Did Paul swear in the Bible? The idea of “cuss words” as we know them—a fixed list of four-letter syllables always considered obscene, regardless of context—is a quirk of modern English. Many other modern languages don’t share this framework. My study of the Japanese language, for instance, revealed that no word is categorically taboo. Words sting or offend purely on tone, timing, and pairing, but no term is permanently off-limits. Unsurprisingly, ancient Hebrew and Greek operated the same way: they had insults, crude references, and obscene registers, but nothing like a universal blacklist of syllables.
When we assume biblical writers thought like Americans about cuss words, we commit a subtle but serious interpretive mistake: unconscious anachronism—a form of cultural bias where we smuggle modern categories into ancient contexts where they don’t belong.
Obvious examples make us chuckle:
Julius Caesar filming a TikTok.
George Washington described as an “environmental activist.”
Taylor Swift releasing her Fearless album on Spotify in 2008.
The first is absurd, the second a little silly, and the third sneaky—because while Taylor Swift released Fearless in 2008, Spotify didn’t launch in the US until 2011. We see how easy it is to accidentally read our world back into time. The same mistake happens when we treat Paul’s vocabulary as if it should be filtered through our modern category of cuss words.
Some Instances of Pauline Profanity
Case Study: σκύβαλον (Phil 3:8) — Dung, Refuse… Shock
“But what things were gain to me, these I have counted loss for Christ. Yet indeed I also count all things loss for the excellence of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them as rubbish (‹ σκύβαλον ›), that I may gain Christ …”
Philippians 3:7–8
At this point in the passage, Paul has just finished accounting for seven aspects of his identity which by Judaizing standards would make him the pinnacle of value in the community. The Philippian church, like practically every other group Paul ministered to during his lifetime, was threatened by spiritual elitism. Like crabs in a bucket, Christians were encouraged to clamber over one another, appealing to everything but the work of Christ to assert their value and status in the community. In blunt retort, Paul redefines all these perceived accolades with one striking word: ‹ σκύβαλον › (skúbalon).
Most English Bibles tragically soften this word into “rubbish” or “garbage.” But it was a visceral term for refuse—trash, food scraps, even excrement. In medical writers like Aretaeus, it names human dung specifically. Paul wasn’t gently saying his old life was “less than ideal.” He was saying it was filth, even sewage; the stuff you shovel away and gag at! The shock is the point: he’s driving home how worthless his former identity is compared to Christ.
Lexicons like BDAG and Louw–Nida agree the word can mean “excrement” and carried a low register. Papyri use it for agricultural waste and sweepings. Scholars like Ceslas Spicq argue Paul may have meant something close to “It’s all crap!” Perhaps, not profanity per se, but offensive enough to jolt.
Case Study: ἀκροβυστία — When “Foreskin” Becomes a Slur
“Therefore remember that you, once Gentiles in the flesh—who are called Uncircumcision (‹ ἀκροβυστία ›) by what is called the Circumcision …”
Ephesians 2:11
Among many other passages, Paul employs ‹ ἀκροβυστία › (akrobystía) in this passage as, literally, “foreskin.” Again, English translations have unduly diminished this word and the rhetorical force behind it. In Jewish–Gentile polemics, it became shorthand for outsiders—the dirty, impure ones. It wasn’t just anatomy—it was a pejorative label: “You foreskins.” A slur, not a neutral description.
In the Septuagint it usually translates Hebrew ʿorlah for foreskin in circumcision texts. In 1 Maccabees 1:15 and Josephus, it even describes men surgically “making foreskins” to pass as Greeks in the gymnasium—showing how socially charged the term was. Scholars note that in Pauline literature, akrobystía often functions as metonymy for Gentiles and carries the force of an ethnophaulism: a boundary-marking insult.
Paul employs this word dozens of times in his writings, not to perpetuate the shaming of the Gentiles, but to disgrace it! He despised how his Gentile brethren were made to feel inferior on the basis of ethnic and cultural background, belittling Christ’s magnificent salvation through faith and causing members of His body to shrivel in shame, desperately grasping at anything that could allegedly make them acceptable.
Case Study: ἀποκόπτω (Gal 5:12) — The Castration Quip
“And I, brethren, if I still preach circumcision, why do I still suffer persecution? Then the offense of the cross has ceased. I could wish that those who trouble you would even cut themselves off! (‹ ἀποκόπτω ›)”
Galatians 5:11–12
The verb ‹ ἀποκόπτω › (apokóptō) means “to cut off.” In Galatians, it’s a barbed pun: “If the Judiazers are so eager about circumcision, I wish they’d go the whole way and castrate themselves.” To Jewish ears, this was grotesque—castration excluded one from the assembly (Deut 23:1). To locals in Galatia, it perhaps evoked pagan cults of Cybele whose priests mutilated themselves. Paul is effectively saying: “Let them join the pagans if they’re going to keep pushing this.”
Ancient commentators like Jerome and Chrysostom recognized the castration sense. Modern scholars unanimously call it shocking invective. BDAG explicitly glosses Gal 5:12 as “probable reference to castration.” It’s not polite disagreement—it’s a biting, grotesque imprecation aimed at spiritual bullies.
