[4][5][6][7] In Classical Athens, the word kyrios referred to the head of the household,[8] who was responsible for his wife, children, and any unmarried female relatives.
It was the responsibility of the kyrios to arrange the marriages of his female relatives,[9] provide their dowries, represent them in court, if necessary,[10] and deal with any economic transactions they were involved in worth more than a medimnos of barley.
Its female form "κυρία, kiría" is the equivalent to the English term Mrs. Kyrios appears about 700 times in the New Testament, usually referring to Jesus.
While the term Mari expressed the relationship between Jesus and his disciples during his life, Christians eventually came to interpret the Greek kyrios as representing lordship over the world.
[17] The Gospel of John seldom uses kyrios to refer to Jesus during his ministry, but does so after the Resurrection, although the vocative kyrie (meaning sir) appears frequently.
Most scholars agree that the use of kyrios, and hence the Lordship of Jesus, predated the Pauline Epistles, but that Saint Paul expanded and elaborated on that topic.
[22]The phrase "The Lord is the Spirit" in verse 17 is Ὁ δὲ Κύριος τὸ Πνεῦμά (Ho dé Kū́rios tó Pneûmá).