Words, and Word of God (γαρ)
One of the interesting issues that comes up in discussions of translation theory is what I would call the mixing of the idea of a “word” and the “Word of God.” Some say that because Scripture is the Word of God, then we are required to translate word for word.
I believe in verbal plenary inspiration. This means that God’s inspiration extends to all (“plenary”) the words (“verbal”) of Scripture. But I do not think that this mandates the type of translation theory.
A charge from the formal against the functional camp is that the latter cannot believe in verbal plenary inspiration since they “leave out” words. Take, for example, the translation of και, especially in John.
και can one of the more difficult words to translate. It indicates a slight continuation (“and”). And in keeping with Hebrew, the Gospel of John begins many of his verses with και, words often omitted in more functional translations. Why? Because starting verse after verse with “and” is poor English grammar, and by using poor English grammar you are saying something about the Greek that is not true.
Does the omission of an English word for every και signal a weakened view of inspiration? No. It means that in their translation philosophy, English grammar and readability rank a little higher than in a formal equivalent translation.
Besides, there are ways to translate words without using words. How? With punctuation. When you end an English sentence with a period, and start a new sentence in the same paragraph, what is the punctuation (both the period and the paragraph) saying? It is saying that the second sentence expresses ideas that are a continuation of the ideas in the first sentence. Is the και translated? Yes, with the punctuation.
But are there dangers of not translating every word? Absolutely. Matt 5:2 can function as an example of the importance of each word. At the beginning of the Sermon on the Mount, the text says Jesus “opened his mouth and taught them, saying ….” (ESV). Mark Strauss in his paper at ETS last year says that the ESV “missed the Greek idiom, which does not indicate two actions, but one.”
But the ESV does not “miss” the idiom; we knew that the text is describing one event. In fact, many functional translations “miss” the fact that there is meaning in “opened his mouth.“ The phrase indicates the solemnity of what Jesus is going to say. D.A. Carson comments that the expression is “found elsewhere in the NT (13:35; Acts 8:34; 10:34; 18:14) and reflecting OT roots (Job 3:1; 33:2; Dan 10:16). It is used in solemn or revelatory contexts” (Expositor’s Bible Commentary, 8:129). The phrase “opened his mouth” was kept in the ESV because it is part of the meaning of the passage: Jesus is about to give what has become the greatest sermon ever given.
The expression is somewhat like the English, “He took a deep breath and said.” These two verbs expressing one basic thought, with an emphasis on the solemnity of the occasion.
Now, certainly the ESV and all other translations “miss” things; no one is perfect, but One. But this is one of the dangers of the functional approach to Bible translation; there may be more in the words than we at first recognize. If the functional translator doesn’t see the nuance, it is possible that they will skip over the word. On the formal side, there is safety in holding fast to the Greek and Hebrew words since sometimes there is more in a word (or phrase) than a translator recognizes.
But does that mean translators of functional equivalent Bibles don’t believe in verbal plenary inspiration? I do not believe so. I don’t yet know all the people on the CBT (Committee for Bible Translation, the NIV translators), but those I do know have a high regard for Scripture, and I am sure Mark totally endorses verbal plenary inspiration. We are back to the issue of translation philosophy.
I am going to continue this theme in next week’s blog, but here is what I am trying to say. Just because we believe in verbal, plenary inspiration does not necessarily dictate which translation philosophy we follow. The Word of God is true. The Word of God is expressed in words and sentences and grammar and punctuation. But to equate “Word” and “word” is not accurate. None of us, for example, would translate every “word” in John 3:16 as it is written.
In this way for loved the God the world that the son to only gave so that each the one believing into him not perish but have life eternal.
We omit some words since they perform grammatical functions (“the only”) or are used differently in a different language (“the God”). We move the words around to make sense. None of this means one translation camp has a higher or lower view of Scripture.
......The Word of God is true. The Word of God is expressed in words and sentences and grammar and punctuation. But to equate “Word” and “word” is not accurate...
Are you saying, Inspiration only applies to the original autographs & not to translations ?
That was not the point I was making, but yes I do believe that. Given all the differences that exist among any family of Greek manuscripts, it appears that God did not think it necessary to keep the textual tradition exactly consistent.
A kid like me has no business arguing details of Koine literary conventions with the likes of Dr. Mounce, but on the chance that I may learn something from the discussion, I'll go ahead and level my criticism.
Starting every sentence with a simple coordinating conjunction, 'and', in Greek or English is not a matter of grammar, but rather of style. In English, it is terrible style, but I don't think it's fair to call it "bad grammar". It's perfectly legitimate to use an 'and' followed by a comma at the beginning of a sentence, so long as one doesn't do it very often.
In any even, I don't get the impression from literary Koine that using και at the beginning of every independent clause was considered good style by native speakers. Literary Greek likes variety in it's conjunctions as much as any European tongue. What I think we are dealing with in John, Mark, sometimes Matthew and Luke (though Luke tends to give us a lot of variety, in addition to his beautiful use of the participles), and obviously in the LXX, is the direct translation of the Hebrew idiom for prose, something that is a little ridiculous in Greek. The pointing of the waw and the conjoined verb are the primary way by which we understand the flow and sequence of classical Hebrew narrative. In typical literary Koine, και has no such function, but we may find traces of these nuances in Biblical Greek.
