These are two phrases which the Bible often uses interchangeably, but they do have a bit of difference in meaning. I’ve written this little piece for Crosswalk to help us understand the difference:
While studying in seminary, in Louisville, I had a job at Chick-fil-A. Taking drink orders was far more complicated than it needed to be because so many people ordered “a Coke.” For me, a native Northeast Missourian, a Coke means a specific dark cola. For those living in more Southern states “a coke” is synonymous with soda. When people ordered a Coke I had to learn to ask “which kind?” In my lingo, all Cokes are sodas but not all sodas are Coke. To many of our customers, all sodas were Cokes. There are many other English words like this which we use interchangeably, but on further inspection, there actually is a bit of difference in meaning.
In the Bible, the terms, sin and iniquity, are often used interchangeably. We know that both of them aren’t good and we know that, in some sense, they are an offense against a holy God. In fact, if you look up the word, iniquity, in most Bible dictionaries, you’ll be redirected to the word “sin,” yet, there is a bit of a difference between these two concepts. At least 70 times, we see these terms used together.
I found this really helpful. Thank you. I knew there was a difference and I have intended to look up the Hebrew for “sin” and “iniquity” and compare, but managed to not ever do it. Mainly because I don’t carry a concordance and Bible dictionary around with me. 😉