11. Bible Versions and Translations
Bible Versions and Translations
Chapter 10 The original Scriptures were written in Hebrew, with some parts in Chaldee, and others in a peculiar dialect of Greek. Attempts were naturally made to make these originals available by translations into other vernacular tongues. But translation is necessarily imperfect. Languages are not uniform in vocabulary or significance, and exact equivalents are not always to be found. Hence arise difficulties of rendering which perplex the most learned linguists, and all that is practicable is to choose the best available words to reproduce the original. No inspiration can be claimed for such human reproductions, yet they are practically safe guides.
While only such approximate accuracy can be claimed for even the most perfect rendering, it is remarkable how faithful all the standard translations are, and most remarkable how, amid all the thousands of doubtful disputed renderings, even of the most perplexing passages, not one affects a single vital doctrine of the Word of God. There are over three hundred different expositions of Galatians 3:20; but, whichever be adopted, no essential truth is at risk. We cannot but believe that the God of the Bible has superintended the translation of the Book into more than five hundred tongues, raising up men for this stupendous task and guiding them in it, so as to make their work practically unerring.
We advise every reader if possible to study the originals; if that is impracticable, to get the best helps to the understanding of them, in the way of literal renderings, such as that of Rotherham, Spurrell, Young, etc., and the most devout commentators. But it behooves us to remember that, though our great standard versions are only reflections of the originals, they are, like our own image in a mirror, which, though not the man himself is for all practical purposes his reproduction, sufficient guides in the understanding of God’s Word, so that it is only the most captious who object to them because they are only translations.
There are some confessedly inexact and inadequate renderings, and, whenever found, such should be carefully noted, and it is well to make the margin of one’s own Bible the place of such record, indicating also the best possible rendering or paraphrase to convey the thoughts otherwise obscured.
Some inadequacies are inherent in the poverty of language and are unavoidable. Sometimes a word means too much, or, again, too little; lacks definiteness and precision, or fails to express delicate shades of meaning. For example, the English word, “World,” is too comprehensive. It is used to render four or five Greek words, one of which means the earth; another, the cosmos, or created cosmic order; another, the age or indefinite time; and another, the world as the habitation of the human race. To discriminate these is difficult, yet often very necessary, for to confuse them is often to obscure or miss the meaning. This will clearly appear if the word, aion, or eon, be uniformly rendered “age,” in which case the sense becomes not only luminous where now obscure, but sometimes wholly new. For instance, examine the following among many texts:
Matthew 12:32—“Shall not be forgiven, neither in this age nor in the age to come.”
Matthew 13:39—“Harvest in the end of the age.”
Matthew 28:20—“Unto the end of the age.”
Romans 12:2—“Be not conformed to this age.”
2 Corinthians 4:4—“The God of this age.”
Galatians 1:4—“That He might deliver us from that present evil age.”
Ephesians 1:21—“Not only in this age, but in the age to come” (Ephesians 2:7).
2 Timothy 4:10—Titus 2:12—“Present age.”
Hebrews 6:5—“Tasted the powers of the age to come,” etc.
There is an easy way to discriminate these kindred words, if we render ge, “matter-world,” cosmos, “created-world,” aion, time-world, and oikoumene, “inhabited-world;” but in some way the reader should learn to distinguish them.
If the above cited passages, and others like them be carefully examined, and the context studied, it will be seen that the stress is upon the world-age, or period of time preceding the second appearing of the Lord. During this whole dispensation Satan, as the God or Prince of this world, is largely in control. He is seeking by masterly strategy and plausible subtlety, to draw away disciples into error both of doctrine and practice; to blind the eyes of men to the supreme beauty and value of what is immaterial, invisible and eternal by the transient and hollow baubles of the material, visible and temporal. He seeks also to impose upon even the believer by counterfeits of what is spiritual and divine. Hence the need of being perpetually on our guard against his sophistries and subtleties; of not being conformed to the notions and patterns of this present evil age. So perilous is this age in its temptations, and so awful in its coming judgments, that one grand object of our Lord’s whole mission was to deliver us from it; and those who live in it but are not of it, are like travelers on a mountain top, or Moses upon Pisgah, they see things in their relations; they compare the desert with the land of promise, the present evil age with the coming age of glory, and so actually foretaste the age to come, and get a growing distaste of the age that now is.
