Problems of New Testament Translation

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PROBLEMS OF

NEW TESTAMENT TRANSLATION By

E D G A R J. G O O D S P E E D

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UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO PRESS • CHICAGO

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University of Chicago Press . Chicago 37 Agefi/: Cambridge University Press • London Copyright 1945 by The University of Chicago. All rights reserye4. Published. February 1945. Composed and printed by the University of Chicago Press, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A.

To ERNEST CADMAN COLWELL ADMINISTRATOR AND SCHOLAR

Preface

h e r e are many vexed questions o f N ew Testament translation on w hich it is interesting to inquire, first, where the traditional readings of the King James and the revised versions originated, for most o f these had their beginnings in some earlier translation, Coverdale, Rogers, the Great Bible, the Geneva, the Bishops’, or the Rheims; and, second, h ow modern translators have dealt w ith them in the private translations o f the last century and more; and, finally, w hat the present position of learning is about them and w hat new ligh t has been thrown upon them by the Greek papyri, the Greek inscriptions, wider study o f Greek literature, and recent lexical and grammatical studies. T his-is w hat I have undertaken to do for more than a hundred such passages in the Greek N ew Testament. In searching for the sources o f the King James renderings, I have made use o f my collection o f early printings o f the Eng­ lish Bible supplemented for Coverdale (1535) and Taverner (1539) by the resources o f the Huntington Library at San Marino, and for the Bishops’ o f 1568 by those o f the Univer­ sity of California at Los Angeles. M y copies of later printings of the Bishops’ (1576, etc.) vary so strikingly from the edition of 1568 that it has becoihe clear that much o f the revision that eventually found a place in the King James of 1611 Was made in the course of the tacit revisions o f the Bishops’ in its suc­ cessive printings. The Bishops’ Bible was, in fact, not so much a text as a textual process.

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V lll

P R E F A C E

In setting forth the various solutions o f these problems proposed by modern translators, I am greatly indebted to their publishers for generous permission to quote their words, in each case w ith the translator’s name and the date of publica­ tion. I am grateful to the Pilgrim Press (Boston and Chicago) for permission to quote W eymouth’s New Testament in Modern Spech (1903); to the Fleming H. Revell Company (N ew York) for permission to quote The Twentieth Century New Testament (1904); to A. and C. Black, Ltd. (London) for permission to quote Ferrar Fenton’s The New Testament in Modern Eng­ lish ( 1 9 0 5 ); to Harper and Brothers (N ew York) for per­ mission to quote James M offatt’s The New Testament: A New Translation (1913); to H oughton Mifflin Company (Boston) for permission to quote Ballantine’s Riverside New Testament ( 1 9 2 3 ); to the Macmillan Company (N ew York) for permis­ sion to quote Francis A. Spencer’s The New Testament of Our

Lord and Saviour Jesus Christy Translated into English from the Original Greek (1937); to the Confraternity of Christian Doc­ trine (W ashington, D .C .) for permission to quote from The New Testament of Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christy Translated from the Latin Vulgate: A Revision of the Challoner-Rheims Ver­ sion Edited by Catholic Scholars under the Patronage of the Episcopal Committee of the Confraternity of Christian Doctrine (Paterson, N .J .: St. Anthony Guild Press, 1941); and to E. P. Dutton and Company, Inc. (N ew York), for permission to quote from The New Testament in Basic English (1941); to Professor James A. Kleist, S.J., of St. Louis, Missouri, for permission to quote from his Memoirs of St. Peter, or The Gospel According to St. Mark Translated into English Sense-Lines (M ilwaukee: Bruce Pub­ lishing Co., 1 9 3 2 ); and to the American Baptist Publication Society (Philadelphia) for permission to quote from A. S. Worrell’s The New Testament Revised and Translated (1904);

P R E F A C E

IX

The Holy Bible . . . . an Improved Edition (1912); and Helen Barrett Montgomery’s Centenary Translation of the New Testa­ ment (1914). The method pursued has been to give first the King James reading of the phrase or clause in question, as now printed in the editions of the American Bible Society; then the Greek, from the text of Westcott an‘d Hort (Cambridge, 1881), w hich sometimes differs considerably from the Greek text (probably Beza’s of 1598) w hich lay before the scholars of King James. Where the problem is one of translation alone, not of w hat the true ancient text was, the renderings of the earlier English ver­ sions are often quoted, w ith some discussion,, to show how the King James reading came to be. Purely textual differences are not considered, except in a few important cases. The solutions proposed by representative private translations are then taken up, where they seem to have anything to contribute, though here it has not seemed worth w hile to go further back than Alexander Campbell (1826). I have usually added any con­ tribution that recent lexical or grammatical studies may have made to the matter and have offered my own solution of the problem. In justice to all translations, except those of Proverbs, I must add that the quotation of phrases or clauses lifted out of their context is no fair test of any translation; the only fair test is that of continuous readability. I quote these detached portions only to exhibit the movement of opinion on vexed questions of translation detail. It has been possible to deal w ith only a hundred and fifteen o f these problems in this volume, but it may at least indicate the kind of studies that underlie the thousands of decisions, philological and literary, w hich must form the basis o f any serious translation of the N ew Testament.

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P R E F A C E

EARLY TRANSLATIONS W yclif, J ohn . The New Testament in English translated hy John W ycliffe circa M ccclxxx ......... Pickerings London.

1848. (Cited as “Wyclif, 1382.’’) first printed in 1731.)

First printed in (The Purveyrevision [1388] was

title-page. It probably read: The New Testa­ The Francis Fry facsimile edition of 1862 has been

T y n d a le, W illiam . (N o ment. 1525.)

used. CovERDALE,

M yles. The Bible . . . . faith fu lly and truly translated out of Douche and Latyn in to Englishe. 1535.

R ogers, John. The Byble

....

truly and purely translated into Englysh by Thomas NLatthew. 1537- Set forth with the Kinges most gracyous lycence.

. . . . truly translated after the veryte of the Hebrue and Greke textes ........ 1539.

The G re a t B ible. The Byble in Englyshe

T a v ern er, R ichard. The M.ost Sacred Bible

....

translated into Eng­

lish . . . . by Rychard Taverner........ 1539.

The G en eva B ible. The Bible

....

translated according to the Ebrue

and Greke . . . . A t Geneva. 1560.

The Bishops’ B ible. The Holie Bible conteyning the old Testament and the new. 1568. The New Testament oflesus Christ, Translated faith fu lly into English, out of the authentical L atin . . . . in the English College of Rhemes........

1582. The K in g James V ersion. The Holy Bible of the Originall tongues........ 1611.

....

N ewly Translated out

The New Testament of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ translated out of the Greek Being the Version set forth A .D . 1611 compared with the most ancient authorities and revised, a .d . 1881. The New Covenant commonly called the New'Testament of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ........ N ewly edited by the NewTestament Members of the American Revision Committee, a .d . 1900. Published 1901.

P R E F A C E

XI

It is,generally agreed that Tyndale’s translation of the N ew Testament formed the basis of Coverdale’s and that Tyndale’s last revision of it was used by John Rogers, w ho seems to have been the editor of the so-called “ Thomas M atthew Bible” of 1537. This Rogers edition then formed the basis of the N ew Testament in the Great Bible, w hich was the first Authorized English Bible, and in the Taverner, in 1539. The Geneva of 1560 was based on these, w hile the Bishops’ of 1568, the sec­ ond Authorized English Bible, was a revision of the Great, w ith the aid of the Geneva. The third Authorized English Bible, the King James (1611), was, of course, a revision of the Bishops’—and of a very late printing of it— “ w ith the former Translations diligently compared and revised.” There was a wealth of excellent work in the private trans­ lations of the eighteenth century, such as those of Whiston (1745) and Wesley (1755); but I have limited my quotation from the private translations to perhaps twenty, dating from 1826 onward. There are many other excellent versions which, m ight have been included, but these represent in my opinion a sufficient sampling of the large output of such translations in the last hundred and twenty years, w hich reflect such a quickened interest in the understanding of the N ew Testament. There is something a little ironic in* the recent attempts to put forth the King James Version, w ith its purely sixteenth-cen­ tury diction, as “ living literature” or “the Bible for today,” when that is exactly w hat it is not and cannot be, however at­ tractively edited and illustrated. MODERN TRANSLATIONS Campbell, A lexander . The Sacred W ritings of the Apostles and Evan­ gelists of Jesus Christy Commonly Styled the New Testament^ Translated from the Original Greek, by Doctors George Campbell, James M acKnight,

xii

PREFACE

and P hilip Doddridge, with Prefaces, Various Emendations, and an A p ­ pendix ........ 1826.

N orton, A ndrews . A Translation of the Gospels, with Notes. 1

1855. H. T. 1864.

A nderson , Greek.

vols.

The New Testament. Translated from the Original

N oyes, G eorge R. The New Testament Translated from the Greek Text of Tischendorf,

1869.

R otherham, J oseph B. The New Testament; N ewly Translated [from the

1872. (As the re­ vised edition of 1878 has been used, I have cited it as of 1878.) F enton , F errar. The New Testament in Modem English . . . . Newly Greek Text of Tregelles'\ and Critically Emphasized.

Translated Direct from the Accurate Greek T ext of D rs. Westcott and Hort. 1895, 1905. (I have cited it as of 1905, the edition in my

hands, which, however, falls far short of the claimthat it is “En­ tirely founded upon Drs. Westcott and Hort’s critically accurate Greek text, and with all weak and faulty renderings corrected,” made in the Preface of 1905.) B a lle n t in e , F ran k S c h e ll. The American Bible. The Books of the Bible in Modem English for American Readers.

4 vols. (New Testament).

1902. W eymouth, R ichard Francis. The New Testament in Modern Speech.

1903. The Twentieth Century New Testament: A Translation into Modern English M ade from the Orignal Greek (W estcott and Hort's T ext). Tentative

edition, 1903; final edition, 1904. A. S. The New Testament Revised and Translated. 1904. The Holy Bible . . . . an Improved Edition. 1912. M offatt, J ames. The New Testament: A New Translation. 1913. W orrell,

B allantine , W illiam G. The Riverside New Testament: A Translation from the Original Greek into the English of To-day.

1923.

G oodspeed, E dgar J. The N ew Testament: An American Translation.

1923.

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PREFACE

M ontgomery, H elen Barrett. Centenary Translation of the New Testa­ ment.

1924.

A llen , R ay . M ark. 1927. K leist, J ames A. The Memoirs of St. Peter, or The Gospel according to St. M ark, Translated into English Sense-Lines.

1932.

Spencer, Francis A loysius. The New Testament of Our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, T ran slated . . . . from the Original Greek.

1937- (This is declared by its publishers to be the first Catholic translation made inAmerica. It beganwith the Four Gospels, translatedfromGreek into modernEnglish, published in 1898. Before his death in 1913, Father Spencer had completed his translation of the New Testa,ment from the Greek, and this work, revised by his colleagues, was published twenty-four years later.) The New Testament of Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Translated from the L atin Vulgate: A Revision of the Challoner-Rheims Version Edited by Catholic Scholars under the Patronage of the Episcopal Committee of the Confraternity of Christian Doctrine. 1941. (This is the new Catho­

lic Authorized Version of the New Testament.) The New Testament in Basic English. 1941. (This translation appeared inJune, 1941, being part of the plan of the Orthological Institute to develop a vocabulary of 850 most essential words in English. For this work the vocabulary was extended to 1,000 words.) The excellent translation of Ronald A. Knox, British man of letters, made from the Latin V ulgate, kindly sent me by its publishers, Sheed and Ward (N ew York, 1944), reached me too late for more than occasional mention. In conclusion I must acknowledge my indebtedness to my brother, Charles T. B. Goodspeed, for his able assistance in reading the proofs of this book; and to Dr. Allen P. Wikgren of the University of Chicago for his help on some difficult bibliographical problems. E d g a r J . G oo dspeed B el-A ir , L os A ngeles

Table of Contents

A H undred T ranslation P roblems

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T he G ospel A ccording to M atthew

1:1 1:18 1:21 2:1 4:21 5:3 5:15 5:18 5:22 6:13 6:27 6:32 9:10 18:22 18:24 20:2 21:9 23:5 23:15 23:23 23:24 26:3 26:28

The book of the generation of Jesus Christ of the Holy Ghost thou shalt call his name JESUS wise men in a ship Blessed are the poor in spirit men light a candle one jot or one tittle Raca For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever. Amen ’ Which of you by taking thought can add one cubit unto his stature? For after all these things do the Gentiles seek publicans and sinners Until seventy times seven ten thousand talents a penny a day Hosanna to the Son of David, . . . . Hosanna in the highest . phylacteries to make one proselyte ye pay tithe of mint and anise and cummin which strain at a gnat Then assembled together the chief priests For this is my blood of the new testament XV

9 10 11 14 15 16 17 19 20 23 24 26 28 29 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40

XVI .

T A B L E

O F

C O N T E N T S

26:50 wherefore art thou come? 28:1 In the end of the sabbath 28:9 All hail

41 43 45

T he G ospel A ccording to M ark

1:1 The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God 1:1 the Son of God 1:2 in the prophets 1:4 John did baptize 1:10 descending upon him 2:1 in the house 2:23 through the corn fields . . . . to pluck the ears of. corn 3:19 they went into a house 5:23 I pray thee, come and lay thy handson her 6:20 he did many things 7:3 except they wash their hands oft 7:11 I t is Corban, that is to say, a gift, by whatsoever thou mightest be profited by me 14:26 when they had sung a hymn 15:2 Thou sayest it 15:25 And it was the third hour, and they crucified him

47 49 49 50 52 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 62 64 68

T he G ospel A ccording to L uke

1:69 a horn of salvation 2:1-5 should be taxed . . . . this taxing . . . . to be taxed ' 2:7 wrapped him in swaddling clothes 2:14 in the highest • 2:14 good will toward men 2:29 Lord, now lettest thou thy servantdepart 2:37 And she was a widow of about fourscore and four years 2:49 I must be about my Father’s business 6:1 on the second sabbath after the first 18:13 God be merciful to me a sinner

70 71 73 74 75 77 79 81 83 85

T A B LE OF CO N TEN TS

18:28 20:16 23:33 23:47 24:13

we have left all God forbid Calvary Certainly this was a righteous man threescore furlongs

xvii 87 88 89 90 91

T he G ospel A ccording to J ohn

1:5 the darkness comprehended it not 1:11 He came unto his own, and his own received himnot 1:51 Verily, verily, I say unto you 2:4 Woman, what have I to do with thee? 2:17 The 2eal of thine house hath eaten me up 7:15 Howknoweth this manletters, having never learned? 7:53-8:11 [The Story of the Adulterous Woman] 14:16 another Comforter 15:1 my Father is the husbandman 15:4 Abide in me, and I in you 15:5 He that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit 19:29 upon hyssop 21:15-17 lovest thou me? . . . . I love thee

93 94 96 98 101 102 105 110 111 112 114 115 116

T he A cts of the A postles

1:1 1:4 1:18 6:2 6:9

The former treatise have I made ' being assembled together'with falling headlong serve tables of the synagogue, which is called fhe synagogue of the Libertines, and Cyrenians, and Alexandrians 9:36 Tabitha, which by interpretation is called Dorcas 12:4 four quaternions of soldiers 17:18 this babbler 19:16 overcame them 22:3 lam verily a man which am aJew 25:21, 25 Augustus 26:28 Almost thou persuadest me to be a Christian

119 122 123 126 127 130 131 132 133 134 136 137

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T A B L E OF CO N TEN TS

T he L etter to the R omans 1 :1

1:7 2:11 3:28 8:1 8:1 8:28 9:25 12:19

a servant of Jesus Christ Grace to you, and peace, from God our Father and the LordJesus Christ respect of persons a man is justified by faith in Christ Jesus who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit all things work together for good to them that love God Osee give place unto wrath

139 141 142 143 146 147 148 I50 152

T he F irst L etter to the Corinthians '

7:21 Art thou called being a servant? care not for it 7:38 So then he that giveth her in marriage doeth well 13:1 a tinkling cymbal 13:1, 2, 3, 4, 8, 13 Charity though I give my body to be burned 1 3 :3 13:4-7 is not puffed up 16:22 let him be Anathema, Maran-atha