Paul’s Ferocity
Paul was not swearing for sport or comedic shock value. He was a warrior-pastor, a loving parent rushing in to throw hands with those who threatened the safety of his spiritual children. His sharp vocabulary had a purpose: to defend, to protect, to expose elitism and lies that robbed people of their worth in Christ. His “obscenity” was an act of vicious love.
Jesus’ Example
Paul wasn’t alone. Like many aspects of his approach, his pattern is modeled directly after Jesus himself, who is far from allergic to verbal sting.
He uses the insult “raca” (Aramaic for “empty-head”) in Matthew 5:22—not to endorse it, but to show how contemptuous words can be murderous.
He called the Pharisees “whitewashed tombs,” “brood of vipers,” “blind guides,” “fools,” and called Herod “that fox.” These weren’t neutral descriptors but socially humiliating metaphors.
He says to the Laodicean Christians in Revelation 3:16 that “[b]ecause you are lukewarm… I will vomit you out of my mouth.” Graphic, bodily imagery used to shame and warn.
And in Revelation 3:16, John describes that “[f]rom his mouth comes a sharp sword with which to strike down the nations… He will tread the winepress of the fury of the wrath of God.”
Jesus shows us that words can wound, and sometimes must, when hypocrisy, oppression, or spiritual manipulation are at stake.
What Eph 4:29 / Col 3:8 / Jas 3 Actually Police (Hint: Rot, Abuse, Duplicity)
I’ve come across three passages commonly put forth as proof texts for banning all cuss words:
Ephesians 4
“Let no corrupt (‹ σαπρός ›) word proceed out of your mouth, but what is good for necessary edification, that it may impart grace to the hearers.” (v. 29)
‹ σαπρός › (sapros) means “rotten, putrid.” It’s often used of decaying fish—no longer useful or even harmful. Paul’s concern is not phonemes but corrosive speech that rots relationships. He narrows his meaning in the following clause: speech should be that which builds up and imparts grace.
Colossians 3
“But now you yourselves are to put off all these: anger, wrath, malice, blasphemy, filthy language (‹ αἰσχρολογία ›) out of your mouth.” (v. 8)
‹ αἰσχρολογία › (aischrología) refers to derogatory or abusive speech—often defamation or demeaning talk. The context lists malice and slander alongside it, clarifying that the issue is hostile, destructive communication.
James 3
“Even so the tongue is a little member and boasts great things. See how great a forest a little fire kindles! And the tongue is a fire, a world of iniquity. The tongue is so set among our members that it defiles the whole body, and sets on fire the course of nature; and it is set on fire by hell. (…) With it we bless our God and Father, and with it we curse men, who have been made in the similitude of God. Out of the same mouth proceed blessing and cursing. My brethren, these things ought not to be so.” (vv. 5–6, 9–10)
James condemns duplicity: using the tongue both to worship God and to spew spite that denies the image of God in others. The “curse” here is personal malice, not the prophetic or pastoral use of biting critique to expose hypocrisy.
It’s very clear that each of these passages is primarily concerned with how we use our speech in relationships: whether to build or to destroy. None create a permanent blacklist. All focus on the effect of words, not on the syllables themselves. In each case the concern is not simply avoiding “bad words,” but avoiding maliciousness, cruelty, and relational rot. This harmonizes well with the moments we witness Jesus and Paul using strong, even crude language to critique those creating division or inferiority in the community.
Speech That Protects vs. Speech That Rots
“Now it happened, as He went into the house of one of the rulers of the Pharisees to eat bread on the Sabbath, that they watched Him closely. And behold, there was a certain man before Him who had dropsy. And Jesus, answering, spoke to the lawyers and Pharisees, saying, ‘Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath?’ But they kept silent. And He took him and healed him, and let him go. Then He answered them, saying, ‘Which of you, having a donkey or an ox that has fallen into a pit, will not immediately pull him out on the Sabbath day?’ And they could not answer Him regarding these things.”
Luke 14:1–6
If we reserve an arbitrary list of untouchable words regardless of circumstance, we risk replaying the Pharisees’ error: condemning a man for rescuing his donkey on the Sabbath while missing the heart of the law. The Bible repeatedly emphasizes the why behind words, not just the which.
So, did Paul swear in the Bible? Paul could wish his opponents mutilate themselves, repeat an ethnic slur aimed at Gentiles, and call his old life utter shit—and do so not out of indecorum or cruelty but as a leader’s fierce love. Jesus could call hypocrites vipers and fools—not because insult is holy, but because in context, biting truth was crucial.
The question is never, “Did you avoid the forbidden list?” but always, “Does your speech build up or tear down? Does it align with truth and relational protection, or with malice and rot?”
Jesus and Paul are great examples of that fiery, humane passion that is too frequently absent in a sanitized, legalistic environment. Perhaps, the greatest act of love we can express in some moments might be to drop a four-letter bomb.
(All scripture quotations are from the New King James Version of the Bible.)
