Naos

(ναός, the Greek technical name for a temple) is used to designate the body of the church. SEE NAVE. The earlier Christians were averse to using this word with reference to their worship, on account of the use of it by the heathen. It was their boast that they had neither temples nor altars. But this is to be understood only relatively, by way of distinction between Jewish and heathen rites. When the danger of sympathizing either with Judaism or heathen idolatry had ceased, and a suspicion of such union could not be supposed to exist, Christians felt less hesitation in calling their churches temples, especially as this was the name rendered familiar to them by the Old-Testament Scriptures. The words ναός and templum are of frequent occurrence in the writings of Lactantius, Ambrose, Eusebius, and Chrysostom, and the phraseology was common in the 4th century. See Neale, Hist. (tst. Ch. Introd. (see Index in volume 2); Coleman, Christian Antiquities (see Index); Walcott, Sacred Archaeology, s.v.