In such a case, I think translating και literally would actually be telling you something that is true about John's Greek: namely, that it's a idiom of colloquial Greek brought in by non-native speakers, and it does indeed make the style a bit clunky.
Now, should a translator translate this literally? No, I think not. The most sensible thing is to translate it into smooth English keeping in mind the sequential force that και probably had somewhere inside of those Hebrew minds. Helping people get to the content is the main thing, I think. Analysis of the Greek style is nice for us in our ivory towers, but it is of little help in understanding.
As for the case of 'opening his mouth and saying...' this is yet another case of a semitic idiom. Going back to Ugaritic poetry, as well as Akkadian Epics (if I'm not mistaken), we find the phrase "and he lifted up his voice and cried out," as a formula used only to report the speech of gods. The Hebrew Bible uses this idiom for extremely poignant and often prophetic speech (See Judges 9:7). Interesting that this exact idiom has also made it's way into John. Of course, as you mention, we have also the phrase 'he opened his mouth and said' in various places in the Old Testament. I agree with your exegesis, that it is a formula to introduce something very important, but I think it would be better to translate the whole idiom into modern English; ie: "So he addressed them and began to teach, saying..."
This doesn't fully do justice to the underlying Hebrew idiom, but it does communicate to the modern reader that this is something worth hearing.
At any rate, as one who holds to verbal plenary inspiration, I'm sure you'll agree that translations are very poor tools for in-depth analysis of the text. If someone without a grasp of biblical languages really wants to explore a passage through close reading, one must consult a commentary with a strong philological emphasis, or ask a well trained Pastor or Scholar. It is simply not possible to do real exegesis on the basis of a translation alone, and in my opinion, translating the Bible in such a way as to suggest that one could is a very dangerous thing. There is a reason Bible scholars spend years of their lives in school cozying up to five or six dead languages that otherwise have no use. These words are of the utmost importance, and no other words in other languages can do them justice. Not to say that one can't read and study and come to a good understanding of the Bible through translations, but there is no authority behind it if one has not struggled with the words themselves (which laypeople do have some access to through commentaries). The main value in translation is that it allows readers to become familiar with the content and flow of the narrative/argument in a given text. It's useless for philological analysis. Why even bother?
Anyway, I'm skeptical about the value of overly literal translations. Just speak English.
Bill,
I appreciated your latest blog entry on words and the Word of God, in particular your comment on Matthew 5:2. There is indeed meaning added by 'opening the mouth.' However, woodenly translating this by stating that Jesus “opened his mouth and taught them, saying …” (ESV) does not communicate the sense here. What English speaker is going to understand from this translation that 'opening the mouth' emphasizes, as you say in your blog, "the solemnity of the occasion?" Your “He took a deep breath and said” certainly gets closer to the correct sense, so why not translate that way? Indeed, as translators let us strive to lose as little as possible in our translations. But in maintaining faithfulness to the Scriptures, we need to communicate to the best of our abilities the 'meaning'--not the words (unless they do communicate the same meaning)--of what is there in the original.
The problem with "he took a deep breath" is that it is a little dynamic for essentially literal translations, and as I recall there is some OT coloring to "opened his mouth." But you are right, "opened his mouth is close to meaningless to an English reader. However, what it does do is signal to the student that there is something else going on here other than just talking, and perhaps that is enough meaning.
But the ESV does not “miss” the idiom; we knew that the text is describing one event. In fact, many functional translations “miss” the fact that there is meaning in “opened his mouth.“
I think the ESV does miss the idiom because its formal equivalence translation "opened his mouth" conveys none of the solemnity that apparently resides in the Greek expression. The equivalent words are there but the meaning those words are intended to convey is missing. It would have been better to use the dynamic equivalent you suggest, "He took a deep breath and said..."
Hi Bill thanks for a great blog,
I dont mean to hijack this post, but I have a question and did not find a place where I could ask you a question. My question is about Eph 2:8-9(NIV), Can you explain to me in the greek which on is from God, the "faith or the Grace"
thanks Bill
As far as your question, Bible College, I have an idea a bit different from that of our brother Iakwbo.
"For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—" (Eph 2:8 NIV).
In Greek, both "grace" and "faith" are feminine words. The "this" in this verse, however, is neuter, not feminine as would be expected if it referred to grace or the faith. My idea, then, is that Paul is not referring to one or the other being from God, but rather that the whole concept/act of being saved by grace through faith is from God. God gives us both the grace and the faith to believe, and He's the one who saves us.
I hope this helps. And if anyone else reads this response, please correct me if I'm wrong.
Blessings!
You are 100% right. That is standard Greek grammar to use the enter to refer back not to a specific word but to a group of words or a concept.
Great post, Bill! I suggest everyone who has a problem with how translations are done learn Greek and translate the Scriptures for themselves.
And, if you don't mind, I'd like to answer the question from "Bible College" above: The grace is from God; we supply the faith.
Cheers,
Ιακωβος
Thanks for answering the question. I know that this gift of Grace is from God, but I was wondering how in the greek Grammar connects the two word. "grace" and "gift"
thanks
The connection is made through the "this," which is neuter. "This," because it is neuter, puts its arms around the entire preceding phrase.
Yeah I know the grace is from God...I was wondering if he would break the grammar down in the greek for me. And use that to tell me why it is the grace not the faith. (how the gift and grace are connected)
I really appreciate it though.....thank for answering it!
This Blog is very good!