Last week I talked about the New Testament being written in the Common Greek of the people. This is extremely important to consider when looking at our translations of the Bible. There are, however, other things that should be taken into consideration. Apart from the standard argument of Word for Word versus Thought for Thought, another common point that comes up is the reading level of the reader. The NIrV is readable on the Third Grade Level, the NLT on the Sixth Grade Level, ESV on the Tenth Grade, KJV on the Twelfth Grade, etc.
However, today I want to propose an alternative to the problem: What if instead of translating our Bibles for the the READER’s reading level, what if we translated it on the WRITER’s writing level?
Let me make this clear: the writer’s of the books of the Bible were not all writing on the same level. Some were skilled grammarians and rhetoricians. Others…..let’s just say were not so.
If you ever take a class in NT Greek, you will most likely spend a lot of time working in John’s works. When I took Greek in my undergrad, we worked mostly out of 1 John. Why is this? John works in a simple Greek. On the other hand, we have the book of Hebrews, which is written by someone who is doubtlessly skilled both in Grammar and Rhetoric. Part of this that becomes peculiar is vocabulary choices. When reviewing Luke, he has a unique vocabulary, especially when it comes to medical terminology. Scot McKnight notes on Luke 14:2:
The man was a doctor, and when he says hyrdopikos in Greek he is giving a medical diagnosis, which is what edema is (the swelling, probably, of legs due to poor blood circulation). The old, quaint term dropsy is common in translations, though both the NIV 2011 and NLT have suggested translations with the term swelling. I give Luke a chance to shine with his own medical terms. My doctor uses terms I don’t understand, so I ask him what he means. Our way of asking is to look it up. If I were say to my doctor, “I’ve got swollen legs,” he might say, “Yes, you do; of a specific kind, called edema. Swelling can describe a variety of diagnoses.”
From the Preface of The Second Testament
The flip note of all of this is the Book of Revelation. The best way I have heard it said is that Revelation is like reading letter written by someone writing in a second language. This is obvious from the wording of the book, that the author was not trained for Greek grammar but incredibly familiar with Hebrew grammar. The style very Semitic, the background focused heavily on the Old Testament, and the author even pulls vocabulary straight from Hebrew.
Take the term Armageddon. This is not a term from the Greek but the Hebrew. We are even see this in Revelation 16:16, “And he assembled them to the place in Hebrew called Armageddon.” This term would be ַHar-Magedon. This is why Armageddon is often thought to happen at Magedo because Har-Magedon could mean Mount Magedo. (I don’t agree with this conclusion. If you have ever seen Magedo, it is a valley, not a mountain. Should I do a post on the location of Armageddon at some point?) What ever it means, we know Armageddon is a Hebrew term.
So I give this proposal to you: Should our Bible’s be on our level or the author’s level? Should we bring the Bible to our level? I argue it should be in our modern language, but who’s level within that language, a middle schooler, a high schooler, a college graduate? Or do we dynamically translate the level within the Bible, with certain books like John’s body of letters being written on an every day level but Luke’s corpus being written in the technical language of a doctor?
How’s your Bible reading been going? Are you looking for a fun new translation to mix things up? Do you want to see what a translation that uses this method looks like? Check out Scot McKnight’s The Second Testament (NT ONLY). John Goldingay also has The First Testament (OT ONLY), however I have not personally used this translation, but Goldingay is phenomenal scholar. His commentary on Genesis is my personal go to and can attest to wonderfully done translations within the commentary.
Trent Hipp 