155 158 160 161 162 165 166

T he Second L etter to the Corinthians 13

:14 the communion of the Holy Ghost

169

T he L etter to the E phesians

1:1

to the saints which are at Ephesus, and to the faith­ ful in Christ Jesus I7 I

T he L etter to the P hilippians

3:1, 4:4 rejoice in the Lord . . . . Rejoice in the Lord al­ ways: and again I say. Rejoice 174 3:5 a Hebrew of the Hebrews 175 T he F irst L etter to the T hessalonians

2:7

But we were gentle among you

177

T A B L E OF CO N T E N T S

xix

T he Second L etter to the T hessalonians 2:1

as that the day of Christ is at hand

179

T he F irst L etter to T imothy

5:22 Lay hands suddenly on no man 181 5:23 Drink no longer water, but use a little wine for thy stomach’s sake and thine ofteninfirmities 182 T he L etter to P hilemon

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being such a one as Paul the aged, and now also a prisoner of Jesus Christ 185

T he L etter to the H ebrews

11:4

he being dead yet speaketh

188

T he L etter of J ames

1:17 no variableness, neithershadow of turning 3:1 be not many masters

189 190

T he F irst L etter of P eter

1:6, 8 Wherein ye greatly rejoice........Whom having not seen, ye love; in whom, . . . . yet believing, ye rejoice 2:5 Ye . . . . are built up 3:19 By which also he went and preached unto the spirits in prison 5:12 wherein ye stand

192 194 195 198

T he R evelation of J ohn

6:6 10:6

A measure of wheat fora penny there should be time no longer

I ndex of R eadings

199 200 203 209

I ndex of R eferences

211

A K ing J ames G lossary

A Hundred Translation Problems

|HE many questions about the translation o f passages in the N ew Testament that I have been asked in the last twenty years have led me to think that these ques­ tions should be discussed in print, w ith a full exhibit of the evidence bearing on each and some indication o f the opinion of translators and lexicographers. The discussions o f these and other questions of N ew Testament translation that arose in the sessions of the N ew Testament section o f the American Standard Bible Revision Committee, in its extremely interest­ ing and fruitful meetings from 1930 to 1943, emphasized my previous conclusion. For the fact is, most people think there is nothing to go upon in such matters except the caprice o f the individual translator; he is thought to be governed in his renderings by w hat he “ lik e s,” as we say. The character and quantity o f ancient evidence bearing on the meaning of a word or phrase are often undreamed of by the modern English reader, even w hen he has had some excellent training in Greek in college or seminary. The points taken up are, in general, those on w hich there seems to be most difference among translators and commenta­ tors. The discussion aims to introduce the reader into a trans­ lator’s workshop and to show him the tools and materials w ith w hich the translator works at his great task, w hich is, w ith all the aids learning can provide—translations, com­ mentaries, grammars, lexicons, concordances, papyri, inscrip­ tions, monographs, articles, everything he can reach that

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PR O B LE M S OF N E W T E S T A M E N T T R A N S L A T IO N

bears on the subject— to find out just w hat each o f the N ew Testament writers meant each sentence to convey; and then to set him self to cast that thought in such English as the translator would have used if he had thought of it himself; English so natural and easy that the reader w ill forget he is reading a translation and be led on and on by the sheer ease of the English style until he has read a w h ole letter or a w hole gospel at a sitting, as they were intended to be read; and begins to realize that the N ew Testament does not consist of chapters and verses but of living, coherent books whose main values are only gained through intelligent, continuous reading, and that any one of them may be read through aloud in a couple of hours. The fault of the first English versions was their word-forword method, coupled w ith the evident conviction that the translator need not understand the text he was at work upon in order to translate it. The supreme example o f this in the Old Testament is Eccles. 12:11: “The words o f the wise are as goads, and as nails fastened by the masters of assemblies, w hich are given from one shepherd.” This certainly meant no more to its producers, the Geneva translators of 1560, than it does to the modern reader. This devotion to word after word w ith never a glance at the line of thought has been the bane of Bible translation, from Tyndale to the revised versions. In II Corinthians we read, in the American Standard Version, “ For verily that w hich hath been made glorious hath not been made glorious in this re­ spect, by reason o f the glory that surpasseth.” This extraor­ dinary sentence—^which, o f course, requires a commentary for its understanding, and was intended to require one— is a com­ pletely successful piece of translation of a certain kind. Its makers were resolved to do full justice to every single word in

A H U N D R E D T R A N S L A T IO N P R O B L E M S

3

the text. That they had also a responsibility just as great to each clause and sentence and paragraph, they seemed una­ ware. Since the N ew Testament was first broken into verses by Robert Estienne, in 1551, it has become customary to read it as verses and in the Geneva, the Bishops’, and King James versions to translate it as verses. This has led translators and revisers to forget their responsibility to keep the’author’s line of thought and to see that .the reader is enabled to keep it. Forgetfulness of this did not matter much in mere narrative portions, but in discourse and argument, such as Paul so often engages in, it is of vital importance. The result has been that Paul’s letters have become for most readers of the standard versions a vast jungle of words, from w hich an intelligible idea only occasionally emerges. As Paul is the leading thinker among the writers of the N ew Testament, this has been in the highest degree disastrous. When Paul’s collected letters were published and circulated in the early church, they at once pro­ duced an extraordinary effect upon Christian thought. But this strong and stim ulating influence has been largely cut off from English-speaking Christianity by the general adherence to the standard versions, w hich have made Paul so difficult and obscure that he has come to be generally neglected, except for a few easy verses and a chapter here and there. As far as in­ telligible, coherent discourse is concerned, Paul has been prac­ tically blacked out by the form the standard versions have fastened upon him. The trenchant vigor and directness that really characterize him have disappeared .The popular impression about modern translation is that the translator simply takes the King James Version and sets out to modernize its phraseology. O f course, he does nothing of the sort; he seldom looks at the King James Version,

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PR O B LE M S OF N E W T E S T A M E N T T R A N S L A T IO N

for he knows that he has a much more ancient and trust­ worthy Greek text to translate than the scholars o f King James; he knows that they did very little translating, being in nine cases out of ten satisfied w ith the renderings already hammered out by Tyndale, Coverdale, Taverner, the Puritans at Geneva, the makers of the Bishops’ Bible, or the Catholic translators at Rheims. It is interesting to see h ow in instance after instance these notes w ill show h ow the King James re­ peats the reading o f one or another of these earlier versions and h ow rare it is to find any new piece of translation in its pages. Of course, it did not purport to be a new translation: “Truly (good Christian reader),’’ ran the now forgotten pref­ ace, “we never thought from the beginning that we should need to make a new Translation, . . . . but to make a good one better, or out o f many good ones, one principal good one, not justly to be excepted against.’’ The King James Version is a mosaic made up o f units from its eight predecessors, Tyndale, Coverdale, Rogers, Taverner, the Great, Geneva, the Bishops’, and the Rheims. That W yclif, or Purvey’s revision of him, had any direct effect upon the King James is not impossible, but I have not observed any evidence o f it. Of course, the King James set out to be a conservative revi­ sion of the then authorized English Bible, the Bishops’ of 1568, w hich by the first rule set up to govern the version was to be “ as little altered as the truth of the original w ill per­ m it.’’^ N ot only has the modern translator a far more sound and ancient Greek text to translate; he has a far better knowledge o f Greek than any possessed in 1611. The rise o f modern sci­ ence has been accurately reflected in the study of language by the development of the method of comparative philology, * T^e Holy Bible: An Exact R eprin t . . . . (Oxford, 1911), Introduction, p. 39.

A HUNDRED TRANSLATION PROBLEMS

5

w hich has transformed language study, and especially the study o f Greek, both syntax and lexicography. The last.forty years have witnessed the production o f a series o f N ew Testa­ ment lexicons, in France, Germany, Britain, and America,, that give the translator aids no previous group of N ew Testa­ ment scholars ever possessed. G^rammars, too, have kept pace w ith lexicons. Young scholars disdain the dictionaries and grammars their fathers used, and older scholars have given up the ones they used thirty years ago for the better ones o f today. Probably no field of p h ilology has made more progress in the number and excellence o f such new aids to its study than the NewTestam ent field, w ith the lexicons.of Preuschen (1910), Zorell ( 1 9 1 1 ) , Ebeling (1913), Souter (1916), Abbott-Smith ( 1 9 2 2 ) , Bauer’s thoroughgoing revision o f Preuschen (1928, 1936), M oulton and M illigan (1930), and K ittel (1933— w hile the new Liddell-Scott-Jones Lexicon (Oxford, 1940) is of greatly increased value for the N e w Testament. Progress in the grammatical field is almost as marked, w ith the works of M oulton (1906-r29; V ols. I and II), Radermacher (1925),. Debrunner (1931), Robertson (3d ed., 1919), and others. The discoveries o f Greek papyri in the field in the last fifty years have further illuminated N ew Testament problems. The tens o f thousands o f Greek papyrus documents of common life already published have show n that the Greek o f the N ew Testament is fundamentally the spoken language of its day, and this has put N ew Testament translation in a new perspec­ tive and stimulated the modern-speech movement in N ew Testament translation during the last forty-five years. Lexi­ cons such as Preisigke’s (1927) and grammars like M ayser’s ( 1 9 3 4 ) have brought the ample philological contribution of these papyri'into focus for the N ew Testament student. A lto­ gether, he is in a most favorable position to make a fresh at-

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P R O B LE M S OF N E IV T E S T A M E N T T R A N S L A T IO N

tack upon the task of N ew Testament translation, w ith new resources o f w hich his predecessors hardly dreamed. Elaborate concordances and indexes facilitate the study of the Greek Testament, the Septuagint version of the Old Testa­ ment, the Apostolic Fathers, and the early apologists, as w ell as scattered classical authors from Homer down. W ith these aids, the actual uses of a rare or difficult word can be studied and the judgment o f the lexicons controlled and even modi­ fied. Acquaintance w ith other Greek of N ew Testament times, Jewish, .literary, translational, and vernacular, may throw ligh t on the use o f a word in the N ew Testament. Private or personal translations o f the N ew Testament began w ith W illiam Tyndale, in 1525, for no one authorized him to translate the N ew Testament; indeed, it was not until 1539 that an Authorized English Bible appeared. It was displaced in 1568 by the Bishops’ and that in 1611 by the King James. By 1729, however, a new movement in private translation began, and this has proceeded w ith increasing vigor, stimu­ lated by fresh manuscript discoveries and improving p h ilologi­ cal and exegetical aids, until today. One of the main causes for these new versions is the feeling that the English of the sixteenth century that saturates all the traditional forms o f the English Bible (though not the new Catholic revision) is an obstacle to its understanding. Many words used in it are now obsolete, many more are used in al­ tered senses, and the w h ole cast o f the language is such as be­ longs only to a translation, not to a work of English origin. The fervid devotion o f many people to the letter o f the tradi­ tional versions was w ell answered in the great preface of the King James Version, “ The Translators to the Reader,’’ which ought still to precede every printing of it, since w ithout it the reader has fallen prey to every kind of misapprehension about

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that great version: “ For is the kingdom of God become words or syllables? W hy should w e be in bondage to them if w e may be free . . . . ?” English had developed so fast between 1382 and 1 5 2 5 that W yclif’s version w ould not answer Tyndale’s purpose; and it has moved almost as far in the four hundred years since Tyndale. For it is not the language of 1611 that is offered us in the King James Bible; it is in the main the lan­ guage of the middle of the sixteenth century, and the language of the King James Version is nearer to the English of Tyndale than it is to that of M yles Smith, bishop of Gloucester, w ho is supposed to have written its great preface. It is of interest and sometimes of importance to note the source from w hich the King James phraseology in this or that passage was derived and to see h ow the earlier English Bibles translated it. It is also of interest to see h o w modern trans­ lators have dealt w ith these matters and w hat new evidence has come to ligh t that bears upon the problem. The translator has to deal w ith a number of considerations, of w hich sound learning is the most fundamental; but good taste in English expression is almost equally important. He must recognize that each original writer has a manner of his own and that his manner must as far as possible be reflected in the translator’s English. It is not the least of the services of the modern translations that they have brought out to some extent the individual styles of the N ew Testament writers, w ho, because of the mannerisms of the standard versions, have generally been thought of, one and all, as using “ Bible Eng­ lish .’’ The familiarity of the King James English and its undoubted stateliness and rhythm in many passages have obscured the fact that in others it has erred just as truly; “ Whom do men say that I am?’’ “ I am verily a man w hich am a Jew ’’; “ He

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must increase, but I must decrease.” The undoubted rhythm o f this verse is secured only by mispronouncing both the verbs, w hich in Eang James’s time, as in our ow n, were properly ac­ cented on the second syllable, as a glance at Shakespeare w ill show:

And I do wish your honours may increase........ Lest thou increase the number of the dead. The modern translator must be a close student not only of Greek but o f the art of English translation, as pursued in the English Bible for more than four hundred years; indeed, since the time of W yclif, in 1382. In every sentence he must recog­ nize a new problem, for it must be rendered not only for itself but in such a w ay that its relation to the context is maintained. The best translation is not one that keeps forever before the reader’s mind the fact that this is a translation, not an original English com position, but one that makes the reader forget that it is a translation at all and makes him feel that he is looking into the ancient w riter’s mind, as he would into that o f a contemporary. This is, indeed, no ligh t matter to under­ take or to execute, but it is, nevertheless, the task o f any seri­ ous translator. Translation is a matter of infinite detail, sometimes so slight as to appear trivial. But in translation no detail is trivial, for translation is made up of a w ealth of such details, neglect o f any one of w hich may vitiate the result.

The Gospel According to Matthew

1:1

The hook of the generation of Jesus Christ (King James) BtjSXos yeviaeois TTjaov XpusTov

h e Greek phrase jStjSXos yeviaecos is reminiscent of Gen. 2:4, 5:1, etc., where it occurs in the Septuagint version, usually to introduce a genealogy, as here. The King James rendering of it was derived from Tyndale’s (1525) “ Thys is the boke off the generacion off Jhesus Christ,” w hich was sub­ stantially follow ed by Coverdale (1535), Rogers (1537), and the Great Bible (1539). But the Geneva Bible (1560) uncon­ sciously fell in w ith W yclif (1382), ‘‘The booc of the genera­ cion ,” and omitted ‘‘This is ,” w hich Tyndale had supplied, probably under the influence of Luther (1522), w ho began ‘‘Das ist das Buch.” The Bishops’ (1568) went back to ‘‘Tlus is the book e,” but the King James follow ed the Geneva in om itting ‘‘This is .” The revised versions (1881, 1901) fol­ lowed the same course. As the phrase is a very blind one, conveying almost nothing to the reader, except perhaps the idea of the birth-story of Jesus, modern translators have made a variety of efforts to clarify it. Campbell (1826) translated it, ‘‘The history of Jesus Christ” ; Anderson (1864), ‘‘the book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ” ; Noyes (1869), ‘‘The genealogy of Jesus Christ” ; Rotherham (1878), ‘‘R oll o f Lineage o f Jesus Christ” ; Ballentine (1902), ‘‘The book o f the genealogy of Jesus Christ” ; Weymouth (1903), ‘‘The genealogy o f Jesus Christ” ; Twen-

