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This is where we come to delve into the biblical text. Theology is not our foremost thought, but we realize it is something that will be dealt with in nearly every conversation. Feel free to use the original languages to make your point (meaning Greek, Hebrew, and Aramaic). This is an exegetical discussion area, so please limit topics to purely biblical ones.

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  • Questions Misunderstood as Declarations: Exhibit XI, B (Mk. 14:41 f.)

    Continuation of the chapter titled "Questions Misunderstood as Declarations" in Our Translated Gospels: Some of the Evidence, by Charles Cutler Torrey:
    Mark 14:41 f. according to Greek: Sleep on now, and take your rest (תִּדְמְכוּן מִכְּעַן וּתְנוּחוּן) it is enough (כַּדּוּ); the time has come; the Son of Man is delivered into the hands of evil men. Up, lets us go; he who betrays me is at hand.

    True rendering: Would you sleep now, and take your rest? (same Aramaic); Already (כַּדּוּ) the time has come, etc.

    Mark 14:41 f., Matthew 26:45. The two Greek verbs in the first clause here translated have in recent times occasionally been interpreted as present tense rather than as imperative, making the clause a question. Thus, the American edition of the English R.V. has in the margin: Do ye sleep on, then, and take your rest? The commentary of Klos.-Gressm. has Schlaft ihr nun und ruht? These renderings are forbidden, however, by the Greek adverb. See the commentaries by Swete and Lagrange. The ancient versions could only render by the imperative; and the commentators, from the earliest times, have understood the command (or rather permission) as ironical. But irony has no place in the scene, especially after what Jesus had said in verse 38: "the spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak."

    The Greek mistranslates the Aramaic adverb, as in several other places; here as in John 13:19, it means simply "now"; not, as it appears to mean (and as the Greek translators always render it), "from now on, henceforth." Accordingly, there being no indication of a question, the Greek interpreter could see in the two Aramaic adverbs ("imperfect" tense, ordinarily rendered by the Greek future) only an ironical injunction: "you may sleep on."

    There is another false rendering in the passage; apparently the translator of Mark was not a native Palestinian. The adverb kaddū, in Syriac, ordinarily means "enough," and so the Greek renders it here. In the Palestinian dialect it always means "now, already," and in this verse it begins the second sentence. The Aramaic text of Matthew differed slightly from that of Mark, reading "See, the hour is at hand (girbath)" instead of "Already the hour has come (ĕthāth)."

    To be continued...

    Comment


    • Questions Misunderstood as Declarations: Exhibit XI, C (Lk 16:8 f.)

      Continuation of the chapter titled "Questions Misunderstood as Declarations" in Our Translated Gospels: Some of the Evidence, by Charles Cutler Torrey:
      Luke 16:8 f. The lord of the estate praised the faithless steward, because he acted shrewdly; for the sons of this world are more sagacious, as regards their own generation, than the sons of light. And I say to you, Gain friends for yourself with base lucre; so that when it gone, they may receive you into the eternal abodes.

      True rendering: Did the lord of the estate praise the faithless steward because he had acted shrewdly (for the sons of this world are more sagacious, as regards their own generation, than the sons of light)? and do I say to you, Gain friends for yourselves with base lucre, so that when it is gone you may be received into the eternal abodes?

      Luke 16:8 f. This passage brings before us a new Jesus, one who seems inclined to compromise with evil. He approves a program of canny self-interest, recommending to his disciples a standard of life which is generally recognized as inferior: "I say to you, gain friends by means of money." This is not the worst of it; he bases the teaching on the story of a shrewd scoundrel who feathered his own nest at the expense of the man who had trusted him; and then appears to say to his disciples, Let this be your model! Commentators have exhausted their ingenuity in trying to imagine such extenuating circumstances as might permit the outraged employer to "praise" (!) the man who had habitually been false to his trust; but the parable gives no hint of such circumstances. Plummer, Comm., p. 381, says very truly: "The literature on the subject is voluminous and unrepaying." No honest man of the present day would prepare his son for the practical affairs of life by reciting to him such an anecdote as this, for his guidance. The son might then show himself "wise, as regards his own generation," by stealing his father's pocket book, in order to gain friends with his fellows. Did Jesus speak complacently of such wisdom?

      The disciples are given here a lesson in faithfulness in the use of that with which they have been entrusted, a possession which will inevitably be damaged, or lost, if they make the mistake of aiming at worldly prosperity. Jesus begins the lesson with a strongly ironical parable, told with some humor. The "children of this world," if they are shrewd enough, can be shockingly unfaithful to their trust, and yet prosper and enjoy life. The "children of light" promise themselves, quite innocently, to serve both God and mammon, but they are sadly in error. Can the friends whom they bribe guarantee them entrance into heaven? Even unfaithfulness in money matters leaves its black mark; will those who have dealt falsely with the property of others ever be trusted in the use of their own? How much more imperative is fidelity in administering true riches!

