G167 Impurity

Strongs:

Transliteration: akatharsia

Phonetic Pronunciation: ak-ath-ar-see’-ah

From <G169> (akathartos); impurity (the quality), physical or moral:- uncleanness.

Strong, J. (2020). ἀκαθαρσία. Strong’s Talking Greek and Hebrew Dictionary. WORDsearch.

Theological Dictionary of the New Testament (Kittel):

akáthartos, akatharsía. These two terms are used for physical, cultic, and moral impurity, which are closely intertwined. The use in the LXX is mostly cultic. Uncleanness clings like an infection and renders cultically unserviceable. Objects, animals, places, vessels, and people may be unclean, e.g., by contact, through sexual processes, or through idolatry. Priests decide what is unclean and conduct the rites of purification (cf. especially Lev. 7, 11, 13ff.; Num. 9, 19). Hellenistic Judaism deepens the concept along moral lines. In the NT 1. the sense of cultic impurity may be seen in Mt. 23:27; Acts 10:14, 28; Gal. 2:11–12, and cf. the term “unclean spirit.” But the NT also has the term 2. for Gentile alienation from God in the form of licentiousness (cf. Rom. 1:24ff.; 1 Th. 4:7; Eph. 4:19; 2 Cor. 6:17). akatharsía is a work of the flesh, i.e., of the unregenerate person who is subject to natural desire (Gal. 5:19). Christian sanctification, however, covers the children of Christians so that they are no longer unclean (1 Cor. 7:14).

Kittel, G., Friedrich, G., & Bromiley, G. W. (1985). Theological Dictionary of the New Testament (pp. 383–384). Grand Rapids, MI: W.B. Eerdmans.

My perspective, reasoning from Gal 5.19 where the term is grouped with sexual immorality and sensuality in a list of works/behaviors/patterns-of-life characteristic of people lost, estranged from God, and thus ineligible to inherit the kingdom of God: a general term for actions of a sensual/sexual nature done in the body which fall short of God’s required standard of righteous purity.