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tieth Century (1904), “/ i genealogy of Jesus Christ” ; Worrell (1904) , “ A book of the lineage of Jesus Christ” ; Ferrar Fenton ( 1 9 0 5 ) , “ The record of the genealogy of Jesus Christ” ; Moffatt ( 1 9 1 3 ), “The birth-roll of Jesus Christ” ; Ballantine ( 1 9 2 3 ), “The ancestral line of Jesus Christ” ; Spencer (1937), “Record of the Genealogy of Jesus Christ” ; the Catholic re­ vision ( 1 9 4 1 ), “The book o f the origin of Jesus Christ” ; and the Basic (1941), “ The book of the generations of Jesus Christ.” As used here in M atthew, the phrase seems to mean what w e express by “pedigree” or “ ancestry”—a list o f ancestors, in the order of descent. We may translate: “The ancestry of Jesus Christ.” 1:18

oj the Holy Ghost (King James) I k TTvevfiaTos a y io v

h e old words “ ghost” and ' ‘spirit” have to some extent exchanged meanings since the sixteenth century; w hat was then called “ ghost” w e now call “ spirit” and w hat was then called “spirit” (as in M att. 14:26) we sometimes call “ gh ost.” Yet Shakespeare uses “ ghost” in the usual modern sense. While TTvevfxa is often translated “spirit” in the King James, if limited by a yio v i t is always rendered “ G h ost,” except in Luke 11:13; Eph. 1:13, 4:30; and I Thess. 4:8. W yclif (1382) translated it, “o f the h oly gost” ; Tyndale ( 1 5 2 5 ), Coverdale (1535), Rogers (1537), and the Great Bible ( 1 5 3 9 ), “ by the holy goost” ; the Geneva (1560), “ of the holie G ost” ; the Bishops’ (1568), “of the holy ghost” ; the Rheims (1582), “ by the H oly G host” ; and the King James (1611), ‘‘o f the holy Ghost. ’’ It was only later printings of the King James that began to capitalize “ H o ly ,” follow ing the

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style o f the Rheims of 1582; and this is the form in the English Revision (^1881): o f the H oly G host” ; here there is a mar­ ginal note on this passage but on no other: ‘‘Or, H oly Spirit: and so throughout this book. ’’ The American Revision (1901), however, reads ‘‘of the H oly Spirit.” Modern translators in general translate ‘‘the H oly Spirit,” w ith a variety o f prepositions— ‘‘o f,” ‘‘from ,” ‘‘b y,” ‘‘through the power o f.” MofFatt (1913) rendered ‘‘by the holy Spirit” ; Spencer (1937), ‘‘from the H oly G host” ; the Catholic revision (1941) and the Basic (1941), ‘‘by the H oly Spirit.” The King James Bible of 1611 did not capitalize ‘‘h o ly ” as the Rheims (C atholic) version had done; in fact, the early Protestant versions (1525—68) did not, as far as I have ob­ served, capitalize either word. Later publishers of the King James, however, have taken up the practice o f capitalizing both words, and many modern users o f that version regard any other course as little less than sacrilege. The 1761 edition of the King James Version, printed at London, capitalized the adjective, though the Edinburgh edition of 1764 did not. The capitalized form probably did not become standard until the labors of Paris and Blayney in revising the King James text, in 1762 and 1769. 1:21

thou shalt call his name JESUS (King James) KaXeaeus

to

o vo fjL a

avrov Trjo’ovj^

' ^ H E u s e o f the antique pronouns ‘‘th ee,” ‘‘th o u ,” ‘‘th y ,” J- and thine” has so long been associated w ith the Bible that to some it seems inseparable from it. But the evidence of the Greek papyri has shown that the N ew Testament, unlike so much of the Old, is written in a vigorous, familiar style, in

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the vernacular Greek of its day; and the stiffness and formality w hich “ thee” and “ th o u ” impart to the translation, and par­ ticularly the distraction w hich they constantly create in the mind of the reader or hearer because o f their unfamiliarity, form a serious drawback to the understanding of the versions in w hich they appear. And, apart from this, the regular form of the second-person pronoun nowadays is “you ” for singular and plural alike. The retention o f “ thee” and “ th ou ” imparts an archaic quality to the style w hich no one would dream of accepting if it were not that the traditional versions had long habituated us to it. But the problem o f the N ew Testament translator is to give to his version as nearly as possible the literary level o f the original; to be as formal, or as informal, as the Greek text be­ fore him is, in a given book or chapter. To decline this respon­ sibility because the problem has long been settled in another w ay would be equivalent to declining the translator’s task altogether. For it is his business to translate not into some antique diction but into such living language as the N ew Tes­ tament itself was written in. As parts of such a living language, “ thee” and “ th ou ” found places in the translations of Tyndale and Coverdale, and passed from them to their successors, w ho for the most part did little but revise w hat those tw o men had written in their notable versions of 1525 and 1535 and in Rogers’ Bible of 1537, w hich embodies Tyndale’s last revision of the'N ew Tes­ tament. These editions formed the basis of the Protestant series that follow ed—^Taverner and the Great Bible, in 1539; the Geneva in 1560; the Bishops’ in 1568; and the King James in 1611, w ith its subsequent revisions in 1881 and 19Q1. But any page o f Shakespeare w ill remind the reader that “ y ou ” was by his time already rivaling “ thee” and “th o u ”

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in general use, and his plays were written between 1591 and 1613. A hundred and twenty-five years ago Scott was using “ thee” and “ th o u ” and the old verb forms of the second and third persons singular to impart an antique air to the diction o f his medieval characters. H ow much, if anything, the English Bible owes to these archaisms is a matter on w hich there is the widest and strong­ est difference of opinion. I have felt that the vernacular qual­ ity the Greek papyri have disclosed in the Greek N ew Testa­ ment bears decisively upon the question. It would be interest­ ing to interrogate the w hole series o f private translators since King James on the point; but, w ithout going back to W histon (1745) and Wesley (1755), it is enough to look at the course pursued by a few modern translators since 1826. The general use o f “ thee” and “ th o u ,” “ th y ” and “ th in e,” is given up in favor of ‘‘you ’ ’ and ‘‘your’’ by Campbell (1826), Norton (1855), Anderson (1864), Ballentine (1902), Wey­ m outh (1903), Twentieth Century (1904), Ferrar Fenton (1905), M offatt ( 1 9 1 3 ), Ballantine (1923), Montgomery ■( 1 9 2 4 ), and the Basic (1941). Some of these retain it in certain uses, as when God is speaking or is addressed. It seems certain that to employ these antique forms of speech in translating the N ew Testament gives it a formal and archaic tone w hich is entirely strange to the original N ew Testament, and seriously detracts from its extraordinary naturalness and vigor of expression. To do so clothes its bold and telling ut­ terances w ith remoteness and unreality and, combined w ith verb forms like “ anointedst” and “ coveredst” or “ escapeth” and “establisheth,” makes the Bible sound stiff and archaic, materially increases the difficulty of understanding it, reduces popular interest in it, and repels the modern reader. It is noteworthy that the Catholic revision (1941), w hile

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retaining “ thee” and “th ou ,” w ith the old verb forms of the second-person singular ( “ killest,” “ stonest,” “ dost” ), has nevertheless abandoned the obsolete forms of the third-person singular ( “ biow eth,” “perisheth,” “resisteth,” “regardeth,” etc.) and also the old subjective form of the second-person plural pronoun “y e ,” w hich occurs more than forty times in the Sermon on the Mount in the King James Version. The abandonment of this single word results in a great increase in vigor and directness throughout the Sermon. 2:1

mse men (King James) fxayoL

h e Latin word “ m agi” W yclif (1382) translated “ kyngis (or w isem en).” The King James translation “wise men” goes back to Tyndale (1525), whose rendering “wyse men” was probably influenced by Luther’s “ die Weisen” (1522). Tyndale’s form was followed by Coverdale (1535), Rogers (1537), and the Bishops’ (1568). The Great Bible (1539) read “wysem en,” and the Geneva (1560), “ W isemen.” The Rheims (1582) translated “ Sages.” The English Revised (1881) retained “wise m en,” but the American Standard (1901) for some reason altered it to “ Wise-men,” capitalized and hyphenated. Yet the same Greek Qixayos) or Latin (magus) word in Acts 13:6 and 8 is never so translated in any of these versions. W yclif (1382) renders it “w icche” ; Tyndale and most of the others “ a sorserer” (sorcerar, sorcerer); but in the Rheims it becomes “ a magician. ’’ It is, of course, the word from which “ m agic” is derived. “ Sorcerer” was adopted in the King James Version (1611) for Acts 13:6 and 8 and is pre­ served in the English and American revisions (1881, 1901). W yclif’s “ kyngis” reflects the medieval and ancient idea suggested in Isa. 60:3-6 that the M agi were kings; the three

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gifts suggested that there were three kings, and by the Middle Ages the apocryphal Gospel o f the Infancy had named them Gaspar, M elchior, and Baltasar. Of course, the gospel narra­ tive has no such implication. The Greek word means a Persian Magus, magician, or astrologer. Their great concern about the stars as guides to coming events shows that they were in this case astrologers. Astrology was a recognized and respected w ay o f thinking in the first century. Tiberius, Augustus’ suc­ cessor as emperor, had spent some of the best years of his life studying astrology at Rhodes. The ancient Greek readers of M atthew understood this passage to mean that astrology bowed at the M essiah’s cradle, acknowledging that its day was done; so Ignatius, Justin, Tertullian, Origen, and Hilary interpreted it. Of the modern translators, Campbell (1826) and Noyes (1869) rendered it “m agians” in M atthew, chapter 2. The word was transferred into English as “M agi” by Norton (1855), Weymouth (1903), Ferrar Fenton (1905), M ontgom­ ery (1924), and the Catholic revision (1941). Twentieth Cen­ tury (1904) translated it “ Astrologers” and M ofiatt (1913), “ m agicians.” M cNeile in his commentary on M atthew (Lon­ don, 1928) translates it “M agians” but remarks that “M at­ thew appears to use it w ith the specific force of ‘astrologer.’ ” . I would translate: “astrologers.” 4:21

in a ship (King James) €V TOO T r X o t o )

h e Greek word tP K o I o v means either “ ship” or “ b oat,” being derived from the same root as TrXeo?, “ to sa il,” and hence means primarily a sailboat. The ordinary boat on the Sea of Galilee in my student days (1900) was some twentytw o feet long and about eight feet wide—a good deal of a tub, in fact, but of great buoyancy, easily accommodating nine

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men, five of them constituting the crew, w h o managed the sail on the one mast, foirward, and also did a good deal of rowing. I suppose the “ships” on that body of water in Jesus’ day were about the same size, not at all what w e understand by “ ships” today, for w h ile a “ boat” may be great or small, a “ ship” means to us something much more than twenty-two feet long. A truer picture is therefore raised before the reader’s mind if we translate t K o l o v “ boat” throughout the gospels, instead o f “ ship,” w hich has been the invariable rendering for it in the King James Version but not in the English and Ameri­ can revised versions, w hich have very properly changed to “ boat” throughout the gospels. W yclif uses both renderings— “ schippe” (M att. 4:21, “navis”) but “ boot” more generally. Tyndale always trans­ lates tt X o l o v “ship” (shyp, shyppe, shippe), and subsequent English Bibles, down to and including the King James, fol­ lowed him steadily in that rendering. The Rheims (1582) usually reads “ boat,” but not infrequently “ship,” as here and in Luke 5:2-11. Modern-speech translators have generally held to “ boat” in the gospels; so also the Basic (1941) and the Catholic revision (1941). 5:3

Blessed are the poor in spirit (King James) MaKaptot ot Trrcoxot ro) TrvevjjLaTL

O THE modern reader, “poor in spirit” suggests “poorspirited, lacking in courage and spirit.” But this is not w hat Trrajxol rch irvehiiarL means. The King James rendering goes back to W yclif’s (1382) “pore in spirit” and has come down through Tyndale, Rogers, the Great Bible, the Geneva, the Bishops’, and the Rheims to King James and the revised ver­ sions (1881, 1901). It is clearly a place where the literal wordfor-word rendering does not convey the meaning. Yet most of the modern translations have accepted W yclif’s translation

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unchanged—Anderson (1864), Noyes (1869), Ballentine (1902), Weymouth (1903), Twentieth Century (1904), Im­ proved Edition (1912), Ballantine (1923), Montgomery (1924), Spencer (1937), the Catholic revision (1941), and the Basic (1941). . Other modern versions have attempted a more penetrating translation: Campbell (1826), “ Happy the poor w ho repine n o t” ; Norton (1855), ‘‘Blessed are they w ho feel their spiritual w ants” ; Rotherham (1878), “ Happy the destitute in [their] spirit” ; Ferrar Fenton (1905), “ Blessed are the gentle in spir­ i t ” ; and MofFatt (1913), “ Blessed are those w ho feel poor in spirit.” The phrase is undoubtedly one of the most difficult to trans­ late in the gospels. Few commentators, lexicographers, or translators make any serious effort to solve it. M cNeile in his commentary paraphrases it as “pious . . . . in their spirit.” Souter, in his Pocket Lexicon, explains ttcoxoI (evidently mean­ ing w ith ro) TTvevixari) as “ humble, devout persons w ho feel the need of G od’s h elp .” I would translate: ‘‘Blessed are those w ho feel their spiritual need.” 5:15

men light a candU (King James) Kaiov(TLP \vxvov

h e prevalent form of illum ination in England in the six­ teenth century was the candle; Shakespeare shows it:

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How far that little candle throws his beams! Night’s candles are burnt out. Out, out, brief candle!

Out of respect to the habit of his day, Tyndale translated the Greek word \i)xvos “ candle,” and \vxAa “ candlestick.” But the ordinary illuminant in the Greek and Jewish world of the

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first century was thp lamp, a small metal or pottery affair full of olive oil, w ith a tiny wick w hich carried the flame. Thou­ sands of them have survived from antiquity and fill our mu­ seums. Epictetus speaks of a metal one he had w hich w^s stolen from him, and he philosophically observes that he w ill get a cheap pottery one w hich w ill give just as m uch.light. As these ancient lamps were not much bigger than an oldfashioned watch, they did not stand on the floor but. were put on kmpstands, so that at least some of their ligh t would be cast down upon whatever business their owner had in hand. This is the simple, common practice referred to in M att. 5:15: men put their lamps not under peck measures but up where they would do some good—on lampstands. It is strange that many intelligent people were so unaware of this fact of an­ cient life that they strongly resented the return of modern versions to the plain meaning of the Greek. They even ap­ pealed to the candlestick in the tabernacle furniture (Exod. 25:31, 32) in support of the idea that Jesus and the apostles used candles—oblivious of the fact that even the candlestick, according to the King James (Exod. 25:31-40), culminated in seven “ lamps” w hich burned oil (25:6, 35:14), not candles. W yclif, working, of course, from the Latin, translated lucernam “ lanterne,” and candelabrum “ candilstik,” w hich suggests a grotesque picture to the modern mind: putting a lantern on a candlestick. Tyndale’s “ candell” on a “ candelstick” is less incongruous. It was accepted and repeated, w ith some changes in spelling, by all his successors down to and in­ cluding the King James. Even the Rheims (1582) only changed “ on” to “upon.” But the English revisers, perhaps admon­ ished by the numerous private translators that had inter­ vened, restored the true picture, w ith “ lamp” and “ stand,” and so did the American Standard Version of 1901. The pri-

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vate translators, certainly since 1788 (George Campbell), have generally translated by “ lamp” and “ stand,” or “ lampstand.” There is probably no improvement on the King James on w hich there is more unanimity among revisers and^ trans­ lators than there is on this. Yet it is strange that the revisers, English and American, have clung to the rendering “ candle­ stick ,” in Exod. 25:31, though w ell aware that it supported seven lamps, not candles. 5:18 pne jot or one tittle (K ing James) Icora %v ^ lAa Kepia

h e Vulgate’s reading “ iota unum, aut unus apex” W yclif (1382) rendered “ one I (that is the leeste letter) or a title. ” Tyndale (1525) translated the Greek “ one iott, or one ty tie .” This was reproduced, w ith slight variations in spelling (iotte, iote, tyttle, title), in all his successors down to and including the Bishops’ (1568). The Rheims (1582) read “ one iote or one tittle .” The King James (1611) follow ed the Geneva in reading “ one iote or one title ,” but subsequent editors of the King James have tacitly altered it to “one jot or one tittle .” There can be no doubt that W yclif was right in explaining the jot as the smallest letter, in Greek (io ta ) or in Hebrew (yodh); the latter is, in fact, only a kind of exaggerated apos­ trophe; in shape and in size. The standard English translation certainly loses the figure entirely, as a glance at some recent dictionaries shows. The English and American revisions (1881, 1901) followed the (revised) King James: “ one jot or one tittle .” The word “ tittle ” has fared better in modern usage, for the dictionaries recognize that it means a dot or mark placed over a letter, like the dot above an i. W hile some modern translators (N oyes, 1869; Catholic re-