      Recent commentators, compelled by Luke's mistaken rendering in verses 8 and 9, have found it necessary to detach verses 10-13, supposing them to have been composed by Luke, or by someone else, in order to correct the unfortunate impression left by the parable. "How could Jesus, immediately after commending sharp practice, go on in the same breath to insist on faithfulness?" Sure enough, how could he?

      In verse 13, the Greek translation makes too sharp a contrast, with its "hating" and "despising." As for the alternative intended in the verse, the one case is that of an intimate relation of affection between master and servant, the other case supposes only the ordinary toleration.

      To be continued...
      Last edited by John Reece; 09-26-2014, 01:13 PM.

      Comment


      • Questions Misunderstood as Declarations: Exhibit XII, A (Jn. 6:32)

        Continuation of the chapter titled "Questions Misunderstood as Declarations" in Our Translated Gospels: Some of the Evidence, by Charles Cutler Torrey:
        John 6:32 according to Greek: Verily I say to you. It was not Moses that gave you the bread from heaven; but my Father gives you the true bread from heaven.

        True rendering: Verily I say to you, Did not Moses give you the bread from heaven? But my Father gives you the true bread from heaven.

        John 6:32. Jesus had no reason to deny the part played by Moses in the gift of the manna, especially as his hearers had said nothing about Moses. On the contrary, by mention of him and his agency he could make clearer the contrast which he was drawing between the old dispensation and the new. Now, he would say, God is making a gift mediated by no human agent.

        In the note on this passage in The Four Gospels, pp. 321 f., I gave abundant illustrations of the favorite Aramaic literary form which it exemplifies: the question, requiring an affirmative answer, followed by an assertion or argument based on the admission. It is not necessary to repeat the passages here. The clause is certainly interrogative, and the Greek, as it stands, can be thus interpreted, cf. 7:19! The Aramaic sentence necessarily began with the negative particle, and a literal translator could hardly render it any other way.

        To be continued...

        Comment


        • Questions Misunderstood as Declarations: Exhibit XII, B (Jn. 7:28)

          Continuation of the chapter titled "Questions Misunderstood as Declarations" in Our Translated Gospels: Some of the Evidence, by Charles Cutler Torrey:
          John 7:28 according to Greek: You know me and whence I am; and I came not of myself, but he who sent me is true (לָכַן קְשֹׁט הוּא דִּי שַׁלְחַנִי), whom you know not.

          True rendering: Do you know me and whence I am? Yet I came not of myself, But the truth is, that one sent me (same Aramaic) whom you do know not.

          John 7:28. This is another typical example of the literary form just described; see the note on 6:32, above. Jesus could not admit for a moment, under the present circumstances (see verse 27!), that his person and his origin were known to people. He tells them so in so many words in 8:14, 19, what he says less directly here, that they know neither him nor whence he came.

          The mistranslation in the clause which follows is evident from the Aramaic text. It could not interest Jesus' hearers to know whether the one who sent him was "true," or not, yet this is given central importance in our Greek. What the sentence has need to declare directly, not indirectly, is that Jesus was sent, and by one unknown to the people.

          To be continued...

          Comment


          • Questions Misunderstood as Declarations: Exhibit XII, C (Jn. 12:7)

            Continuation of the chapter titled "Questions Misunderstood as Declarations" in Our Translated Gospels: Some of the Evidence, by Charles Cutler Torrey:
            John 12:7 according to Greek: Let her keep it (שְׁבוּקוּהָא תִּנְטְרִנֵּהּ), for the day of my burial.

            True rendering: Let her alone; should she keep it (same Aramaic) for the day of my burial?

            John 12:7. How could the woman "keep" the ointment for future use, when it had already been poured out? The absurdity is of course not to be charged to the evangelist, he could not possibly have made such a blunder; as the achievement of a translator, however, it is perfectly typical. It is the same easy rendering of words, without attention to the clear requirement of the context, which is so constantly illustrated in the Greek renderings from Semitic; the LXX swarms with such cases. A similar example of flat contradiction of the near-context is Luke 7:45, see the note.

            Of the two possible interpretations of the Aramaic text, the true and the false, the one is as idiomatic as the other. Since there was no indication of a question, the translator (having forgotten what was said) rendered the more natural way.

            To be continued...

