do not cast away your freedom of speech (parresia), which has a great reward."
The principle found in the above verse teaches us to maintain our freedom of speech even in the face of persecution. Open discussion was highly prized in the New Testament assembly as it had been in Greece. In fact, discussion (as in the Greek ecclesia) was used as the Christian method of learning.
The Greek word dialegomai, the common Greek word for "discuss," is the word used during Christian meetings.
The meaning of dialegomai in classical Greek is expressed by our lone word dialogue. It means to hold a conversation or to talk openly. Used by the philosophers, it came to mean conversation with teaching as its object: one debates and learns in so doing.
Unfortunately, as we’ve learned about other mistranslations, the true meaning of dialegomai is hidden by the KJV and as usual, other translations have followed suit. For example, a favorite text of modern "preachers" is found in Acts 20:7. The KJV renders it thus:
"And upon the first day of the week, when the disciples came together to break bread, Paul preached (dielegeto) unto them, ready to depart on the morrow; and continued his speech until midnight."
As you can see, by translating dielegeto (a derivative of dialegomai) "preach" rather than "held a discussion" it would certainly be easy to get the idea that this was a "speech" or “sermon” rather than a discussion.
Though the modern practice in all institutional churches of any stripe is that of “giving sermons” and “preaching from the pulpit,” the word group for "giving a speech" or "give sermons" is never found within the New Testament ecclesia. Instead we have "discuss" or "start a discussion," or "dialogue", the true meaning of the Greek word.
But again, the translators gave an incorrect rendering. They inserted the word “preach” instead of dialegomai, “dialogue”, confirming yet again their love affair with the medieval practices and traditions of power hungry and lust-filled men.
So now we have in the church institution the notion called “the centrality of preaching,” taken from Acts 20, a situation where the Apostle Paul spoke for a long time. But many fail to notice, and others even refuse to acknowledge, that verse 7 specifically states that the purpose of their coming together was “to break bread” (fellowship) not to hear a sermon!
Remember, there were special circumstances surrounding this particular meeting, for it was the last time Paul would ever see them. If the apostle came to your assembly, wouldn’t you want to prolong your time together in order to hear what he had to say? Even though the specific word used here is dialegomai, from which we derive our English word “dialogue,” implying a give-and-take with the listeners, men still insist in twisting the Scriptures to gain their own ends. What Paul said certainly provided the substance of the gathering, but he did not talk non-stop for hours. There certainly would have been discussion and audience participation. Paul was concerned about what was on the hearts of others too.
This is just yet another despicable an