We hear the name all the time, don’t we? In songs, in churches, on street corners, and just splashed all over historical texts. “Jesus Christ.” It’s almost always said as a single name, like “Jesus” is the first name and “Christ” is the last.
But have you ever really stopped to think about it?
I have. For years, I just accepted it. It was his full name, like “John Smith” or “Tom Jones.” The truth, though, is so much more fascinating. It’s a truth that unlocks the very foundation of an entire global faith. “Christ” isn’t a family name. Not at all. It’s a title. And answering why is Jesus called “Christ” takes us on this incredible journey through history, language, and belief, all the way from ancient Hebrew prophecies to the everyday Greek spoken in the New Testament.
Understanding this one word is really the key to understanding the central, radical claim of Christianity. It’s not some minor detail. It’s the whole point.
So, let’s unpack the meaning behind the most famous title in the world.
More in About Jesus Category
What Is Jesus Christ’s Real Name
What Does the Name Jesus Christ Mean
Key Takeaways
- “Christ” is not a last name. It’s a title, and it comes from the Greek word Christos.
- Christos simply means “Anointed One” or “The Anointed.”
- This Greek title is a direct, one-to-one translation of the Hebrew word Mashiach, which we pronounce as “Messiah.”
- This means saying “Jesus Christ” is the exact same thing as saying “Jesus the Messiah” or “Jesus the Anointed One.”
- This title is the bridge that connects Jesus to all the Old Testament prophecies of a coming king, priest, and prophet who would finally save God’s people.
Wait, You Mean “Christ” Isn’t His Last Name?
That’s right. This is the first hurdle, and it’s the biggest one. Once you clear this, everything else starts to make sense.
His given name was Jesus. Or, to be more precise, Yeshua. This was a very common Jewish name back in the first century, and it’s a beautiful name that means “The Lord saves.” In his own time, he would have been known as Jesus of Nazareth (identifying him by his hometown) or Jesus, son of Joseph (identifying him by his father).
So, if “Christ” isn’t his last name… what is it?
It’s a title. It’s a job description.
Think of it like this: we say “King Charles” or “President Biden.” “King” and “President” aren’t their names. They are titles that instantly tell you their role and their authority. When the very first followers of Jesus started calling him “the Christ,” they were making a monumental statement. They weren’t just trying to pick him out of a crowd. They were making a declaration about who he was and what he came to do.
This simple shift in understanding is incredibly powerful. It changes “Jesus Christ” from a static, two-part name into a dynamic, world-changing proclamation: “Jesus is the Christ.”
So Where Did the Title “Christ” Actually Come From?
To find the origin of “Christ,” we have to look at the language of the New Testament. Now, Jesus and his disciples spoke Aramaic, a language closely related to Hebrew. But the books of the New Testament? They were written in Koine Greek.
Why Greek? Because it was the common language of the entire Mediterranean world, the language of business, culture, and ideas, all thanks to Alexander the Great’s conquests centuries earlier.
When the apostles and evangelists, men like Paul, Matthew, and John, wanted to share the story of Jesus with this wider, Greek-speaking world, they used the word Christos (Χριστός).
Christos is a Greek word that means, quite simply, “the anointed one.” It comes from the Greek verb chríō, which means “to anoint,” specifically by rubbing or pouring oil. Anointing was a deeply significant act in the ancient world. So, Christos was the perfect, precise word to describe a person who was specially chosen and set apart by God for a special purpose.
But here’s the thing: this concept of an “anointed one” wasn’t new. The New Testament writers weren’t just inventing a new idea. They were, in fact, making a direct and deliberate link to a much older, incredibly powerful Hebrew concept.
What’s the Original Hebrew Word for “Christ”?
The Greek Christos is a direct translation of the Hebrew word Mashiach (מָשִׁiחַ).
Does that sound familiar? It should. We get our English word “Messiah” straight from Mashiach.
This is the central connection. It’s the “Rosetta Stone” for this whole topic.
- Hebrew: Mashiach
- Greek: Christos
- English: Messiah / Christ
They all mean the exact same thing: “The Anointed One.”
So, when Peter, a Jewish fisherman, made his famous declaration to Jesus, “You are the Christ” (Matthew 16:16), he was saying, in his own mind and heart, “You are the Mashiach.” He was claiming that this man, his teacher and friend, was the long-awaited, prophesied “Anointed One” that the Jewish people had been expecting for centuries.