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vised, 1941) have accepted the modernized King James render­ ing, most of them have made great efforts to clarify it and, if possible, recover the figure lost in the strange technical words “ jot” and “ tittle .” The result has been a variety of render­ ings: “one iota, or one tittle” (Campbell, 1826); “ the smallest letter or stroke” (Norton, 1855); “ one yod or one point” (Anderson, 1864); “ one least letter or one point” (Rother­ ham, 1878); “not the dot of an ‘i , ’ nor the cross of a ‘t ’” (Ballentine, 1902); “ not one iota or smallest detail” (W eymouth, 1903); “not even the smallest letter, nor one stroke of a letter” (Twentieth Century, 1904); “a single dot or hairstroke” (Ferrar Fenton, 1905); “not an iota, not a comma” (M offatt, 1913; Montgomery, 1924); “ not the smallest letter or part of a letter” (Ballantine, 1923; Basic, 1941); “not one iota nor one d ot” (Spencer, 1937). Since we cannot stop to teach every listener that iota is the smallest letter in the Greek alphabet and yodh in the Hebrew, it seems best to substitute the corresponding English idiom, of dotting Ts and crossing Ps. I am gratified to see that Ballentine (1902) had long before reached the same conclusion. I would translate: “ one dotting of an ^ or crossing of a ^.” 5:22

Raca (King James)

Ta/ca YCLIF, w ith the Latin Vulgate “racha” before him, translated or transliterated it “racha (that is a worde of scorne).” Tyndale (1525), perhaps follow ing Luther (1522), used the same form, though his Greek text (Erasmus, 1522) read paKa. Coverdale (1535), Rogers (1537), and the Great Bible (1539) followed Tyndale in reading “ Racha,” but the Geneva (1560) changed it to “Raca” to conform more closely to the Greek text. The Bishops’ (1568) still clung to “Racha,”

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but the Rheims (1582) follow ed Geneva ( “Raca”). The King James (1611) naturally follow ed the Bishops’ and read “Racha,” w hich subsequent printers of this version as early as 1734 were altering to “Raca,” under the influence o f the Geneva Bible and the Greek text. . The Greek text was as much at sea as to the right spelling of the word as the early translators were. M ost Greek manu­ scripts, uncial or minuscule, read paKa, but A leph’s firsthand, D, W, most Old Latin and Vulgate manuscripts, and Tertullian and Cyprian support pa%a. The precise reading has recently as­ sumed new importance in view of the occurrence of the word in a Greek document of the Ptolemaic period. The word has long perplexed translators and interpreters and has led to much speculation. N o Aramaic word resembling it has been reported. There is a Hebrew root from w hich such a word m ight have arisen, but no occurrence of this form from that root in either Aramaic or Hebrew has been pointed out. Dr. Colwell quotes Augustine as saying that a Jew “ told him it was a word w ithout meaning, an interjection expressing indignation.” ^ Among translators, Campbell (1826), Norton (1855), and Ballentine (1902) rendered paKa “fo o l,” using “miscreant,” “reprobate,” or “ scoundrel,” for pcope in the follow ing clause. Anderson (1864) translated “worthless fello w ” ^Noyes (1869) “ simpleton” ; Ferrar Fenton (1905), “ scoundrel” ; Mofl’a tt (1913), using a verb, “ m aligns” ; Spencer (1937), “Thou id iot” ; the Basic and the Catholic revision (1941) return to “Raca.” N ew light was suddenly thrown upon the vexed question when in 1934 C. C. Edgar published among some additional ^ E. C. Colwell, “ Has Raka a Parallel in the Papyri?” Journal of Biblical Literature^ LIII (1934), 351-54.

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Zenon papyri in the Rylands Library at Manchester a letter dated February 6 or 9, 257 b . c ., probably from a certain Amyntas to his chief, Apollonius.^ Amyntas is speaking sharply, as was his w ont, and warning his principal against the represen­ tatives of Antiochus, "the rachas”— t 6 v paxav- Edgar says other letters of Amyntas “ are spiced w ith uncomplimentary epithets,” and here he seems to be calling Antiochus a bad name, perhaps so vile that Greek literature has nowhere pre­ served it, except in M att. 5:22, where the evangelist mentions it only to forbid its use. The acceptance of this as another instance of the mysterious word in M att. 5:22 goes far to clear up the difficulty. The ac­ cusative t 6 v p a x ^ v would imply just the vocative in -a w hich the text has. The spelling w ith x instead of k accords w ith that in the first hand of Aleph, D, W, and most Old Latin and Vulgate texts, as w ell as that Tertullian and Cyprian. In fact, as Dr. Colwell has pointed out, since A, C, and the Beatty papyrus are wanting at this point, “ of important early Greek witnesses Vaticanus alone can be cited in support of the form pO L K a." ^

Taxas has long been known as a Greek word from Photius (paxAs,paxa5os)and the Greek InscriptionsXpdxas,paxa),meaning “ a wooded ridge” (cf. pdxts, “ a spine, ridge,” a w ellknown word). Possibly this passed in some obscure fashion into a term of reproach, like our “roughneck,” “ moss-back,” etc. There are, or used to be, English epithets— “ foul names”— which one sometimes heard on the lips of foul-mouthed peo­ ple but never saw in print. Such a name was paxas. The form of it in M att. 5:22, like that of Mojpe further on in the verse, is * C. C. Edgar, A New Group of Zenon Papyri (Manchester, 1934), p. 2. 3 Op. cit.

T H E GOSPEL ACCORDING TO M A T T H E W

23

vocative (like 'Aypiinra [Acts 25:24, 26:2]) and should re­ ceive a circumflex on the ultima, 'PaxS, as in ’ETra^pa, A o v k o l , TiTecfyava.

For thine is the kingdom, and the -power, and the glory, for ever. Amen (King James)

6:13

h e doxology at the end of the Lord’s Prayer is present in most Greek manuscripts of the gospel and in most of the ancient versions but not in the Old Latin or the Latin Vulgate or in the best Greek manuscripts, Aleph, B, D, and Z, and a number of minuscules. It was added to the prayer when it was used in public worship, and this must have been done very early, since a form of it follow s the prayer in the Teaching of the Twelve Apostles, chapter 8, about a . d . 150. It was w ell known by the time of Chrysostom, at the end of the fourth century. It is a litufgical addition, based on I Chron. 29:11: “Thine, O Lord, is the greatness and the power and the glory and the preeminence and the majesty, . . . . thine is the do­ minion, O Lord,’’ and perhaps also on Ps. 145:11: ‘‘They shall speak of the glory of thy kingdom, and talk of thy pow er.’’ The doxology is absent from the translations of W yclif (1382) and Tyndale (1525), though it was in Luther by 1560 or soon after and is present in Coverdale (1535), Rogers (1537), the Great Bible (1539), the Geneva (1560), the Bishops’ (1568), and the King James (1611). It was absent from the Rheims N ew Testament of 1582, w hich was made from the Latin Vulgate, and was omitted from the English and Ameri­ can revisions of King James (1881, 1901). It is almost invariably absent from the modern translations —Campbell (1826), Norton (1855), Anderson (1864), Noyes (1869), Rotherham (1878), Ballentine (1902), Weymouth (1903), Twentieth Century (1904), Worrell (1904), Ferrar

T

PROBLEMS OF NEW TESTAMENT TRANSLATION

24

Fenton (1905), Moffatt (1913), Ballantine (1923), Spencer (1937), the Catholic revision (1941), and the Basic (1941). It is omitted from the text in the principal modern editions of the Greek N ew Testament—Tischendorf, Westcott and Hort, Nestle, Von Soden, Souter, etc. 6:27

Which of you hy taking thought can add one cubit unto his staturel (King James) ris 8e ej Vfxcov [xepifxvcov h w a r a i TTpoadeivai M rrjv rfKudav avTov Trl)xcv ha

h e idea of adding eighteen inches to ofie’s height is for most of us simply grotesque, and as a matter of fact the word translated “heigh t’’— f}\Lda—in N ew Testament times generally meant age. Field thought the use of the word “ cubit,” a measure of length, was fatal to that sense here;^ but we have no trouble w ith “ millions of money for an inch of tim e!” and most people would be glad to extend life even a little as they approach its end. Certainly, iJXt/cta is translated “ age” by Mrs. Carter, George Long, and Professor Oldfather in their translations of Epictetus, w ho was a contemporary of our evangelists (h i. 21. 16). It is rendered “ age” by Preisigke, in his Woerterbuch der griechischen Urkunden, column 654, w ith numerous instances, “of age,” “under age,” etc. It is rendered “ age” by Souter in his Pocket Lexicon, page 106. Zorell, in his Lexicon Graecum, translates it “ aetas,” and Ebeling, Woerter­ buch zum Neuen Testament, page 192, translates it “ LebensAlter, Lebens-Laenge.” M oulton and M illigan in their Vocabu­ lary of the Greek Testament say: “ N o one w ho reads the papyri

T

1 Cf. Luke 12:25. 2 F. Field, HoUs on the Translation of the New Testament (Ca.mhndgc, 1899), p. 6.

THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO MATTHEW

25

can have any doubt that the word meant ‘age,’ in ordinary parlance.” So also in Justin, Tatian, Athenagoras, Ignatius, Martyrdom of Polycarf, and the Septuagint. The new Liddell-Scott-Jones Lexicon (1940) gives its usual • meaning as “ age,” and “ stature” as an exceptional one. It translates the word “ age” in the tw o gospel passages in ques­ tion and refers to the expression 7n7%utos xP^^os, “ but a span,” — “ a cubit of tim e”— in Mimnermus, a striking parallel to “ an inch of tim e.” This seems decisive. If more were needed, we m ight recall Ps. 39:5: “ Thou hast made my days but as handbreadths, and my lifetime is as nothing before thee.” It is strange that Field and commentators in general do not take account of this passage, w hich establishes the figure of apply­ ing linear measures to length of life. W yclif read “stature,” as did all the sixteenth-century translators, the King James, and the English Revised Version (1881). But the American revisers (1901) read “ the measure of his life .” Campbell (1826) translated “prolong his life one hour” ; Norton (1855), “ add one cubit to his life” ; Anderson (1864), “ add one span to his life” ; Noyes (1869), “ add*to his life one cubit” ; Weymouth (1903), “ add a single foot to his h eigh t,” though adding in a note, “N ot one person in ten thousand wishes to add eighteen inches to his stature, but many would gladly prolong their liv es.” T w entieth Century (1904) translated “prolong his life a single moment” ; Ferrar Fenton (1905), “ add a single foot to his h eigh t” ; the Im­ proved Edition (1912), “ add one cubit to his age” ; Moffatt ( 1 9 1 3 ), “ add an ell to his height” ; Ballantine (1923), “ add to his height one fo o t” ; Montgomery (1924), “ add even one ^cubit to his stature” ; Spencer (1937), “add a single span to his life” ; the new Catholic revision (1941), “ add to his stature a single cubit” ; and the Basic (1941), “ make him self a foot

26

PROBLEMS OF NEW TESTAMENT TRANSLATION

taller.’* It is plain that Campbell, Norton, Anderson, Noyes, the American Standard, Weymouth (note). Twentieth Cen­ tury, the Improved Edition, and Spencer are in line w ith mod­ ern lexicography. I would translate: “ But w hich 6f you w ith all his worry can add a single hour to his life?” 6:32

For after all these things do the Gentiles seek (King Jahies). TCLVTa y a p r a v r a r a edvrj eTa^rjTOVCTLV

h e u^e o f “heathen” to translate Wvrj is much criticized by some, w ho prefer “ G entiles.” It is urged that “hea­ then” is a harsh word, conveying an idea of inferiority; it is a definite reflection upon the people so termed. This is true, but it is also just the reason “heathen” is a good translation of WvT], w hich in the Bible, Old Testament and N ew , is usually an expression of condemnation and even of contempt. This is w h y our word “nations” is inadequate to translate it, w hile “ G entiles” also fails of the purpose, since we are ourselves Gentiles in the sense in w hich the word is used today. The Greek word for “nations” (Wvrf) occurs 126 times in the N ew Testament, usually w ith the article (some 90 timps), not to mention frequent occurrences of it in the singular., It corresponds, in general, w ith the Hebrew word goyirh\ or sometimes ^ammim^ “peoples,” w hich in the King James Old Testament are variously translated “nations” more than 200 times; “ heathen” about 136 times, three-fourths of them in the parts first translated not by Tyndale from the Hebrew but by Coverdale from the Latin and German; and “ G entiles” 28 times. In the King James N ew Testament we find “nations” used

T

THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO MATTHEW

11

36 times; “ G entiles,” 90 tinles, in almost every case as a trans­ lation of edvT); and “ heathen,” 7 times. W yclif preferred “heathen” in most passages, so that it seems that “ Gentiles*' was Tyndale’s contribution. In giving up “ heathen” for “ nations” or “ G entiles,” the nineteenthcentury revisers certainly moved in the wrong direct:ioh, for these words by no means convey tt> the modern reader the feeling that goyim did to the Hebrews and Wvr} did to the Jews of the Greek world. The modern Jewish ns6 of goy implies an* outsider and an unbeliever; it is a term o f disapproval and implies'the inferiority of the person to whon^ it is applied. , Luther’s Heiden probably influenced both Tyndale and Coverdale (beithen) to use “ heathen,” and, of course, it was the Vulgate “ gentes” that led them to use “ G entiles,” w hich seems to be a piece of distinctly biblical English. Modern N ew Testament translators for the.most part prefer'the word “ Gen­ tiles” to “heathen,” just as the English and American re­ visers did in the seventies. For my part, I feel that “ G entiles” fails entirely to convey to the modern reader the reproach that goyim and, eSvr] possessed and were meant to convey. Here in 6:32, Tyndale, Rogers, and the Great Bible used “ gentyls,” but Coverdale used “ heithen.” The Geneva and the Bishops’ follow ed the Great Bible and read “ G entiles,” and from them the reading passed into the King James and the revised versions. W yclif (1382) translated gentes as “ hethene m en,” and the Rheims (1582) translated it “ the H eathen.” Spencer (1937), working from the Greek, also translates it “ the heathen,” but the new Catholic revision (1941) renders “ the G entiles.” ^ I would translate: “for these are all things the heathen are in pursuit of. ’’

28 9:10

PROBLMS of n e w TESTAMENT TRANSLATION publicans and sinners (K ing James) T^Oivai Kal ajjLaptci)\oi

"

'

h e word “publicans’’ for “ tax collectors’’ goes back to the Latin Vulgate’s “publican!’’ and to W yclif’s (1382)^ “puplicans and synful men.’’ Tyndale (1525) read “publicans an4 synners,’’ and this reading, w ith slight variations in spelling and the addition of “also’’ after “publicans” (the Great, the Geneva, the bishops’) , continues through Rogers (1537), the Great (1539), the Geneva (1560), the Bishops’ (1568), the Rheim^ (1582), the King James (161J), and so iiito the revised versions (1881* 1901). “ Publican” may haye had the sense of rax collector in six­ teenth-century English outside the Bible; but Shylock’s “ H ow like a fanning publican he looks!” is the only occurrence of the word in Shakespeare (Merchant of Venice, I, iii), where it certainly does not mean a tax collector. It had already come, in England, to mean a keeper of a public house, or saloon,,as it. does today, w hile in America it has no particular use or meaning. Modern translators have, therefore, pretty generally given it upi Norton (1855), Weymouth (1903), Twentieth Century (1904), and Montgomery (l9 2 4 ) translated “ taxgatherers” ; Rotherham (1878), “ tax-collectors*’; Ballentin^ (1902), “ saloon-keepers” ; Ferrar Fenton (1905) and the Basic (1941), ‘'‘tax-farmers” ; Ballantine (1923), “ tax collectors” ;' but Spencer (1937) and the Catholic revision (1941) retain “ publicans.” I would translate: ‘‘ta^-collectors. ’’ Even more difficulty attaches to the word “ sinners.” It means in gospel usage those people whose failure to observe the ceremonial refinements of the Law as the Pharisees under­ stood it threw them out o f the class of “ saints” into that of

T

THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO MATTHEIV

29

“ sinners.” They were, or were deemed by the Pharisees, irre­ ligious. But Weymouth (1903) translated “notorious siri-^ ners” ; Twentieth Century (1904), “outcasts” ; and Ferrar Fenton (1905), “reprobates.” I would translate: “ irreligious people^” 18:22

