ekklēsia

Semantic range

1. 1a civic assembly of citizens summoned (Acts 19:32, 39 — of a riot and a lawful meeting)
2. 2the congregation of Israel, in the Septuagint
3. 3the body of Christ's disciples

Ek (out) plus kaleō (to call): the called-out. The word had a secular life first — the citizen assembly of a Greek city — and a Septuagint life as the translation of qāhāl, the covenant congregation of Israel. Neither means a building, and neither means an abstraction.

So when Christ says "upon this rock I will build my church" (Matthew 16:18), He is speaking of a summoned covenant people with a structure. The Restoration's insistence on organisation — apostles, prophets, quorums, ordinances, records (Ephesians 4:11–14; D&C 20) — follows from what the word already meant.

Modern revelation also settled the name: "my church shall be called in the last days even The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints" (D&C 115:4).

See also

• קָהָלqāhāl
• ἀπόστολοςapostolos
• ἅγιοςhagios