What Did It Mean to Be “Anointed” in the Ancient World?
Today, “anointing” sounds a bit strange, maybe purely ceremonial or old-fashioned. But in the world of the Old Testament, it was a profound act of commissioning. It was a huge deal.
When you were anointed, you were being set apart by God himself for a specific, holy task. The act itself usually involved pouring olive oil, often mixed with precious spices, over the person’s head. This wasn’t just a symbolic gesture, like a ribbon-cutting. It was believed to be the moment that person was divinely empowered by God’s Spirit to do their job.
This special, holy anointing was reserved for the three most important offices in the nation of Israel.
Who Got Anointed in the Old Testament?
Not just anyone could be “the anointed.” This title was reserved for the people who held the most vital leadership roles, the human mediators between God and the people.
- Prophets: Men like Elisha were anointed to be the very mouthpiece of God. Their job was to speak his words of warning, guidance, and comfort to the people.
- Priests: Aaron and all his descendants were anointed to serve in the tabernacle and, later, the temple. They offered sacrifices and prayers for the nation, bridging the gap between a holy God and a sinful people.
- Kings: This is the big one. Kings were anointed to rule as God’s representative on earth. When the prophet Samuel anointed Saul, and later David, with oil, it was the unmistakable sign that God had chosen this man to lead and protect his people.
The “anointed one” (mashiach) was a figure of supreme, God-given authority.
How Did This Lead to the Expectation of The Messiah?
The idea of a messiah (meaning, an anointed prophet, priest, or king) was a common part of life. But over time, this common idea evolved into the expectation of THE Messiah.
Here’s how it happened: King David was Israel’s greatest king. He was a “man after God’s own heart” and became the gold standard, the model of an anointed ruler. God even made a covenant—a binding promise—to David, saying that one of his descendants would always sit on the throne (2 Samuel 7).
But history got messy.
After David and his son Solomon, the kingdom fractured. It split in two. Centuries later, both the northern and southern kingdoms were conquered and dragged into exile, first by the Assyrians and then by the Babylonians. Their land was taken, their holy temple was burned to the ground, and there was no king from David’s line on the throne.
It was during this dark time of national crisis and foreign occupation (which continued under Persia, then Greece, and finally Rome) that the prophets began to speak of a future Anointed One. A Mashiach who would be the ultimate deliverer. This coming Messiah, they said, would be the perfect, final fulfillment of all three roles in one: a prophet who would speak the ultimate truth, a priest who would make the final atonement for sin, and a king who would defeat all God’s enemies and restore the kingdom forever.
What Kind of Savior Were People Expecting?
By the time Jesus was born in Bethlehem, the land was under the iron boot of the Roman Empire. The Jewish people were oppressed, heavily taxed, and just desperate for hope.
Their expectation of the Messiah had become intensely practical and political.
They were looking for a new King David. A warrior-king. A brilliant military strategist. A political revolutionary. They fully expected the Mashiach to:
- Gather a massive, loyal army.
- Violently overthrow the hated Roman occupiers.
- Purge the holy land of all foreign, pagan influence.
- Re-establish the physical, independent kingdom of Israel in all its former glory.
- Reign from a golden throne in Jerusalem and usher in a new age of peace and prosperity for God’s chosen people.
This was the “Messiah” on everyone’s mind. They were waiting for a lion.
Why Did People Start Calling Jesus the “Messiah” (or “Christ”)?
Into this powder keg of political and religious expectation, Jesus of Nazareth walked onto the scene.
And he was… different.
He started his ministry. He taught with an authority that stunned the religious leaders. He performed miracles that showed his power over nature, disease, and even death itself. He spoke constantly about “the kingdom of God.”
The buzz began to grow. “Could this be him? Could this be the Mashiach?”
People were excited. But they were also deeply confused. He didn’t talk like a revolutionary. He didn’t try to raise an army. He hung out with the “wrong” people—tax collectors, sinners, prostitutes, the poor, the unclean. And his primary message wasn’t about defeating Rome. It was about repentance, forgiveness, and loving your enemies.
How Did Jesus Redefine What “Messiah” Meant?
This is the absolute core of the issue. Jesus didn’t fit the mold, so he broke the mold. He systematically redefined what it meant to be the “Messiah.”