Until seventy times seven (King James) ecus

e^dojJLTjKOVTaKLS

CTrra

EVENTY times seven would be’ 490, but not “ 490 tim es,” w hich is w h ap th e question calls for as an answer. The answer should in that case ht i^boiirjKovraKis irram — “ seven­ ty times seven tim es.” As the Greek stands, the meaning seems unquestionably to be seventy-^even times. The phrase i^BofxrjKovTaKis iirra is probably reminiscent of Gen. 4:24 (L X X ), where Lamech fixes upon it as the ratio of his vengeance; he w ill be avenged seventy-seven fold. In that passage it is correctly translated in the King James “ seventy and sevenfold.” One wonders w h y it was not translated the same way in M atthew. The point of Jesus’ saying seems to be to make Lamech’s ratio of revenge the Christian’s ratio of forgiveness. ThO King James rendering misses the allusion. James Hope M oulton (Grammar^ I, 98) says ojf Gen. 4:24, ‘Tt wilLsurely be felt that W., F. M oulton was right in regarding that passage as decisive.” This has seldom been the attitude of the translators, how ­ ever. W yclif (1382) read “ seventy sithe sevene sithes,” trans­ lating “ septuagies septies” o f the Latin Vulgate. So the Rheims N ew Testament (1582) also incorrectly translated the Vulgate, “ seventie times seven tim es.” And yet Jerome him ­ self understood it to mean four hundred and ninety times. But Tyndale (1525), working from the Greek, also read

S

30

PROBLEMS OF NEW TESTAMENT TRANSLATION '

“ seventy tymes seven tym es.“ 'So also Coverdale (1535), Rog­ ers (1537). the Great Bible (1539), and the Geneva (1560), but not the Bishops’ (1568), w hich read “untyll seventie tymes seven.” The latter was probably the contribution of M atthew Parker hin^self, the archbishop of Canterbury and the moving spirit of the w hole enterprise, since he was responsible for the revision of M atthew and Mark for that Bible. From the Bish­ ops’ it probably passed directly into the King James (1611) and, w ith modernized spelling, into the English (1881) and American (1901) revisions.* Alexander Campbell (1826) followed the older course, “ sev­ enty times seven tim es” ; but Norton (1855), Anderson (1864), Noyes (1869), Twentieth Century (1904), Ferrar Fenton (1905), Moffatt (1913), Ballantine (1923), Spencer (1937), the Catholic revision (1941), and the Basic (1941) all followed M atthew Parker’s reading in the Bishops’ of 1568. Weymouth (1903) followed the older reading, “ seventy times seveh tim es.” But all alike failed to see the bearing of Gen. 4:24, to w hich this expression in M atthew is an evident allusion, and they also failed to see that e^boixriKovTciKLs iTrra looks much more like “seventy-seven tim es” than like “seventy times sev­ en tim es,” for it has but one - kls suffix (meaning “ tim es”), whereas “ seventy times seven tim es’’ would require tw o. M at­ thew Parker’s device of leaving the second - kls to be supplied, supposedly in imitation of the Greek, builds too much upon the supposed identity of English order w ith Greek. Of the lexicographers, Zorell, Lexicon Graecum, declares the oriental versions have correctly translated the Greek phrase, but not the Latin seftuagies septies, w hich, he says, means seventy-seven times (ci. q^uadragies q^uater, “forty-four tim es”). But if the oriental versions understood the Greek, as he says, the Septuagint translators must have misunderstood the Song

THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO MATTHEW

31

of Lamech, for they used the same Greek phrase that M atthew later employed in his gospel. Precise parallels.are difficult to find in Greek, but generally Kai is not added in the N ew Testament after numbers from 20 to 90 (e.g ., e\Ko(XL\TrevTe,]oh.n 6:19, etc.). The question is sim­ ply w hether after seventy (fold) Kai has been omitted in M att. 18 :22. Indeed, h ow would one express seventy-seven fold in Greek if not by e^dofJLrjKovraKLs eTrrd? Certainly not by iPdojxrjKOVTCLKLS eTTTaKLs (as in the Codex of Beza), for that would seem to mean seventy times sevenfold. It Inust be expressed either by i^dofxrjKovra eTTCLKis or by the form used in M att. 18:22. Origen and Augustine understood the meaning to be seven­ ty-seven times; as did the Gospel of the Hebrews fragment quoted by Jerome, “ septuagies septies.” Zorell is right ill saying th .it means setenty-seven times, though Plummer is unaware of it in his Commentary on Matthew, page 255, note 1. "Ei^ho]xi]KovTa occurs three times in the N ew Testament w ith an accompanying numeral: seventy-two (Luke 10:1, 17), sev­ enty-five (Acts 7:14), and seventy-six (Acts 2 7 :3 7 ).'In all these instances the koX is absent, just as w e in modern English om it the “ and.” This encourages the idea that Kai is omitted in M att. 18:22, as it was in the LX X in translating the He­ brew “ Seventy and seven” in Gen. 4:24. M cNeile observes (St. Matthew, p. 268): “If this is a cardinal number [severity times seven] it does not strictly answer the question ttoct&kls* ( H o w often?), which calls for an answer in “ tim es.” The question “ H ow often?” is not answered by “ Seventy-seven” or by “ Four hundred and ninety.” We ex­ pect “ Seventy-seven tim es,” or “ Four hundred and ninety tim es.” Certainly, of tw o possible ways of saying “ seventyseven tim es” in Greek, this is one, and the Genesis parallel seems decisive for the meaning “seventy-seven tim es.”

32 18:24

PROBLEMS OF NEW TESTAMENT TRANSLATION fen thousand talents (K ing James) fJLVpicCV T o k a V T O iV

h e point in this parable is the great disparity between the one debt and the other, and this is not fully brought out unless the amounts are made intelligible. “ A hundred pence” (denarii) is roughly equivalent to tw enty dollars, w hile ten thousand talents, at a thousand dollars a talent, w hich is a fair average value for a talent of silver, would be ten m illion dollars. The King James puts the smaller debt into English money, w h ile leaving the larger one in Roman. A talent was generally worth 6,000 denarii, but if one undertook to set forth the amounts of the tw o debts w ith minute accuracy, the literary effect of the round numbers would be lost. The use of “ talents” and “pence” in this passage goes back to Tyndale and was adopted in most of the sixteenth-century revision, though Coverdale read “pounde” and “pens.” M od­ ern translators in the nineteenth century generally put the smaller sum back into Roman money, “ a hundred denarii.” This course was also follow ed by Spencer (1937) and the Catholic revision (1941). The difficulty w ith it is that not all readers or hearers know the difference between a denarius and a talent. Some twentieth-century translators have tried to put both amounts into modern money, British or American. Twentieth Century (1904) translated “ six m illion pounds . . . , ten pounds” ; Moffatt (1913), “ three m illion pounds . . . . tw enty pounds” ; the Basic (1941), ‘‘ten thousand pounds . . . . one hundred pence. ’’ Of course, this sterling currency is no more appropriate to N ew Testament times than our ow n decimal kind. The disproportion was in the ratio of one to six hundred thousand. I would translate: “ ten m illion dollars . . . . tw enty dol­ lars.”

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THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO MATTHEW 20:2

33

a penny a day (K ing James) 6K drjpapiov rijv rjfxipav

h e King James Version of 1611 always accompanied its use o f the word “penny” (w hich it spelled “peny”) w ith a note indicating that the value of the Roman penny was seven pence halfpenny, changed to eight pence halfpenny in the re­ vised versions, English and American. But many present-day printings o f the King James om it such notes, and the reader is left to suppose that the ancient laborer worked for a penny a day. Of course, the mere listener, w ho only heard the text read, never got any other impression. “ Penny” in this and similar connections goes back to Wycl i f s “ a peny for the day,” and Tyndale’s (1525) “ a peny a daye,” and runs through all the sixteenth-century versions. Few modern translators have been content w ith this render­ ing. Campbell (1826) rendered “ a denarius a-day” ; Norton (1855), “ a denarius a day” ; similarly Anderson (1864), Spen­ cer (1937), and the recent Catholic revision (1941). In sub­ stantial agreement ( “ a denarius the day” ) was Ferrar Fenton (1905). Noyes (1869) read “ a denary a day” ; Rotherham (1878), “ a denary the day” ; and Worrell (1904), “ a denary a day.” Tw entieth Century (1904) and M ontgomery (1924) read “ tw o shillings a day” ; and Weymouth (1903), Moffatt ( 1 9 1 3 ), and Ballantine (1923) read “ a shilling a day.” M ost recently the Basic (1941) has gone back all the w ay to Tyndale, “ a penny a day.” Ballentine (1902), seeking to make the pay intelligible to American readers, translated “ a dollar a day,” w hich was, at any rate, a, common farm wage tw o gen­ erations ago. Before I came across Ballentine’s painstaking version, I had reached the same conclusion.

T

34 21:9

PRO BLE M S OF N E W T E S T A M E N T T R A N S L A T IO N

Hosanna to the Son of Davidj . . . . Hosanna in the highest (King James)^ Slaavva rw vlQ Aaveid . . . . '^Slaavva ev rots

vxI/'lo'tols

T T OS A N N A ” is really a Hebrew word, found in Ps. 118:25, X and meaning “ Save!” or “ Save, pray!” though Canon Cheyne sought to show that the Hebrew is no guide to its meaning in the gospels.^ It naturally found its w ay into liturgy, and this reacted upon its interpretation in the text, in w hich, in fact, it has come to seem almost liturgical. W yclif (1382) translated it “ Osanna (th at is I preye save).” Tyndale (1525) and Coverdale (1535) read “ hosianna.” Rog­ ers (1537), Taverner (1539), and the Great Bible (1539) read ‘Hosanna.” But the Geneva omitted “ to ” and read “ Hosanna the sonne o f D avid,” remarking in the margin, “w hich is to say. Save I pray th ee.” Further on, it read “ Hosanna thou which art in the hiest heavens," The Bishops’ (1568) agreed w ith the earlier versions, “ Hosanna t o ” and “ Hosanna in the h igh est.” In this (w ith changes in spelling) it was followed by the Rheims (1582), the King James (1611), the English Re­ vised (1881), and the American Standard (1901). Campbell (1826) read “ Hosanna to the Son of David, . . . . Hosanna in the highest heaven” ; Norton (1855), “ Hosanna to the Son of David, . . . . Hosanna, thou in the highest heavens” ; and Noyes (1869), “ Hosanna in the highest heav­ ens.” More recently, Weymouth (1903) read “ God save the Son of David! . . . . God in the highest Heavens save H im !” Twentieth Century (1904) translated “ God save the Son of David! . . . . God save him from on h ig h .” Moffatt (1913) read “ Hosanna to the Son of David! . . . . Hosanna in high heaven!” Spencer (1937) read “ Hosanna to the Son of David! . . . . Hosanna in the heights of heaven!” The new Catholic ^ Cf. 21: 15 .

^ Encyclopaedia Biblica^ s.v.

35 revision follows the Rheims and the King James, but the Basic (1941) says, “Glory to the son of David: . . . . Glory in the highest.” I cannot escape the feeling that the spontaneity of the out­ burst was no more liturgical than “Vive le roi!” or “God save the King!” and that to transfer “Hosanna” into English gives too much liturgical atmosphere to this jubilant scene. The pilgrims called down blessings upon Jesus as he went by: “God bless the Son of David! . . . . God bless him from on high.” “In the highest” sounds well, of course, but is gen­ erally misunderstood as meaning “in the highest degree,” which is not the meaning of the Greek at all. (Cf. Luke 2:14.) THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO M A T T H E W

23:5

-phylacteries

(King James)

puXaKTypca

his word, which is no more than a transliteration of the Greek, appears as far back as Wyclif (1382), “filateries T (that ben smale scrowis),” doubtless meaning scrolls. Tyndale (1525) called them “filateris.” Coverdale (1535) has “Philateries”; Rogers (1537) and the Great (1539) have “fila­ teries,” but the Geneva (1560) changes to “phylacteries,” which was followed by the Bishops’ (1568) ( “philacteries”), the Rheims (1582), the King James (1611), both revisions (1881, 1901), and almost all modern translators, down to Spencer (1937), the Catholic revision (1941), and even the Basic (1941), which latter admits the word to its very limited vocabulary on the basis of this, its only occurrence in the whole Bible. The word has, in general, been treated as though it were a distinctively biblical word, reflecting a purely Jewish custom (Exod. 13:9, 16; Num. 15:38, 39), but this is by no means the

PROBLEMS OF NEW TESTAMENT TRANSLATION

36

case. ^vXaKTTjpLov is a pufe Greek word^ as old as Herodotus, Thucydides, Plato, and Xenophon, all o f w hom used it, in various senses. In Greek contemporary w ith the N ew Testa­ ment it came to mean “ amulet” and was so used by Dioscorides, Plutarch, and others. It occurs in this sense also iminscriptions and in magical papyri. Rotherham (1878) very soundly translated it in M att. 23:5 by “ aniulet,” and the tentative Twentieth Century (1903) looked in the same direction: “ they widen the texts w hich they wear as charms.” The 1904 edition, however, retreated to “phylacteries.” This loses the slur which M atthew ’s word casts upon them and really puts more into the word than the Greek w ill bear. Certainly it adds one more needless difficulty to the understanding o f the English N ew Testament. I would translate: “They wear wide Scripture texts as charms.” 23; 15

U make one -proselyte (King'James) TOLijcruL tva irpoariKvTov

h e last word is simply a transliteration o f the Greek word Trpo(Tr}\vTos, w h ich means “ a stranger, sojourner, . . . . convert, proselyte” (Liddell-Scott-Jone^ [1940]). It was used by W yclif (1382): “ th:atf yee make one proselite (that is a convertide to your ordre).” Tyndale (1525), however, trans­ lated “ to brynge one in to youre belefe.” This was follow ed by Rogers (1537), “ into your belefe” ; but Coverdale-(1535) read “ Proselyte,” as did the'Great Bible*(1539), “proselyte.” The Geneva (1560) said “ to make one of your profession” ; but the Bishops’ (1568) follow ed the Great and read “proselyte,” ^ as did the Rheims (1582), the King James (1611), and the English and American revisions (1881, 1901). And in Acts 2:10

T

1 With the delightful note: “One brought from gentilitie to their religion.”

th e gospel

ACCOKDim TO MATTHEW

3?

(though not always in 6:5 and 13:43) all the versions read “proselytes” (proselytis, proselites) from W yclif down, ex­ cept .Rogers'(1537), w h o, follow ing Tyndale’s revision, read “ convertes.” Modern translators have more and more inclined toward “ convert” instead o f “ proselyte”—^Rotherham (1878), Wey­ mouth (1903), Twentieth Century (1904), Ferrar Fenton (1905), Spencer (1937), and the Catholic revision (1941) do so, w h ile the Basic translates “ disciple.” I would translate: “ to make one convert.” 2 3 :23 ye pay tithe of mint and^ anise and cummin (K ing James) CLTodeKaTovre

t6

rjdvocrfxov Kal

to

livrjdov koX t 6

k v ju v o v

YCLIF (1382) translated, “ myntte and annet and . com yn” ; Tyridale (1525) sim ilarly, “ mynt,-annys, and commeh” ; and so, w ith varying spelling, Coverdale (1535), Rogers (1537), the Great (w hich in 1539 restored the “ and” before “ anyse” ) , the Geneva (1560), the Bishops’ (1568), the Rheims (1582), and the King James (1611), w hich read “ mint, and annise, and cummine.” Later printer^editors have modernized the spelling and punctuation into that given above, w hich is reproduced in the English and American re­ visions (1881, i901), but w ith a note “ Or, d ill,” on anise. These revisions and the modern King James now spell the three herbs just as the Rheims did in 1582. Yet the modern translators have for many years known and indicated that the second herb is not anise but dill; witness Campbell (1826), Anderson (1864), Noyes (1869), Weymouth (1903), Ferrar Fenton (1905), the Improved Edition (1912), Moffatt (1913), and Ballantine (1923). The best lexicons agree that the word translated “ anise,” &vrjdov, mean§ dill, o f w hich Rabbi Eliezer (ca. a . d . 100) said: “O f dill, must one tithe

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PR O B LE M S OF N E W T E S T A M E N T T R A N S L A T IO N

the seed and the leaves and the stalk s.” It was used in.cook­ ing and for medicinal purposes (A llen, Gospel According to St. Matthew, p. 247). The Liddell-Scott-Jones' Lexicon (1940) says of avrjdop that it is “ not to be confused w ith avv'qaov" (anise). I would translate: “ mint, dill, and cum min.” 2 3 :24

which strain at a gnat (K ing James) 8 lv\

l^ o v t € s t o p

KUPCOTra

h i s is an admitted misprint in the King James Version, w hich for some reason has never been corrected. There is no basis for it in the Greek text, divXL^opTes, a reading in w hich all the manuscripts agree and w hich means simply “ straining o u t” a gnat (from one’s drink) so as to observe the law of Lev. 11:23. The verb “ strain” is the one used of strain­ ing m ilk and contains no suggestion of intense effort. A ll the ancient versions agree w ith this meaning, as do all the modern versions, European and other, including the English (from W yclif down to and excepting the King James), all the Eng­ lish retranslations since the King James, and both the revised versions, English and American. In short, the “ a t” stands alone in the King James, a distinguishing feature of that edi­ tion in all its printings, from 1611 to 1943, although it has been repeatedly exposed as a sheer misprint, and hundreds of other such misprints in the King James of 1611 have been de­ tected and corrected. But since Benjamin Blayney’s revision of the King James in 1769 no further corrections have been made by its publishers, and so this misprint still mars its text, al­ though as good an authority as Robert Low th, once professor o f poetry at Oxford and later bishop of London, said of it more than a century and a half ago that it completely destroyed the sense of the passage.

