The verb epikeimai (literally 'lie upon') serves as a virtual passive to epitithemi ('place upon') and spans two distinct experiential poles in the New Testament. In its stative sense, it describes things that lie upon or are placed on something — a stone 'was lying upon' the tomb of Lazarus (John 11:38), fish 'lying on' a charcoal fire greets the disciples at the Sea of Tiberias (John 21:9), and regulations 'imposed' on the old covenant worshippers until the new order (Heb 9:10). Paul uses it figuratively of necessity that 'is laid upon' him to preach the gospel (1 Cor 9:16). Spanish estar puesta/impuestas and French peser sur capture this regulatory weight. But in three Lukan passages, epikeimai takes on an active, pressing force: the crowd 'pressing upon' Jesus to hear the word of God at the lake (Luke 5:1), the chief priests 'urgently pressing' Pilate with their voices (Luke 23:23), and the storm 'pressing upon' the shipwrecked crew so that all hope was abandoned (Acts 27:20). Here the same root shifts from passive placement to aggressive insistence — from a stone resting on a tomb to a mob bearing down on a governor.