temptation/testing: temptation
Peirasmos denotes a testing circumstance to be endured or an enticement that people are urged not to enter.
The predominant use concerns trials or testing circumstances that bring grief, require endurance, or expose whether people remain faithful; a common use concerns an enticement or dangerous situation that people are told to avoid, especially through prayer.
Senses in use
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Trials and testing circumstances · dominant
The term marks circumstances through which people pass and must endure: in James 1:2 the APB renders falling into “various temptations,” while 1 Peter 1:6 speaks of grief in various such experiences. In Luke 8:13, testing is the setting in which those without root fall away; Revelation 3:10 describes an hour coming upon the whole world to test its inhabitants.
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Temptation or danger to be avoided · common
In the prayer and watchfulness sayings, the accusative singular form occurs in requests not to enter or be brought into the danger: Matthew 26:41 and Luke 22:40 pair this request with prayer. The APB also places the term in the devil's completed encounter in Luke 4:13 and in the warning that those desiring wealth fall into it in 1 Timothy 6:9.
In the Anselm Project Bible: The APB variously presents the term as “temptation,” “temptations,” “trials,” “testing,” and “trial,” as seen in James 1:12, Acts 20:19, Luke 8:13, and 2 Peter 2:9. These are verse-level renderings rather than fixed definitions.