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TH E GOSPEL ACCORDING TO M A T T H E W

39

Sir Humphrey M ilford has kindly called my attention to a ^’iggcstion in the Review of English Studies for A pfil, 1944 (X X , N o. 7 8 , 1 5 5 , 156), that “ strain a t” was used in 1570 and 1584 in translating Calvin’s Latin discussion of this passage. But the quotation goes on: “ lest in sw allow ing a gnat thou hurt thy jaw s,” w hich, of course, is w hat has led the trans­ lators of Calvin to introduce the idea of overexertion into the previous sentence. Yet the comment in the Review proceeds: “The English translators [of Calvin] think o f the straining as done, not by pouring the liquid through a sieve-like strainer, blit by making the lips and teeth serve as strainer, sucking in the liquid but rejecting the gnat.” Even this grotesque process could hardly hurt the jaws. It is enough to say that no reader of the King James would ever so understand it, and as good an eighteenth-century scholar as Bishop L ow th took it simply as an unintelligible and misleading misprint. When it is remembered that the King James Version as first printed in 1611 differed in numerous details—M oyses, Hierusalem, Isahac, Marie, fornace, charet, murther, damosel, fift, sixt, moe, fet, creeple, moneth, etc.—from its present-day printings, it w ould seem a simple matter, and even an obvi­ ous duty of its custodians, to correct the last o f its numerous misprints. It should, of course, read “ straining out the gn at.” 26:3

Then assembled together the chief -priests (K ing James) Tore (Tvvifxd'naav ql dpxtepets

NE o f the commonest literary features of the King James Version is inversion— the introduction of a declarative verb before its subject. Chapter 26 of M atthew yields numer­ ous examples: “Then assembled together the chief priests” (vs. 3); Then cometh Jesus” (vs. 36); “Then saith he unto them” (vs. 38); “ Then cometh he to his disciples” (vs. 45);

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PROBLEMS OF NEW TESTAMENT TRANSLATION

“ Then said Jesus unto him ” (vs. 52); “Then did they'spit in his face” (vs. 67). Most of these are imitations of the Greek order, and all are in clauses that begin w ith “Then.” There are scores and even hundreds of instances of this practice in the King James Ver­ sion, almost all of them quite at variance w ith modern usage, though we still sometimes say, “ said I ” or “ said h e .” This feature of King James English goes back to Tyndale (1525),' from whom it passed through the sixteenth-century versions to the King James (1611) and the English and American re­ visers (1881, 1901). Modern versions naturally avoid it as an­ tique and distracting. 26:28

For this is my hlood of the new testament (King James) TO a lfia jJLOV T7js hadi]Kr]S

h e word ‘‘new ’’ (jiaiv^s) is absent in the best and oldest manuscripts (Aleph, B, L, Z, Theta, 33, etc.) and in most modern editions^—Tischendorf, Westcott and Hort, Nestle, Souter—as w ell as in the parallel, Mark 14:24. It stood in the medieval text and the Latin Vulgate and passed into the translations of Wyclif, Tyndale, and their successors, down to and including the King James (1611), but not into the revised versions, English or American (1881, 1901). It is usually ab­ sent from modem translations^—Noyes (1869), Ballentine (1902), Weymouth (1903), Twentieth Century (1904), Wor­ rell. (1904), the Improved Edition (1912), Ballantine (1923), Montgomery (1924), and the Basic (1941). It is retained in Ferrar Fenton (1905), Moffatt (1913), Spencer (1937), and the Catholic revision (1941). “The blood of the covenant” or “ agreement” means, of course, the blood shed in ratifying it, as Weymouth took pains to indicate: “ the blood which ratifies the Covenant.”

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THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO MATTHEW

41

The usual imitations of the Greek idiom “ the bl’o od of the testament,” or “ covenant b lood,” convey nothing to the mod­ ern reader, w ho does not ratify his agreements w ith animal sacrifice. I would translate: “ This is my blood which ratifies the agreement.” 26:50

wherefore art thou come'l (King James) 9 j 9

f

e

* 6 and translated '"do that for which thou art com e,” though they had to supply their principal verb, “d o,” in order to give the words this meaning. The old “Received” text had taken the interrogative sense for ecf)’ § (as it read), and printed a question mark after Trapet, being followed in this by Tischendorf, Scrivener, Von Soden, etc. The Revisers’ rendering, taking it as a command, is supported by the punctuation of W estcott and Hort, Nestle, Souter, etc. J. H. M oulton in his Grammar, I, 93, stoutly maintains this position: “ It is superfluous to say that

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42

PRO BLEM S OF N E W T E S T A M E N T T R A N S L A T IO N

this usage \_6s as interrogative] cannot possibly be extended to direct question, so as to justify the AV in Mt. 26:50.” But the new Liddell-Scott-Jones Lexicon (1940) recognizes this passage as an instance of the interrogative use of os and compares Epictetus iv. 1. 120, though admitting that both are doubt­ ful. Deissmann argues strongly for the interrogative sense of the clause (Light from the Ancient East [1927], pp. 125-31), and Mayser (Grammatik der griechischen Papyri [1926], II, 79) says that in the Ptolemaic papyri “the confusion of the relative and interrogative pronouns is very comm on,” though he gives no examples of the use of 6s in a direct question. But the indefinite relative octtls is frequent in direct questions, and if an imperative is to be supplied, EIttov, “T ell” (M att. 4:3; 24:3), is quite as natural an imperative to supply as ILoirjaov, “D o ” (M att. 8:9). Moulton admits the use of 6s as interroga­ tive in indirect questions in the papyri, and Mayser quotes in support of it (II, 79) a letter of the third century b.c. which I published some years ago (Greek Papyri from the Cairo Museum^ p. 3): 67TCOS eidrjis ov Tpoirov ol deol ae olbaaiv AiyvTTLOL. The leading private translations, from Campbell (1826) to Fenton (1905), usually read the sentence as interrogative: “ For w hat purpose do you come?” ‘‘Why are you here?” etc. Since 1900 the Protestant versions generally supply the impera­ tive ‘‘do” in some form: ‘‘Do what you have come for” (Twentieth Century); ‘‘Carry out your intention” (W ey­ mouth); ‘‘Do your errand” (M offatt); ‘‘Do that for which you have come” (Basic). Recent English exegetes also make the clause declarative, finding no difficulty in supplying the necessary imperative verb. That is really the most violent solu­ tion of the problem, however; and, even granting the neces­ sity for it, there is no more reason for supplying the word

T H E GOSPEL ACCORDING TO M A T T H E W

43

“D o ” than the word “T ell.” The Vulgate and the Old Syriac took the sentence as. interrogative, and that on the w hole seems the most natural w ay to take it. The supplying of TToir](Tov, “ d o,” is probably an unconscious harmonistic as­ similation to Jesus’ words to Judas in John 13:27: 6 Trotets TroL7](Tov rax^Lov, “ Be quick about your business.” One is reminded of a sentence in I Macc. 12:45: t o v t o v y a p X^pi'V Trapetjut, “It was for this that I came.” I would translate: “ What are you here for?” 28:1

In the end of the Sahhath (King James) ’O^e de (xaPparcov

h e adverb b^j/e is sometimes used in the sense of “ late,” w ith a genitive of time w ithin w hich, in this case, the Sabbath, w hich would mean “late on the Sabbath.” But this sense is precluded by the very next phrase, which the King James translates “ as it began to dawn toward the first day of the w eek ,” or, as w e would say, “as the first day of the week was daw ning,” for the Sabbath did not last until the dawn of Sunday but ended w ith sunset or dark Saturday night. Much has been made of this difficulty. But b\l/e has another sense; it is also used by late Greek writ­ ers like Philostratus (second to third century) as a preposition meaning “after,” followed by the genitive, 6 \p e t o v t c o v , “ after these things” (^Life of Apollonius, vi. 10; cf. iv. 18: oi/'e pvarrjpicov, “after the mysteries”). This is the sense of the word in M att. 28:1 and at once clears up any difficulty; so most mod­ ern lexicons: Preuschen (1910), Zorell (1911), Ebeling (1913), Abbott-Smith (1922), and (doubtfully) Liddell-Scott-Jones (1940). Allen, in his commentary on M atthew, grapples w ith the problem for a whole page and comes to the astonishing conclusion that M atthew probably thought the angel ap-

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PROBLEMS OF NE!V TESTAMENT TRANSLATION

]

peared to the women ‘‘oh Saturday evening when the Sabbath was ending or had just ended” (p. 301). Yet on page 300, at „ the beginning of his discussion, he has translated the line cor1 reedy, ‘‘And after the Sabbath, at the dawning toward the first day of the w eek.” ^ Translators have always found this line difficult. Tyndale began: ‘‘The saboth daye att even which dauneth the morowe « after the saboth.” Coverdale read: “Upon the evenynge of the s Sabbath holy daye.” The Great Bible read: ‘‘Upon an evening | of the Sabbothes, which dawneth the fyrst daye of the Sab5 bathes.” But the Geneva Bible said: “’N o w in the end of the Sabbath, when the first day of the weke began to dawne.” | The Bishops’ read: ‘‘In the later ende of the Sabboth day, | w hich dawneth the first day of the w eeke.” The King James j said: ‘‘In the end of the Sabbath, as it began to dawn toward 'i the first day of the w eek.” i! Modern translators, too, have found the passage perplexing. Where the Rheims N ew Testament of 1582 read, ‘‘And in the | evening of the Sabboth which dawneth on the first of the y Sabboth,” Spencer (1937) read: ‘‘N ow far on in the night of « the Sabbath, as it was growing bright toward the first day of the w eek” ; w hile the new Catholic revision (1941) reads: : ‘‘N ow late in the night of the Sabbath, as it began to dawn to­ wards the first day of the w eek .” It w ill be seen that the tw o ^ last put a good deal into the simple Greek words 6\l/k 8e aa^^aroiv. The old view of 6\j/e also survives in Ballantine’s transla­ tion (1923): ‘‘Late on the Sabbath, as the first day of the week was drawing near” ; and in the N ew Testament in Basic English (1941): ‘‘N ow late on the Sabbath, when the dawn of « the first day of the week was near.” But the prepositional character of 6\pe appears in Weymouth (1903), ‘‘After the Sabbath, in the early dawn of the first day of the w eek” ; and

THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO MATTHEW

45

in the Twentieth Century (1904), “After the Sabbath, as the first day of the w etk began to dawn” ; but less clearly in Moffatt ( 1 9 1 3 ) , ‘ ‘At the close of the sabbath, as the first day of the week was daw ning.” There is no more reason to suspect an Aramaism here (Torrey, T h Four Gospels, p. 297) than in the passages quoted from Philostratus’ Life of Apollonius. The plain sense of the passage is: “ After the Sabbath, as the first day of the week was daw ning.” 28:9

All hail (King James) Xaipere

HILE Tyndale (1525) translated Xalpe in Luke 1:28 as “ H ayle,” here in M atthew he rendered it “ God spede y ou ,” as did Coverdale (1535); but Rogers (1537) translated it, “A ll h ayle,” w hich the Great Bible (1539) retained. The Geneva (1560) changed it to “ God save y ou .” But the Bish­ ops’ (1568) preferred “ A ll haile” (hayle) and so did the King James (1611). The revised versions, English and American (1881, 1 9 0 1 ), retained this in the modernized spelling which had already been introduced into eighteenth-century print­ ings of the King James, “ A ll h a il.” As the King James renders the singular “ H ail,” in Luke 1:28, “A ll” is probably a way of conveying the plural, in M att. 28:9, not a heightening of the greeting. W yclif (1382), translating the Vulgate “ avete,” rendered it “ Heyle yee.” The Rheims (1582) rendered it “ A1 h aile.” “ H ail” is a salutation frequently used by Shakespeare, w ho uses “ A ll h a il” too, even in addressing one person. “ Good morrow” is also frequent in ;Shakspeare, and even “ Good morning” is sometimes used. “ H ail” still appears in English dictionaries but is, in fact, so antique that we hardly ever hear it except as a pleasantry.

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PR O B LE M S OF N E W T E S T A M E N T T R A N S L A T IO N

This has led some modern translators to make a serious ef­ fort to find a modern equivalent that w ill escape the stiffness of the traditional rendering, for Xatpere in Greek was a fa­ miliar salutation of greeting, or farewell, from Homer down. See the note on Phil. 4:4, where its evident meaning is “ Fare­ w ell!” But that cannot be its force here in M atthew. Campbell (1826) translated it “Rejoice” ; Rotherham (1878), “Joy to you ” ; Weymouth (1903), “ Peace be to y ou ” ; Twentieth Century (1904), “ W elcome!” Worrell (1904), “Rejoice!” Ferrar Fenton (1905), “ Good day to y o u !” Spencer (1937), “Joy to you!” Basic (1941), “ Be glad.” The Liddell-Scott-Jones Lexicon (1940) translates it “ as a form of greeting, 1. at meeting, ‘hail, w elcom e’ (especially in the morning), Dio Cassius (2d-3d century a .d .) 6 9 .1 8 .” D io ’s narrative in fact makes it clear that, in his day, Xatpe, X a ip ere , was used only as a morning salutation, w hen we would nat­ urally say “ Good morning!” In view of the instructive pas­ sage in D io, and the testimony of the latest lexicon, I would translate: “ Good morning!”

