The verb κολλαω (kollao) means to glue, stick together or attach to (hence English words like collage and collagen). It stems from the in the New Testament unused noun κολλα (kolla), glue, but it's unclear where that word comes from. It seems to share an origin with words like clay, but that too is of unclear descent.

Here at Abarim Publications we don't know either but we would bet that our words ultimately stem from Semitic and were imported into the European languages along with the alphabet (see our article on the many Hebrew roots of Greek). Of particular interest we find the verb כלל (kalal), meaning to make whole or perfect.

Our verb is used 11 times in the New Testament, see full concordance, all in the passive voice and predominantly in a societal way, of people being attached to other people. From our verb derives:

The noun κολλουριον (kollourion) describes a kind of eye-salve or eye-flush, called collyrium (Revelation 3:18 only). Collyrium consisted of powderized elements like sugar and fennel, and was either ejected into one's eyes with a small pipe, dissolved in water (sometimes rose water) and poured in, or made into a clayey patty and placed upon the affected eye. This word was also used to describe a kind of fine clay into which a seal could be stamped. Our noun is a diminutive of κολλυρα (kollura), a variant of κολλιξ (kollix), which described a kind of course bread.

The origins of these words are as obscure as the above, but the chances are excellent that they all relate. The regular word for bread is αρτος (artos), which also served as the symbol of anything that was the final product of a very large industrial complex whose many elements all worked together in organizational harmony in order to bring the thing about — the production of any little bread required a vast agricultural complex with machinery and legislation, animal husbandry and a commercial market set within a bustling overall economy between centers of production within a network of trade routes. The demonstratively similar adverb αρτι (arti), means just or exactly right.

Note that blindness was one of two great categories of all maladies and disease; the other being lameness: see our article on the proverbial blind and lame.

The noun κολλυβιστης (kollubistes) means currency-matcher or foreign exchange person (Matthew 21:12, Mark 11:15 and John 2:15 only). This word is comparable to κερματιστης (kermatistes), which describes someone (probably the same person) who exchanges high-value coins for a near-equivalent in small change. Our noun κολλυβιστης (kollubistes) comes from the noun κολλυβος (kollubos), which denotes either a small coin, a small cake (known mostly in plural as κολλυβα, kolluba), the rate of exchange between currencies, or the exchange itself.

These words clearly relate to the above, but an added pun comes with the obvious similarity of this word's final half and that of the word ακροβυστια (akrobustia), being foreskinned, that is being unmannered and uncivilized. This latter word consists of ακρον (akron), tip, and a mystery element that appears to have been designed to remind of בשת (boshet), shame. Note that the verb επισπαω (epispao), to "draw on" as used in 1 Corinthians 7:18, was also used in the sense of to overturn or disrupt.