Bible Dictionary
DEED
A deed is an act, work, or action. Depending on the context, Scripture uses it for ordinary conduct, God’s works, or wicked practices and offenses.
Definition
A deed is an act, work, action, transaction, or course of conduct. The term may describe ordinary human activity, God’s works, or practices that are morally wrong. In biblical translations it can also represent words meaning recompense, thing, acts, doings, work, or doing.
Biblical Usage
The New Testament commonly uses deed for work or action. In several passages it means wicked doings or a crime, while in others it has a neutral sense. Scripture also speaks of deeds in relation to judgment, conduct, and the practical expression of faith.
Historical Background
The English word represents several Hebrew terms in the Old Testament and chiefly ergon in the New Testament. Another New Testament term, praxis, may mean either a neutral action or, frequently, a wicked practice.
Historical Bible Dictionaries
International Standard Bible Encyclopedia (ISBE)
<p>ded: Used in its ordinary modern sense in EV. In the Old Testament it is used to translates five Hebrew words: gemylah, literally, "recompense" (Isa 59:18); dabhar, literally, "word," "thing" (2Ch 35:27 the King James Version, the Revised Version (British and American) "acts"; Es 1:17,18; Jer 5:28); ma`aseh (Ge 20:9; 44:15; Ezr 9:13); `alilah (1Ch 16:8 the King James Version, the Revised Version (British and American) "doings"; Ps 105:1 the King James Version, the Revised Version (British and American) "doings"); po`al (Ps 28:4 the King James Version, the Revised Version (British and American) "work"; Jer 25:14).</p><p>In the New Testament "deed" very frequently translates ergon (same root as English "work"; compare "energy"), which is still more frequently (espescially in the Revised Version (British and American)) rendered "work." In Lu 23:51; Ac 19:18; Ro 8:13; Col 3:9 the King James Version, the Revised Version (British and American) "doings," it stands for Greek praxis (literally, "a doing," "transaction"), each time in a bad sense, equivalent to wicked deed, crime, a meaning which is frequently associated with the plural of praxis (compare English "practices" in the sense of trickery; so often in Polybius; Deissmann maintains that praxis was a technical term in magic), although in Mt 16:27 (the King James Version "works") and Ro 12:4 the same Greek word has a neutral meaning. In Jas 1:25 the King James Version "deed" is the translation of Greek poiesis, more correctly rendered "doing" in the Revised Version (British and American).</p><p>D. Miall Edwards</p>