Agony (Hastings' Dictionary)
In the sense of great trouble or distress, agony is used in 2 Mac 3" 'There was no small a. throughout the whole city' (cf. 3"-"). In Canonical Scripture the word is found only in Lk 22** of our Lord's Agony in the Garden. And there it seems to have been introduced by Wyclif directly from the Vulg. agonia, just as the Lat. of the Vulg. waa a transliteration of the Gr. d7aii»(a (on which see Field, Otium Norv. iii., ad loc).
Tindale (1534), Cranmer (1539), the Geneva (1557), the Rheims (1582), the AV (1611), and the RV (1881) all have 'an agony' here; Wyclif himself has simply ' agony.' J. HASTINGS.
This topic also has an entry in the International Standard Bible Encyclopedia. Both articles offer independent scholarly perspectives.
International Standard Bible Encyclopedia on Agony
Agony ag'-o-ni (agonia; Vulgate agonia): A word occurring only once in the New Testament (Lu 22:44), and used to describe the climax of the mysterious soul-conflict and unspeakable suffering of our Lord in the garden at Gethsemane. The term is derived from the Greek agon "contest" and this in turn from the Greek ago "to drive or lead," as in a chariot race. Its root idea is the struggle and pain of the severest athletic contest or conflict. The wrestling of the athlete has its counterpart in the wrestling of the suffering soul of the Saviour in the garden. At the beginning of this struggle He speaks of His soul being exceeding sorrowful even unto death, and this tumult of emotion culminated in the agony. All that can be suggested by the exhausting struggles and sufferings of charioteers, runners, wrestlers and gladiators, in Grecian and Roman amphitheaters, is summed up in the pain and death-struggle of this solitary word "agony." The word was rendered by Wyclif (1382) "maad in agonye" Tyndale (1534) and following translators use an agony." The record of Jesus' suffering in Gethseman…
Fausset's Bible Dictionary on Agony
(Greek conflict in wrestling; figuratively, a struggle with intense trials.) Used only in Luk 22:41. Jesus' agony in Gethsemane, "so that His sweat was as it were great clotted drops of blood" (thromboi), namely, blood mixing with the ordinary watery perspiration, medically termed diapedesis, resulting from agitation of the nervous system, turning the blood out of its natural course, and forcing the red particles into the skin excretories. The death of Charles IX. of France was attended with it. Many similar cases are recorded, as the bloody sweat of a Florentine youth, condemned to death unjustly by Sixtus V. (De Thou 82 4 44.) Compare Heb 5:7-8; Mat 26:36-46; Mar 14:32-42. Each complements the other, so that the full account is to be had only from all compared together. Luke alone records the bloody sweat and the appearance of all angel from heaven strengthening Him, Matthew and Mark the change in His countenance and manner, and His complaint of overwhelming soul sorrows even unto death, and His repetition of the same prayer. The powers of darkness then returning with double force,…
References
- Orr, J. (ed.) (1915) The International Standard Bible Encyclopedia. Chicago: Howard-Severance Company. [Public Domain]
- Easton, M.G. (1893) Easton's Bible Dictionary. 3rd edn. Thomas Nelson. [Public Domain]
- Nave, O.J. (1897) Nave's Topical Bible. Topical Bible Publishing Co.. [Public Domain]
- Hastings, J. (ed.) (1909) A Dictionary of the Bible. Edinburgh: T&T Clark. [Public Domain]
- Smith, W. (ed.) (1884) Smith's Bible Dictionary. London: John Murray. [Public Domain]
- Fausset, A.R. (1878) Fausset's Bible Dictionary. [Public Domain]A Critical and Expository Bible Cyclopaedia