            Comment


            • Questions Misunderstood as Declarations: Exhibit XII, D (Jn. 11:49 f.)

              Continuation of the chapter titled "Questions Misunderstood as Declarations" in Our Translated Gospels: Some of the Evidence, by Charles Cutler Torrey:
              John 11:49 according to Greek: (Caiaphas said to the chief priests and Pharisees) You know nothing at all; nor do you consider that it is expedient for you that one man should die for the people, and that the whole nation should not perish.

              Probably intended: Have you no wisdom, and do you not consider that it is better for you that one man should die for the people, than that the whole nation perish.

              John 11:49. It is perhaps not important to defend Caiaphas against a charge of crass insolence; it is worthy of notice, however, that the occasion was one which seemed to call for something more diplomatic than the insulting speech which our Greek puts into the mouth of the high priest. He would at least gain nothing from speaking contemptuously of his fellows, if he wished his view to prevail. Nor is it easy to see why the evangelist should have invented the impoliteness. If the sentence is simply read as interrogative, it is obviously more effective, and more probably what the narrator intended.

              End of chapter 2; to be continued...

              Comment


              • Continued from the last post above ↑

                Beginning of Chapter III titled 'The Redundant "And"' in Our Translated Gospels: Some of the Evidence, by Charles Cutler Torrey:
                Chapter III

                THE REDUNDANT "AND"

                The Semitic usage which is here illustrated, the conjunction wa may be termed superfluous, inasmuch as it may always be omitted. On the other hand, in its rather widespread use it contributes a shade of meaning which can be recognized. Introducing the conclusion of a compound sentence, in a place where ordinarily no conjunction would be expected, it adds slightly to the emphasis given to the main idea. It is not quite "also." As thus employed, it appears sporadically in the Semitic languages generally; not, indeed, in Arabic, in which the conjunction fa serves the purpose. Hebrew, moreover, occupies a place of its own, for in its syntax the connection of clauses is looser, more primitive, and the conjunction "and" is almost omnipresent. In the dialects of Aramaic, especially in popular literature (as Brockelmann, Compar. Gramm., II, 674, remarks), this peculiar use of the particle is hardly rare. If it could be rendered at all, it would be rendered by such words as "then, so, thereupon, accordingly." There is good evidence that in Palestine, at the beginning of the present era, it was in vogue, at least in Christian usage, to a remarkable degree.

                To be continued...

                Comment


                • Continued from the last post above ↑

                  Continuation of Chapter III titled 'The Redundant "And"' in Our Translated Gospels: Some of the Evidence, by Charles Cutler Torrey:
                  The following illustrations are taken chiefly from the Old Syriac ("Sinaitic") version of the Four Gospels. It will surprise many to see this classed as Palestinian. It must suffice here to say that the available evidence seems to indicate that the version was made in the second century, by Christians who had migrated from Palestine to the neighborhood of Antioch. While in the main it is excellent Syriac, only occasionally tinged by the Greek it translates, yet it is so full of specifically Palestinian words, grammatical forms, and idioms, as to declare plainly the native land of the man or men, who accomplished the task. The Curetonian Gospels are also Old Syriac (a somewhat later revision), but in these the traces of the southern dialect have generally been removed.

                  To be continued...

                  Comment


                  • Continued from the last post above ↑

                    Continuation of Chapter III titled 'The Redundant "And"' in Our Translated Gospels: Some of the Evidence, by Charles Cutler Torrey:
                    The late Professor Burkitt, in the very valuable discussion of the Old Syriac version in Vol. II of his Evangelion da-Mepharreshe, lists the most of the occurrences of this redundant "and" (pp. 69-73), and treats a number of them in detail. He fails, I think, to recognize their true origin, regarding their presence as a feature of the early Syriac language, and explaining their absence in the Peshitta version as due to "the later theory of Syriac syntax" (p. 70). Against this must be said, that the syntax of written Aramaic, in all the regions north and east of Palestine, was fixed many centuries before the beginning of the present era; and that its usage, as regards this conjunction, is everywhere and at all times the same which is found in the Peshitta, after due allowance has been made for the fact of translation. Nowhere, in the very many specimens of the native language known to us, is there anything even remotely what we see in the "Sinaitic" Syriac, and (I should add) in the Aramaic which lies behind the Greek of our Four Gospels. On the contrary, it must be evident that in such exuberant―though hardly disturbing―use of "and" as appears constantly in such passages as Old Syriac Matthew 9:20, 10:23, etc., there is to be recognized an easy-going retention of Hebrew idiom.

                    To be continued...