When he stood up in his hometown synagogue to read from the scroll (as told in Luke 4), he read from the prophet Isaiah: “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor…” He was, in effect, announcing his mission statement as the Anointed One—and it had nothing to do with political liberation. It was about spiritual liberation.
His kingdom, he insisted, wasn’t a physical, earthly one. As he would later tell the Roman governor Pontius Pilate, “My kingdom is not of this world.”
He came not as a conquering lion, but as a sacrificial lamb. His great enemy wasn’t Caesar in Rome; it was sin and death. The throne he was anointed to take wasn’t a golden chair in Jerusalem. It was a rough, blood-stained wooden cross on a hill called Golgotha.
This was a radical, shocking, and for many, a deeply disappointing redefinition. They wanted a king to take their enemies’ lives. He came as a priest to give his own life as a sacrifice.
A Personal Story: The Coach
I remember growing up, so many kids on the street called my dad “Coach.” To me, he was just “Dad.” He was the guy who made terrible pancakes on Saturday and helped me (badly) with my math homework. But to his players, “Coach” was a title. It meant respect, leadership, and authority. They saw him in a completely different light. They looked to him for guidance, for strategy, for inspiration.
It took me a while to understand that “Coach” wasn’t just a nickname. It was a role. It defined his relationship with them and his promise to lead them.
When Jesus’s followers finally called him “Christ,” it was that same kind of powerful shift. It was the moment they finally realized, “You’re not just Jesus, the carpenter from Nazareth. You are the Anointed One. You are the ‘Coach’ of our very souls, the King we’ve been waiting for… even if you’re not the king we expected.”
When Did His Followers Really Get It?
There’s this pivotal moment recorded in the Gospels (Matthew 16) that’s the “click” for the whole story. It’s when the light bulb finally goes on.
Jesus takes his disciples away from the crowds and asks them two simple questions. First: “Who do people say I am?” They give the popular answers: “Some say John the Baptist… others say Elijah… and still others, Jeremiah or one of the prophets.” All good guesses. They all recognized him as a great prophet.
But then Jesus gets personal. He looks them in the eye. Second: “But who do you say I am?”
This is the moment of truth. And Simon Peter, always the first to speak, blurts out the words that will change the world forever:
“You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.”
You are the Mashiach. The Christos. The Anointed One.
Jesus’s reply is so telling. He says, “Blessed are you, Simon… for this was not revealed to you by flesh and blood, but by my Father in heaven.” Peter didn’t come to this conclusion through political analysis. It wasn’t a human guess. According to Jesus, it was a divine revelation. This is the moment his followers truly began to understand his identity, even if they wouldn’t fully grasp what it meant until after his death and resurrection.
Why “Christ” Instead of “Messiah”?
This is a great question. If Jesus was a Jew, speaking to Jews, and fulfilling Jewish prophecy, why did the Greek title “Christ” stick so much more firmly than the Hebrew “Messiah”?
The answer is simple: audience.
After Jesus’s death and resurrection, his followers were commissioned to take his message “to the ends of the earth.” This mission, spearheaded by missionaries like the Apostle Paul, moved out of its Jewish cradle and into the wider, Greek-speaking Roman world.
To this non-Jewish (Gentile) audience, the Hebrew word “Mashiach” was a foreign term. It had no context. But the Greek word Christos? That, they could understand. It meant “The Anointed One,” and while the specific concept of a Jewish Messiah was new, the idea of an “anointed” king or a holy figure set apart by the gods was one they could grasp.
The New Testament was written in Greek. The faith spread through the Greek-speaking world. And so, “Jesus the Christos” became the standard way to refer to him. When this title was eventually translated into English, it became “Jesus Christ.”
The word for his followers, “Christians,” which was first used in the city of Antioch, literally means “followers of the Christ” or “people of the Anointed party.”
This title and the identity it represented became the absolute core of the new faith, which is why, as the religion spread, it became known as Christianity. You can learn more about its spread and context from high-authority sources like Harvard’s Religious Literacy Project on Christianity.
How Does Jesus Fulfill All Three “Anointed” Roles?
For the early Christians, the true “aha!” moment was realizing that Jesus didn’t just fulfill the role of King. He perfectly and completely fulfilled all three anointed offices at once. This concept, known as the munus triplex (or “threefold office”), is a cornerstone of Christian theology.
