I have had a great summer off from my daily routines and have been busy on some major writing projects. They will be announced at this year’s ETS annual meeting. You’ll like them.

But during the summer Robin (my wife) and I were listening to some sermons from an excellent preacher. I want to emphasize that he is really good. But even really good exegetical preachers can make mistakes, and his mistake, as subtle as it was, should serve as a reminder that we should always check the Greek before we preach.

I have no doubt that this preachers knows the Greek rule I am going to share with you, but I don’t think he checked the Greek this time.

Jesus is out on the sea with his disciples, the storm comes up, and the disciples wake up Jesus to ask him, “Teacher, don’t you care if we drown?” (NIV). The preacher preached this passage as an open question, one in which the disciples showed no faith in Jesus. But is that right? This certainly is the impression that the NIV gives (as well as all the other major translations). Even the NLT is at fault here, making the disciples faith even harder to see. “Teacher, don’t you care that we’re going to drown?”

The Greek is, διδάσκαλε, οὐ μέλει σοι ὅτι ἀπολλύμεθα; What do you see?

I am taking a break from my Monday with Mounce blog until September. See you September 10th.

There are lots of little things in this section that make translating fun. If you are in class, make an experiment. Have everyone do their own translation on this section and compare notes.

21:5. Jesus calls out to them, παιδία, a word describing "a child, normally below the age of puberty." It can also be used to describe someone “who is treasured in the way a parent treasures a child” (BDAG). Translations try words like “friends,” “children,” and “fellows,” none of which work in this historical situation. I wonder how a bunch of grown fishermen first responded when a stranger yelled out over the water, “Hey you prepubescent kids.” Sounds almost like the Goonies.

This question can be answered several ways, but this morning I am not interested in the issue of the faithfulness of the manuscript tradition to the original autographs. I am interested in the faithfulness of our modern Greek texts to the ancient Greek manuscripts we have.

I was proofreading a statement I made in my textbook, Basics of Biblical Greek. In 8.13 I say, "The ν in the third singular ἐστίν is a movable nu, but ἐστί occurs only once in the New Testament (Acts 18:10)."

This statement is true for NA27 (the 27th edition of the Nestle-Aland text) and UBS4, but in NA28/UBS5 it isn't true because the modern editors have standardized spellings. There are other examples of this, but ἐστί illustrates my point.

Why do this? Have the manuscripts changed? Is this an issue of textual criticism? I don't think so, since there are standardizations of spellings elsewhere as well. This appears to be an overall decision of the editors of the Nestle/Aland.

This is one reason why I am thankful for the new Tyndale House Greek New Testament. The vast majority of scholars agree that the earliest texts such as Sinaiticus and Vaticanus are the most reliable, so shouldn't our modern critical text follow them more closely, not just in what words are actually used but in things like spelling? See the Introduction to the Tyndale House text for a detailed discussion of their approach, pp. 508-12).

I saw a chart the other day that mapped out how "accurate" different translations are. Unfortunately, based on the translations that were deemed "accurate," you could see that the author had a defective view of what "accurate" means.

The old adage is that you measure what you value. If you value the replication of words, then the most formal equivalent translations will win.

I am only somewhat amused at the marketing of the Bible that champions what they call "optimal equivalence," and surprise, surprise, they are the most optimally equivalent translation. The problem with their marketing is that I know the programmer who did the math, and his work is based on a reverse interlinear approach that sees the purpose of translation to be the replication of the words. You measure what you value.

But two things happened to me the last couple days that illustrate the real issue. This morning I was driving to the gym and saw a construction truck in front of me with the sign, "Construction Vehicle. Do Not Follow." Now, if a German friend who didn't speak English were riding with me and wanted to know what the sign was, how should I translate it?

The problem, of course, is that the sign does not say what it means. How can you not follow the truck in front of you? Once the truck is on the road, does the road have to be vacated until it leaves the road? Of course we understand that it means, "Do not follow closely." So what would be an accurate translation? If you said, "Folge nicht," would that be an accurate translation for your friend? Or would you have to say, "Folge nicht genau"?