The Gospel According to Mark

1:1

The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christy the Son of God (K ing James) *Apxv rod evayyeXiov T tjctov XpLarov

h e relation of this verse, or phrase, to w hat follow s con­ stitutes for the translator an acute problem, w hich has called forth a variety o f solutions. Is it a title, to be punctu­ ated w ith a period? If so, is it the title of the gospel, meaning the origin of the Christian movement, or, as Dr. Allen Wikgren has recently suggested, the rudiments or elements of Christianity? Or does it mean no more than “ Here beginneth” the good news of Jesus Christ? This would leave the text of the gospel to begin w ith Kadd^s, “ A s,” w hich seems an awkward beginning for a book. This must have been the idea of Coverdale (1535), w ho read: “ This is the begynnynge of the Gospell of Jesus Christ the sonne of G od,” Or should verse 1 be follow ed by a comma, and verse 2 be treated as an explanatory addition? This would make “The beginning” a kind of floating nominative, w ithout construc­ tion. This was the view taken in the King James Version, though later printers of it have changed the comma to a semi­ colon,^ and was inherited from a long series of earlier versions, beginning w ith Tyndale (1525). This would leave verse 3 an­ other floating nominative, w ithout grammatical relation to the rest: “ The voice of one crying in the wilderness........... ” It further leaves verse 4 to begin, abruptly and w ithout rela-

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1 An Edinburgh edition of the King James (1764) still had the comma. 47

48

PROBLEMS OF NEW TESTAMENT TRANSLATION

tion to anything that has gone before, the story of the min­ istry of John. The consciousness of such difficulties w ith the usual punc­ tuation may have been what led the Rheims translators to put a comma after verse 2 and defer their period to the end of 3. They had a period after verse 1, making verses 2 and 3 a sort of explanation of it. This left the introduction of John’s ministry in verse 4 as abrupt as before. But if verse 1 is taken as a title, and punctuated w ith a peri­ od, the relation of the next three verses remains to be decided. What is the first principal sentence in Mark? The recent Basic translation (1941) treats verse 1 as a title, or an incipif, “The first words of the good news and makes verses 2 and 3 one sentence, apparently intending “ See, 1 send my servant” as the principal clause. A more vigorous and significant understanding of these opening lines in Mark is to treat verse 1 as a title but to recog­ nize in verses 2 and 3 a subordinate clause and in verse 4 the principal clause: “ As it is written in the prophet Isaiah, ‘Here I send my messenger..........Hark! Someone is shouting in the desert,’ . . . .John the baptizer appeared in the desert,” etc. This was the solution reached by Campbell (1826), Norton (1855), the English and American revisions (1881,1901), Moffatt (1913), Kleist (1932), Spencer (1937), the Catholic re­ vision (1941), and in substance by other modern translators. It undoubtedly yields the strongest and most probable sense. It is the punctuation of most modern Greek texts—Westcott and Hort, Nestle, Von Soden, and (substantially) Souter. I would treat verse 1 as a title and punctuate with a period, making verses 2 and 3 subordinate to 4: “ As it is written in the prophet Isaiah, . . . . John the baptizer appeared in the desert.”

THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO MARK

49

1:1 fhe Son of God (King James) h e words vlov Oeov (or vloO rod deov^ are present in most ancient manuscripts and versions, but their absence from a few important ancient witnesses (the first hand of Aleph, Theta, a number of Armenian manuscripts, Irenaeus, Origen, Epiphanius, Jerome, etc.) has led most modern editors of the text (Tischendorf, Westcott and Hort, Nestle) to omit them, as having probably crept into the text from Mark 15:39, “ This man was certainly a son of God!” (ut6s 0eoG)—the exclama­ tion of the Roman captain at the cross. The older English versions all included the words, as they stood in their Greek text down to and including Beza (1598), Elzevir (1633), etc.; and they stand in the English and Ameri­ can revisions (1881, 1901), with a marginal note: “ Some an­ cient authorities omit Son of God. ’’ Most modern transla­ tions also include the words, but they are omitted by Noyes (1869), Twentieth Century (1904), Ballantine (1923), and Ray Allen (1927). The textual problem is discussed by Hort, The New Testa­ ment in the Original Greeks Volume II, ‘‘Notes on Select Read­ ings,” page 23. The fullest statement of the evidence is given by Legg, Novum Testamentum Graece^ Evangelium 'Secundum Mar­ cum (Oxford, 1935). H ort’s argument for the omission of the phrase at this point seems to me conclusive.

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1:2

in the prophets (King James) €v T(^ ’Hcral^ rep Trpoefyrjr'd

HILE the medieval Greek text current in the times of King James read ev rots TrpoejyrjraLs and had been trans­ lated “ in the prophets” ever since the days of Tyndale (1525), later manuscript discoveries have made it clear that the an-

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PROBLEMS OF NEW TESTAMENT TRANSLATION

cient text read ev rco ’Hcrata rc^ Tpo(f)r]Tri. The whole body of the best and most ancient Greek manuscripts—Aleph, B, D, L, Delta, Theta fam., etc., and some ancient versions, including the Old Latin and the Vulgate, read thus. Wyclif and the Rheims version, being made from the Latin, had therefore read “ in ysaie (Esay) the prophete.” The early change to the plural “ the prophets’’ was evidently due to the fact that part of the quotation was from Malachi, “I send my messenger’’ (Mai. 3:1); and scribes sought to cor­ rect the text to agree w ith that fact. Modern editors of the Greek text—^Tischendorf, Westcott and Hort, Nestle, Von Soden, Souter, etc.—read “ in Isaiah the prophet.’’ This reading was followed by the English and American revisions (1881, 1901). It has also prevailed in mod­ ern translations at least as far back as Alexander Campbell (1826), who doubtless derived it from George Campbell (1788); also recently Kleist (1932), Spencer (1937), the Catho­ lic revision (1941), and the Basic (1941) read in this way. I would translate: “ in the prophet Isaiah.’’ 1:4

did hapi%e (King James)^ Tcoavrjs 6 ^aiTTL^cop

OHN is called “ the Baptist,’’ 6 ^aTrTLaTrjs, twice in Mark, three times in Luke, and seven times in M atthew; but Mark three times speaks of him as 6 Pawrl^cov, “ the Baptizer,’’ apparently a more primitive designation of him. The medieval Greek text had no article w ith the word in Mark 1:4, and sixteenth-century translators, though w ith much variation in spelling, accordingly translated eyevero ToodvTjs “John did baptize.’’ In 6:14 and 24, where their text had the article w ith PaTrL^oiv, they translated “John

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1 Cf. 6:14, 24.

THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO M ARK

5I

the Baptist.” Wyclif, working from the Latin, which, of course, has no article, translated in 6:14 and 24, ‘‘ion baptist,” and Tyndale (1525), ‘‘Jhon baptist,” or “ baptiste.” It was the Rheims (1582) that first used ‘‘lohn the Baptist” in these places. In Mark 1:4 Tyndale translated ‘‘Jhon did baptise.” Coverdale ( 1525) read ‘‘Jhon was in the wyldernes, and baptysed.” But Tyndale’s reading reappeared and continued, w ith chang­ ing spelling, in Rogers (1537), the Great Bible (1539), and the Geneva (1560). The problem is confused by the fact that here the early translators’ Greek text did not have the article and so they were led to treat the participle as predicative, not attribu­ tive. In M att. 3:1 Tyndale translated Tcoavrjs 6 PaTTTtaTTjs, ‘‘Jhon the baptiser,” while Coverdale (1535), Rogers (1537), the Great Bible (1539), etc., w ith varying spellings say ‘‘John the Baptist. So the King James found 6 ^airri^oiv and 6 ^aTTTujTrjs already assimilated in translation and adopted ‘‘the Baptist” for both. Of the modern translations, Campbell (1826) and Anderson (1864) translate 6 ^airri^oiv and 6 ^airTiarris, ‘‘the Immerser.” The others generally render ‘‘the Baptist,” disregarding the participle, but Noyes (1869) translates ‘‘the Baptizer” in all three Mark passages, as did Weymouth (1903) and the Twentieth Century (1904). Ferrar Fenton (1905) translated ‘‘the Baptizer” in 6:14, 24, as did the American Stand­ ard Version (1901), Moffatt (1913), Ballantine (1923), and Spencer (1937). Most modern Greek texts (Tischendorf, Westcott and Hort, Nestle) have the article w ith ^airTi^oiv in Mark 1:4, contrary to the bulk of medieval manuscripts, but w ith the support of the best and most ancient ones, Aleph, B, L, Delta, 33, etc.

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PROBLEMS OF NEW TESTAMENT TRANSLATION

In Mark 1:4 and 6:14, 24, I would accordingly translate 6 PaTTL^oip: “John the baptizer.” 1:10 descending upon him (King James) Kara^alvov eis avrbv

YCLIF translated “ comynge doune . . . . and dwellynge in hym .” This fairly reflects the Latin Vulgate: “ descendentem, et manentem in ipso.” However, the Rheims (1582) translated this “remaining on him ,” and the recent Catholic revision (1941) translates “remaining upon him .” The medieval Greek text published by Erasmus and his suc­ cessors read ex’ avrbv ^ “upon him ,” and this was, of course, the basis of the Protestant translations—^from Tyndale’s “ descendinge uppon him ” and Coverdale’s “ commynge downe upon him ” to the nineteenth-century revised versions, English (1881) and American (1901). But, almost unnoticed by trans­ lators and revisers, the text as printed in recent Greek edi­ tions (Tischendorf, Westcott and Hort, Nestle, Von Soden) has, on the basis of the Vatican and Bezan manuscripts, some minuscules (family 13—the old Ferrar Group, 13. 69. 124. 346. 543. etc.), and some Old Latins, changed from ex’ avrbv to els avrbv, which must have been displaced in the third or fourth century, through harmonistic assimilation w ith M att. 3:16 and Luke 3:22, both of which read ex’ avrbv. The preposition els is used w ith this verb “ to come down” in the sense of “ into” in Luke 18:14, Acts 7:15 ( “ into,” King James), 8:38 ( “ into,” King James), 14:25 ( “ into,” King James), 16:8, 18:22, 25:6; and Rom. 10:7 ( “ into,” King James). The translation “upon” is influenced by the use of the preposition meaning “upon” (ex’), in the parallel passages in M atthew (3:16) and Luke (3:22). It was that preposition in M atthew and Luke that led the ancient scribes to write it

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THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO M ARK

53

in Mark in place of eis, and has led most modern translators to turn from the idea of the spirit as taking possession of Jesus at his baptism to the milder picture of the spirit resting upon him. The idea of the Spirit as possessing people is familiar in the New Testament, where Elizabeth, Zechariah, Jesus, the apos­ tles, Peter, Stephen, and Paul are all described as full of or filled w ith the Spirit. This psychology is not so different from that of Mark when he says that the Spirit came down into Jesus. It is indeed a bold, even a harsh, description, but bold­ ness and harshness are strikingly characteristic of this first page of Mark, from the first line, and M atthew and Luke smoothed and softened almost every clause of it. Probably no one thinks that in John 13:27 we should translate, “ Satan came up to him ,” dayeTai jjLe

h i s quotation from Ps. 69:9 has the verb in a past tense in both the Hebrew and the Septuagint translation, and it was read as a past, KaTecfiaye, in the sixteenth-century Greek editions of the New Testament, for example, Beza’s edition of 1598. The early English versions therefore all read, from Tyndale ( 1525) on through the Great Bible (1539), “ The zele of thyne housse, hath even eaten me.” This was altered in the Geneva (1560) to “The zeale of thine house hathe eaten me up.” The Bishops’ (1568) returned to the earlier rendering, but the King James adopted the Geneva translation. Modern manuscript discoveries and the critical editions of Tregelles and Tischendorf had meantime shown that the an­ cient Greek text was not a past, Karecfiaye, but a future, Karacf)ayerau (w ith Aleph, A, B, L, W, Theta, and most Greek man­ uscripts), and the English Revised Version (1881) accordingly translated, “The zeal of thine house shall eat me up,” which the American revision (1901) altered to “ Zeal for thy house shall eat me up.” Modern editions of the Greek text—^Tischendorf, Westcott and Hort, Nestle, Von Soden, Souter, etc.—are unanimous for the future here, and modern translators at least as far back as Noyes (1869) were translating “Zeal for thy house will con­ sume me.” Weymouth (1903) translated “ My zeal for thy house will consume me” ; the Twentieth Century (1904),

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102 PROBLEMS OF NEW TESTAMENT TRANSLATION “Zeal for thy House w ill consume me"; Ballantine (1923), “Zeal for thy house w ill devour me” ; Spencer (1937), “Zeal for Thy house consumes Me” ; and the Basic (1941), “ I am on fire w ith passion for your house.” The translation should make it clear that it is his own zeal, not some other’s, that is to consume him, as Weymouth real­ ized. I do not think we can do better than to render it: “ My zeal for your house will consume'me.” 7:15 How knoweth this man letters^ having never learnedl (King James) IIcos ovTos ypaixfiara ol8ev ySi jjLejiadrjKOJS; h e King James rendering really goes back to the Rheims New Testament of 1582: “ How doth this man know let­ ters, whereas he hath not learned?” Tyndale (1525) had trans­ lated; “ Howe knoweth he the scriptures? seynge that he never learned.” Coverdale (1535) read, “ How can he the scrypture, seynge he hath not lerned it?” Tyndale’s reading reappeared in Rogers (1537), the Great Bible (1539), and the Bishops’ (1568), but the Geneva (1560) rendered, “ How knoweth this man the Scriptures, seing that he never learned.” The King James rendering blended and compressed the Geneva and the Rheims: “ How knoweth this man letters, having never learned?” It was reproduced w ithout change in the English and American revisions (1881, 1901). Of the modern translators, Campbell (1826) translated, “ Whence comes this man’s learning, who was never taught?” Norton (1855), “ Whence has this man. his learning, having never been instructed?” Anderson (1864), “ How has this man a knowledge of letters, having never been tailght?” Rother­ ham (1878), “ How does this one know letters* not having learned?” Weymouth (1903), “ How does this man know any-

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thing of books, . . . . although he has never been at any of the schools?” Twentieth Century (1904), ‘‘How has this man got his learning, . . . . when he has never studied?” Ferrar Fenton (1905), ‘‘How can this fellow know theology, having never studied?” Moffatt (1913), ‘‘How can this uneducated' fellow manage to read?” Ballantine (1923), ‘‘How does this man know books when he has never been educated?” M ont­ gomery (1924), ‘‘How does this fellow know the sacred w rit­ ings, when he has never learned them?” Spencer (1937), ‘‘How has this Man a knowledge of letters, since He has never learned?” The Catholic revision (1941), ‘‘How does this man come by learning, since he has not studied?” and the Basic (1941), ‘‘How has this man got knowledge of books? He has never been to school.” Of all these, only Moffatt seems aware that the phrase in doubt is an idiom and therefore not to be literally translated, though our own idiom, ‘‘knowing one’s letters,” would be a good 3equivalent. This idiom, yphiiixard eidivat, occurs hun­ dreds of times in Greek papyrus documents, mostly from the first Qentury on, in the sense of ‘‘being literate” (Rylands Pa­ pyri 154:37, Fayurn Towns 12>[a] :2) but almost always w ith the negative iirj, to express illiteracy—inability to write one’s name. Eighty-nine instances of it occur in the Oxyrhynchus Papyri^ ten in Tebtunis Papyri (Vol. II), ten in Amherst Papyri (Vol. II), twenty-eight in Rylands Papyri (Vol. II), and nine in Fayupi Towns and Their Papyri—in fact, all papyrus collections exhibit the idiom in abundance; it is also found in ostraca. It is the regular formula at the end of a legal document which someone signs on behalf of an illiterate party to the contract who cannot write his name, prj eidoTos ypapixara. Vpdppara eTriaTaadai sometimes occurs, always in the same sense, but much less frequently, in Oxyrhynchus Papyri 1467,

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1473 bis, 1639; Rylands 73; and Tebtunis 104, 291, 386, 821, 823. I can learn of no use of y pajjL ix ara e ib e v a i in any other sense than this, nor do the lexicons direct us to any other. We cannot escape the conclusion that this is the sense which the phrase was meant to convey in John 7:15; the Jews wondered that Jesus knew how to read and write. This understanding of the passage is confirmed by the in­ sertion soon after in the narrative of the story of the Adulter­ ous Woman (7:53-8:11), which described Jesus as writing on the ground. One Greek manuscript introduces the story at 7:36, while some Greek and some Armenian manuscripts of John put it at the end of that gospel. Vpaixpara in this sense is also to be understood w ith the phrase prj pepad-nKw, “when he has never learned,” immediate­ ly following—when he has never learned, that is, been taught, to write. Tpdppara pavOdveiv in the sense of learning to write is found in a number of papyri, listed by Preisigke in his Woerterbuch der griechischen Papyrusurkunden. Vpappara (as here, w ithout the article) is used in the papyri in the sense of the art of writin g : rexvv 5e '^pSiv ypdppara, ‘‘and we are scribes by profession” (Tebtunis Papyri 316, 15). To translate this well-known Greek idiom literally, and render y p d p p a r a by the ambiguous word “ letters,” so sugges­ tive of literature and literary attainments, is altogether at variance w ith the plain meaning of the Greek idiom, which is as clear and as amply attested as any in the Greek language. It seems clear that the meaning in John 7:15 is: “ How is it that this man knows his letters?” that is, “ can read and write?” So Moulton and Milligan decide in their Vocabulary of the Greek New Testament, page 131. I would translate: “ How is it that this man can read, . . . . when he has never gone to school?”