- Jesus as the Ultimate Prophet: A prophet speaks God’s word. But Jesus didn’t just speak God’s word; the Gospel of John claims he was the Word of God made flesh. He was the final and perfect revelation of who God is.
- Jesus as the Ultimate Priest: A priest mediates between God and people, offering sacrifices for sin. But Jesus didn’t just offer a sacrifice; he was the sacrifice. The book of Hebrews describes him as the great High Priest who offered himself “once for all” to make a new and permanent way for humanity to connect with God.
- Jesus as the Ultimate King: A king rules and protects his people. But Jesus’s kingdom wasn’t earthly. He is the “King of Kings” who defeated the ultimate enemies—sin and death. He is the prophesied Son of David, but his reign is spiritual and eternal, ruling in the hearts of his followers.
A Personal Moment of Clarity
For a long time, “Jesus Christ” was, for me, just a name. A historical figure. I’d read the texts, I understood the Greek and Hebrew connection. It was academic. It was just a fact to be learned, like knowing that “Buddha” is also a title.
But it wasn’t until a particularly rough patch in my life, a time when I felt completely lost and overwhelmed, that the title “Christ” clicked on a personal, gut level.
I wasn’t looking for a history lesson. I was looking for a savior.
I needed a high priest who could understand my failures, a prophet with a word of real hope, and a king to bring some kind of order to the chaos in my own heart. Realizing that “Christ” meant all of that—that it was a job description for a savior, an Anointed One sent to do all three—was everything. It wasn’t just a name anymore. It was a lifeline. It was a promise.
What Does It Mean When Someone Says “Jesus is Lord”?
This is another phrase you’ll hear right alongside “Jesus is the Christ.” And they are deeply connected.
“Lord,” in the New Testament, is the Greek word Kyrios. This word was a massive deal in the Roman Empire. It was a title of absolute authority. You called your master “Kyrios.” You called the gods “Kyrios.” And, most importantly, you were legally required to call Caesar “Kyrios”—Caesar is Lord.
For an early Christian to stand up and declare, “Jesus is Lord,” they weren’t just making a spiritual statement. They were making a dangerous political one. They were saying, “Caesar is not my ultimate authority. My boss is not my ultimate authority. Jesus, the Anointed One, is.”
To say “Jesus is the Christ” is to declare his identity as the anointed savior. To say “Jesus is Lord” is to declare his authority over your life.
The two are the foundational claims of the faith.
The Whole Story in One Word
It’s a title that bridges Old and New Testaments, Hebrew and Greek, prophecy and fulfillment. It declares that Jesus of Nazareth is not just another teacher or historical figure, but the Mashiach of Israel and the Savior of the world.
It’s a declaration that he is the anointed Prophet who is the Word of God, the anointed Priest who is the Sacrifice for sin, and the anointed King who rules for eternity.
It’s far more than a last name. It’s the ultimate title. And for billions of people, it’s the ultimate truth.
FAQ – Why Is Jesus Called “Christ”
What does the title ‘Christ’ mean and what is its origin?
The title ‘Christ’ comes from the Greek word Christos, meaning ‘The Anointed One,’ which is a translation of the Hebrew Mashiach, also meaning ‘The Anointed.’ It signifies someone chosen and set apart by God for a holy purpose.
Why did early followers call Jesus the ‘Christ’ instead of using his Hebrew name, Yeshua?
Because the early followers adopted the Greek word Christos for wider understanding in the Mediterranean and Roman worlds, where Greek was the common language, making the concept of him as the Anointed One more accessible to non-Jewish audiences.
What is the significance of calling Jesus ‘Lord’ and how does it relate to his title ‘Christ’?
Calling Jesus ‘Lord’ uses the Greek word Kyrios, known as a title of authority in the Roman Empire, and declares his supreme authority over life and worship, directly challenging the imperial claim of Caesar as ‘Lord’ and affirming Jesus’s divine authority as the Messiah.
How does the title ‘Christ’ summarize the entire role of Jesus according to Christian faith?
The title ‘Christ’ encapsulates that Jesus is the Prophet, Priest, and King—The Word of God, the Sacrifice for sin, and the Ruler for eternity—making it a comprehensive declaration of his divine mission and identity.