                    Comment


                    • Continued from the last post above ↑

                      Continuation of Chapter III titled 'The Redundant "And"' in Our Translated Gospels: Some of the Evidence, by Charles Cutler Torrey:
                      It is interesting to observe that the "Palestinian Syriac" (dating several centuries later than the Old Syriac) retains some traces of this hybrid usage, and that not merely in the Gospels. See Schulthess, Gramm. des Christl.-Paläst. Aramäisch, p. 99.

                      To be continued...

                      Comment


                      • Continued from the last post above ↑

                        Continuation of Chapter III titled 'The Redundant "And"' in Our Translated Gospels: Some of the Evidence, by Charles Cutler Torrey:
                        To return to the illustrations from the Sinaitic Syriac Gospels: an example of the "slight added emphasis" may be seen in Matthew 21:21: If you have faith, and doubt not, you can not only do such a deed as this of the fig tree, but even if you say to this mountain, "Be taken up and cast into the sea," [and] thus it will be done. (Curetonian Syriac omits the conjunction).

                        To be continued...

                        Comment


                        • Continued from the last post above ↑

                          Continuation of Chapter III titled 'The Redundant "And"' in Our Translated Gospels: Some of the Evidence, by Charles Cutler Torrey:
                          Another conditional sentence is Luke 12:45 f.: But if that servant shall say in his heart, "My master delays to come," and shall begin to beat the menservants and the maidservants, and to eat and drink and be drunken, [and] the master of that servant will come, etc. (In this case the Curetonian Syriac has failed to omit the conjunction.)

                          To be continued...

                          Comment


                          • Continued from the last post above ↑

                            Continuation of Chapter III titled 'The Redundant "And"' in Our Translated Gospels: Some of the Evidence, by Charles Cutler Torrey:
                            Compare in Hebrew such passages as Gen. 31:8 and Exo. 40:47.
                            • Gen. 31:8 אִם־כֹּה יֹאמַר נְקֻדִּים יִהְיֶה שְׂכָרֶךָ וְיָלְדוּ כָל־הַצֹּאן נְקֻדִּים וְאִם־כֹּה יֹאמַר עֲקֻדִּים יִהְיֶה שְׂכָרֶךָ וְיָלְדוּ כָל־הַצֹּאן עֲקֻדִּים (ʾim-kō yōʾmar nᵉquddı̂m yihyeh śᵉḵāreḵā wᵉyālᵉḏû ḵol-haṣṣōʾn nᵉquddı̂m wᵉʾim-kō yōʾmar ʿᵃquddı̂m yihyeh śᵉḵāreḵā wᵉyālḏû ḵol-haṣṣōʾn ʿᵃquddı̂m) NRSV: If he said, ‘The speckled shall be your wages,’ then all the flock bore speckled; and if he said, ‘The striped shall be your wages,’ then all the flock bore striped.
                            • Exo. 40:37 וְאִם־לֹא יֵעָלֶה הֶעָנָן וְלֹא יִסְעוּ עַד־יוֹם הֵעָלֹתוֹ (wᵉʾim-lōʾ yēʿāleh heʿānān wᵉlōʾ yisʿû ʿaḏ-yôm hēʿālōṯô) NRSV: but if the cloud was not taken up, then they did not set out until the day that it was taken up.

                            Comment


                            • Continued from the last post above

                              Continuation of Chapter III titled 'The Redundant "And"' in Our Translated Gospels: Some of the Evidence, by Charles Cutler Torrey:
                              An example of different construction, Matthew 18:8 f.: It is better for you that you should enter (eternal) life maimed . . . rather than that you, while having two hands or two feet, [and] should go to eternal fire. (Likewise verse 9): . . . rather than that you, while having two eyes, [and] should go to the Gehenna of fire. (Curetonian Syriac is wanting here).
                              Last edited by John Reece; 12-18-2014, 07:14 AM.

                              Comment


                              • Continued from the last post above ↑

                                Continuation of Chapter III titled 'The Redundant "And"' in Our Translated Gospels: Some of the Evidence, by Charles Cutler Torrey:
                                The most characteristic use of the redundant "and," however, by far the oftenest illustrated, is its employment to introduce the conclusion which follows a clause of relative time. Thus, for example, in the Sin. Syr. of Matthew 2:1: Now when Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of Herod the king, [and] behold, magi came from the east to Jerusalem. It is interesting to observe that in this verse the superfluous wa is found also in Both Cur. and Palest. Syr. For this fact, the interjection "behold" is to be held responsible; for the phrase "and behold" (so very common in Hebrew) is especially fixed in the usage of Old Syr. and Palest. Syr. in places where the conjunction is unnecessary.

                                To be continued...

                                Comment

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