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7 : 53— 8:11

53 And every man went unto his own house, 8:1 Jesus went unto the mount of Olives. 2 And early in the morning he came again into the temple, and all the people came unto him; and he sat down, and taught them. 3 And the scribes and Pharisees brought unto him a woman taken in adultery; and when they had set her in the midst, 4 They say unto him. Master, this woman was taken in adultery, in the very act. 5 Now Moses in the law commanded us, that such should be stoned: but what sdyest thou'l 6 This they said, tempting him, that they migjot have to accuse him. But Jesus stooped down, and with his finger wrote on the ground, as though he heard them not. 7 So when they continued asking him, he lifted up himself, and said unto them. He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her. 8 And again he stooped down, and wrote on the ground. 9 And they which heard it, being convicted by their own con­ science, went out one by one, beginning at the eldest, even unto the last: and Jesus was left alone, and the woman standing in the midst. 10 When Jesus had lifted up himself, and saw none but the wom­ an, he said unto her. Woman, where are those thine accusers? hath no man condemned thee? 11 She said. No man. Lord. And Jesus said unto her. Neither do I condemn thee: go, and sin no more. (King James) ESTCOTT and Hort in their Greek Testament (1881) omit the passage from John altogether but print it on a page hy itself, immediately following John, w ith the title Ilepl MotxaXtSos liepLKOTrj. It may be noted that “ the scribes” are never mentioned in John, unless this passage is accepted as part of that gospel.

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106 PROBLEMS OF NEW TESTAMENT TRANSLATION The Westcott-Hort text may be translated as follows: Then all the others went home, but Jesus went to the Mountain of Olives. Very early next morning he went back to the temple and all the people gathered about him, and he sat down and taught them. But the scribes and Pharisees brought in a woman who had been caught committing adultery, and they made her stand in the middle of the crowd, and said to him, ‘‘Master, this woman was caught in the act of committing adul­ tery. N ow in the Law, Moses commanded us to stone such women to death. So what do you say?” They said this to test him, so as to get some charge to bring against him. But Jesus leaned forward and wrote on the ground with his finger. When they insisted upon an answer, he straightened up and said to them, ‘‘Let the man among you who has never committed a sin throw the first stone at her.” And he leaned forward again and went on writing on the ground. But when they heard what he said, they went away one by one, be­ ginning w ith the eldest, and he was left by himself, w ith the woman standing before him. And Jesus straightened up and said to her, ‘‘Where are they? Did nobody condemn you?” And she said, ‘‘Nobody, Sir.” And Jesus said, I w ill not condemn you either. Go free, and from this time give up sin.”

The incident of the adulterous woman brought to Jesus for his judgment of her act has appeared in all standard English Bibles from the first, the Great Bible of 1539, and had pre­ viously appeared in Tyndale (1525), Coverdale (1535), and Rogers (1537). It stood also in Taverner (1539). It was a part of the Greek text first published by Erasmus in 1516, and it

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continued to find a place in editions of the New Testament in Greek for some three hundred years. It is thus firmly estab­ lished in Christian use. The Greek text published by Erasmus was based on a very few comparatively late Greek manuscripts; he had only two for the Gospels, and they dated from the twelfth and fifteenth centuries; in his haste Erasmus did not pause to create a text even on the basis of these two but sent the fifteenth-century one directly to the printer, contenting himself w ith introduc­ ing in the proof such readings of the other as seemed prefer­ able. The discovery of older manuscripts of the Greek text and of the versions gradually revealed the fact that the section was not present in them; it has no place in Aleph, B, L, N, W, Y, Theta, Psi, and some minuscules; and, while it would fall in parts of A and C that are lost, space considerations show that it could not have been present in them. Some Old Latin manu­ scripts do not contain it, and it is absent from the Old Syriac. Since some of the most important Fathers make no mention of it—Clement, Origen, Theodore of Mopsuestia, Chrysostom— it was evidently not in the Gospel of John as they knew it. The story is quite unlike the Gospel of John in its style and . in its picture of Jesus, being much nearer in these respects to M atthew, Mark, and Luke. Eusebius ( a . d . 3 2 6 ) mentions such an incident as recorded in the Gospel of the Hebrews. The story, which may have been suggested by the story of Susanna and Daniel’s interference on her behalf, appears in one large group of manuscripts as a part of Luke (after 21:38). In the manuscripts that contain the story as a part of John, its text varies so much from one manuscript to another that Von Soden distinguished thirteen different forms of the text, and there are forms of the story that do not fit into any of these.

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This was due to the fact that the story came into John from a Latin form of the text, which was freely and variously trans­ lated into Greek. It was probably introduced into John at this point (7:53) to show that Jesus knew how to write, a thing the Jews had questioned his ability to do in 7:15. Some Latin scribe evi­ dently thought this story would supply a good answer to that slur upon his Master. One medieval Greek manuscript intro­ duces the story at 7:36, and some Greek and Armenian manu­ scripts place it at the end of John. All the best and most an­ cient Greek manuscripts omit it; it is first mentioned as a part of scripture by Latin Fathers of the fourth century—Ambrose, Jerome, and Augustine. As the longest of New Testament interpolations, this sec­ tion has constituted a serious problem for modern editors. Tischendorf declared it formed no part of the original Gospel of John. Westcott and Hort (1881) omitted it entirely from the text but printed it by itself under a separate heading between John and Acts. This extricated it from John but seemed to ele­ vate it into the position of a new book of the New Testament. Scrivener (1881) left it in the text as 7:53—8:11, but in smaller type. Nestle (1901) put it in double brackets and in the mar­ gin, among the footnotes. Souter (1910) printed it in the text of John but inclosed it in brackets. Von Soden (1915) printed it in the text, between 7:52 and 8:12, but in small type. Most modern translators recognize it as an interpolation. Norton (1855) omitted it entirely; Noyes (1869) put it at the foot of the page; Rotherham (1878) printed it in two forms, in the body of his text, following the two forms of the text given by Tregelles in his tritical edition of the Greek Testament (1872). The revised versions (1881,1901) printed it in brackets. Weizsaecker (3d ed., 1888) put it in small type in the margin at

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the foot of the page. Ballentine (1902) omitted it. Weymouth (1903) printed it in the text, in brackets. The Twentieth Cen­ tury (1904) printed it as an appendix to John. Ferrar Fenton ( 1905) omitted it from the text but printed it as an appendix to John. Moffatt (1913) printed it in the text in brackets. Ballantine (1923) printed it in smaller type in the text in brackets. Spencer (1937) and the Catholic revision (1941) printed it in the text. The Basic (1941) printed it in the text in brackets. Knox ( 1944) printed it in the text. The best textual authorities of the past century—Tischendorf, Tregelles, and Westcott and Hort—^have agreed that the section is no genuine part of the Gospel of John. The ancient manuscripts clearly support their verdict. It would seem that, unless we are to trifle w ith manuscript discovery and textual study, we have no choice but to concur. Interesting as the sec­ tion is, it was a late intrusion in John, which existed for two or three hundred years at least before anyone thought of put­ ting this addition into it. The story seems to have come from the Gospel of the Hebrews (Eusebius) and from a Latin version of that, into some Old Latin manuscripts, to remove the Jew­ ish charge (mentioned in 7:15) that Jesus could not read or write. Then when the fashion of writing bilingual manuscripts came in, in the fifth or sixth century, some scribe, copying the Greek and Old Latin texts side by side, found this long section in his Latin w ith no equivalent in his Greek, translated the Latin into Greek, and thus filled out his Greek page. If, as leading textuad scholars agree, the story is no part of John, it is no part of the New Testament, and, much as we may like it, we have no right to introduce it. Putting it into the margin or an appendix is only an evasion of the issue. The facts have been known for a hundred years, and it is certainly time to act upon them. I would omit this anecdote entirely.

PROBLEMS OF NEW TESTAMENT TRANSLATION

no

14:16 another Comforter (King James)^ iiWop TrapaK\rjTOP h i s rendering for TrapdKXrjros comes down, all the way from Wyclif (1382), who spelled it “ confortoure.” He was translating the Vulgate “paraclitum,” and in I John 2:1 the Vulgate had rendered irapdKXrjTos by “ advocatus,” which Wyc­ lif translated “ avoket.” Tyndale (1525), working on the Greek, took the same course, using “ comforter” in the gospel and “ advocate” in the epistle. All the leading Protestant ver­ sions down to and including the King James followed this course, w ith some variations in spelling. It was carried over into the English and American revised versions (1881, 1901) and adopted by Noyes (1869) and Spencer (1937). The Rheims translation (1582) read “ Paraclete” in the gospel and “ aduocate” in the epistle, reproducing the Vulgate forms in both. Modern translators in general have retained “ advocate” in the epistle but have sought to improve upon “ Comforter” as a rendering of irapaKkriTos in the gospel. Many have used “ ad­ vocate” in both books: Campbell (1826), Anderson (1864), Rotherham (1878), Weymouth (1903), Worrell (1904), and the Catholic revision (1941). Norton (1855) translated the word “Teacher” in the gospel. Montgomery (1924) used “ Comforter” in the gospel but “ Paraclete” in the epistle. Ballantine (1923) read “ Counselor” in the gospel and “ advo­ cate” in the epistle. “ Helper” is used in the gospel by the Twentieth Century (1904), Ferrar Fenton (1905), Moffatt ( 1913), and the Basic (1941). But in the epistle, Ferrar Fenton and Moffatt use “ advocate,” the Twentieth Century, “ one who can plead for us,” and the Basic, “ a friend and helper.” Knox ( 1944) in the gospel uses one “who is to befriend you.”

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1

Cf. 14:26, 15:26, 16:7j I John 2:1.

THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO JOHN

Ill

The best opinion seems to be that the word meant one called to someone’s aid in court, a helper, intercessor, pleader; a character witness (cf. Field, Notes, on this passage). “Defend­ er” is a very close equivalent, yet more than a defense witness seems intended. The work of teaching and reminding them seems to go far beyond this meaning and calls for a looser and broader word, as it is used in the gospel. I would translate: “ another Helper,” and in I John 2:1, “ one who w ill intercede for us.” 15:1

my father is the husbandman (King James) 6 TTOLT'bp nov 6 yecopyos ecrriv

h i s precise rendering “ the husbandman” first appeared in Taverner (1539) and then in the later printings of the Great Bible, such as the Rouen edition of 1566. The first print­ ing had read “ the husvande man.” From the Great it passed into the Bishops’ (1568) and, hyphenated, into the Rheims (1582)—“ the husband-man.” The Bishops’ was, of course, the avowed basis of the King James, and “ the husbandman” was taken over in the King James (1611) and the English and American revisions (1881, 1901). Tyndale (1525) read “ an husbande man,” as did Coverdale (1535) and Rogers (1537), perhaps through Luther’s influence (1522—“ ein Weingartner” ); the Greek text has always had the article. But the Vulgate, of course, did not, as there is no Latin article, and Wyclif had read “ an erthe tilier.” Modern translators have felt the antiqueness of the word “ husbandman,” and Campbell (1826) rendered 6 yecapyos “ the vine-dresser” ; this has been the translation of Anderson (1864), Weymouth (1903), Moffatt (1913), Spencer (1937), and the Catholic revision (1941). “The vine-grower” has been the reading of the Twentieth Century (1904), Ballantine

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112 PROBLEMS OF NEW TESTAMENT TRANSLATION ( 1923), and Montgomery (1924). The Basic (1941) reads “ the gardener.” Rotherham (1878) and Ferrar Fenton (1905) trans­ late “ the cultivator” ; Weizsaecker (1888) translated “ der Weingaertner.” There is a special -word in Greek for “ vine-dresser, vinegrower” ; it is aixweXovpyos (Luke 13:7). Tecopyos is the ordinary word in the Greek papyri for “ a farmer,” “ a cultivator” of public or private land, and is generally translated ‘‘cultivator’’ by papyrologists, as in the Oxyrhynchus^ Hibeh, Tebtunis, Fayum, Rylands, and Amherst papyri. The extremely bold figure here in John is probably reminiscent of Paul’s statement in I Cor. 3:9, where the Corinthians are called God’s yeo)pyLov, or farm, plot of ground. I would translate: “ My Father is the cultivator.” 15:4 Abide in me, and I in you (King James) M evere tv ip o i, Kayo) iv vp tv

h e King James rendering “Abide in me, and I in you,” inherited from the Geneva (1560), which was slightly al­ tered from Tyndale’s “ Byde in me, and I in you” (1525),^ can hardly be defended as English, for the imperative verb will not fit the second subject “ I ,” any more than in verse 5 ( “ He that abideth in me, and I in him ”) “ abideth” can be understood w ith the subject “ I .” The Greek ellipsis of the verb cannot al­ ways be safely imitated in English. To seek to do so results in intolerable harshness. Nevertheless, the original Tyndale ren­ dering, as modified in the Geneva Bible (1560), was taken over from the King James in both the revised versions, Eng­ lish and American (1881, 1901). The value of the whole figure of the Vine and the Branches as an illuminating interpretation

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^ Tyndale may have been simply translating word for word, or he may perhaps have been influenced by Luther, whose rendering “Bleibt in mir, unnd ich in euch,” is even worse than “Byde in me, and I in you.”

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of Paul’s favorite expression “ in Christ, in Christ Jesus,” w ilh be discussed under Rom. 8:1. The harshness of Tyndale’s rendering of John 15:4 did not long escape Tyndale himself, for in his last revision, as pub­ lished by his last friend and literary executor, John Rogers (1537), he had notably improved it: “ Byde in me, and let me byde in you.” Taverner (1539) read, “ Abyde in me, and let me abyde in you.” Coverdale (1535) read “ Byde ye in me and I in you” ; but, in revising Rogers’ Bible for Cranmer and the bishops into the Great Bible (1539), he went back to Tyn­ dale’s original reading. The Geneva (1560) changed to “ Abide,” but the Bishops’ (1568) clung .to “ Byde.” The Rheims (1582) followed Geneva, reading “ Abide in me: and I in you,” and the King James (1611) did the same. Few modern translators have been content to imitate so pal­ pable a solecism. Alexander Campbell (1826), reproducing in the Gospels the version of George Campbell of Aberdeen (1788), translated “ Abide in me, and I will abide in you” ; Norton (1855), “ Remain united to me, and I will remain united to you” ; Anderson (1864), “ Abide in me, and I will abide in you” ; Weymouth (1903), “ Continue in me, and let me continue in you” ; the Twentieth Century (1904), “Re­ main united to me, and I will remain united to you” ; Ferrar Fenton (1905), “ Remain on Me, for I am w ith you.” The harshness of this is due to an effort to preserve the English idiom of a branch being “ on” a vine or tree. Moffatt (1913) translated “ Remain in me, as 1 remain in you” ; Spencer (1937), “ Abide in me, and I w ill abide in you” ; and the Basic (1941), “ Be in me at all times as I am in you.” There are obviously two problems in this short sentence for the translator: the meaning of the preposition and the relation of the two clauses. The preposition must mean “ united to ,” as the figure of a vine and its branches shows, and is doubtless

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meant to show; this is the resolution of the Pauline paradox— we in Christ and Christ in us. Verses 15:1-8 constitute a brief clarification of Paul’s idea of the believer “ in” Christ, and yet Christ “ in” the believer. Norton, the Twentieth Century, and Ferrar Fenton felt this and sought to express it. The other problem is the relation of the two clauses. It is not as Tyndale and Weymouth thought (let me byde in you; let me continue in you) that the imperative sense extends from the first clause to the second. The first clause is imperative, but it also states a condition—“ and if you do, I will remain united to you.” This relation of the clauses is reflected in Campbell, Anderson, the Twentieth Century, and Spencer. As ICnox (1944) puts it, “You have only to live on in me, and I will live on in you.” Some translators have met one problem, and some the other, but the two problems are best met by Norton (1855), the Twentieth Century (1904), and Knox (1944). I translated: “ You must remain united to me, and I will re­ main united to you.” 15:5

He that ahideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fru it (King James) 6 iievcov ev eiioi Kayo) ev aur