In the Bible, aheb and hesed were two words used to express God's love for Israel. It was also the love the Israelite people were to show one another. After Israel had been under Greek rule for many centuries, Jewish scholars began to translate the Hebrew Scriptures into Greek during the third and second centuries B.C.E, as Greek was spoken by many Jews.

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When the translation work began, these scholars could not find a common, comparable Greek word to represent the aheb and hesed love of God. The most often used Greek words for love were philo for brotherly love and eros for passionate love. The Jewish translators decided to use a little-known Greek word, agape, to reflect God's aheb and hesed love. To keep close to the Hebrew understanding of God's love for man and God's expection of man to love one another, the New Testament writers continued the usage of the word agape when they wrote about love.