Some such new views of biblical truth are the fruit of a searching study to “know the Scriptures and the power of God” in them, by ascertaining just what the language which they employ is meant to convey.
Psalms 36:1 reads in the Authorized Version:
“The transgression of the wicked saith within my heart, that there is no fear of God before his eyes.” This conveys no very clear, intelligible idea. Mrs. Spurrell translates:
“The rebellion of the wicked causeth him to say within his heart:
‘There is no fear!’
God is not present to his sight” This is both intelligible and impressive. Dr. John DeWitt paraphrases thus:
“Sin’s oracle voice possesses the wicked man’s heart, and his eyes have before them no God to be feared.”
Similarly, Psalms 10:4 should be rendered:
“The wicked, in the height of his scorn—
‘God will not requite! No God!’ Such are all his thoughts.”
Here the very abruptness of the transition expresses the haughty arrogance of the blasphemer. Sin is personified, assuring him that he may sin with impunity. Falsehood, like a lying spirit, a demon, possesses him, and emboldens him to say, “There is no future judgment”—“no God to requite.” The short, abrupt, fragmentary, exclamatory utterance is so far a part of the design that the supplying of extra words rather spoils the majestic brevity of the original. Sin is madness and strikes quick, sharp blows at God, and it is the manner of a madman to utter short and unfinished exclamations, like the mutterings of a wild beast.
So, in Psalms 14:1 :
“The fool (atheistic fool) hath said, in his heart, ‘no god!’” i.e., “I would there were none!” This, or something like it, may be what is meant, as though he conspired to get God out of the way. An incomplete sentence leaves the imagination room to fill out the meaning. But the bottom idea in any case, is that sin hardens the heart, emboldens the sinner, and ends in his being given over to a reprobate mind (Romans 1:28). In the judgment of many scholarly exegetes no italics should be used in a translation. They represent words supplied by translators; if the original implies such words they need not be italicized; if it does not, to supply them is unwise, perhaps irreverent, for it may obscure and even pervert the sense. In Psalms 22, the whole of the opening verses is broken up into short ejaculations and exclamations, probably to make more vivid the dying agonies of the Sufferer, whose strength is gone and whose breath is too short to complete a single sentence. How pathetic if read as in the original, “My God! My God! Why—forsaken me?—far from helping me!—words of my roaring!”
Bishop Alexander, appreciating this singular feature of the Hebrew, calls this a Psalm of Sobs.”
Psalms 99:1 reads:
“The Lord reigneth; let the people tremble!
He sitteth between the cherubim; let the earth be moved.”
Here, without doubt, the sense is inverted; it should read:
“Jehovah is King, let the people be never so impatient:
He sitteth between the cherubim, let the earth be never so unquiet” (English Psalter).
If the latter be the true rendering, the thought is, that, however men may be troubled by the course of events or tremble with fear, Jehovah is still Sovereign; and sits firm on His throne, however the earth shakes and is unsteady. Not only does this rendering completely invert the whole conception, but it supplies infinite encouragement to a believer, to look away from all earthly commotions and human disturbances to Him who is eternally calm and unmoved—immutable, while all else changes, the controller of all men and all events, without whose permission no disaster can occur, and who makes even the wrath of man to praise Him, and the uprisings of the people to prepare the way to His final triumph. Nothing takes place that is not part of His plan or in some way promotes it. The Greek word in Galatians 4:16; Ephesians 4:15, means not only to speak, but to act, live the truth—to be true. It includes all, and is used but twice; in both cases how much clearer the meaning if literally translated:
“Am I become your enemy because I am true to you,” or “deal truly with you,” not only “speak the truth,” but live it. “Truthing in love” means more than “speaking the truth in love”—it includes being true, wholly governed by what is sincere and genuine. The ideal character is one which thus combines truth and love, in which truth is always mingled with love, and love always faithful to truth. The value of an exact rendering never perhaps more appears than in Romans 5:9-10, where is a turning point of the whole New Testament.
“Much more being justified we shall be saved from wrath.”
“Much more being reconciled, we shall be saved by His life.”
If reconciled and justified, we are already saved from wrath and from enmity; but the thought is that, being thus saved, we shall be kept saved, kept safe in His life, and not only so, but kept always rejoicing.[1] By his death we were delivered from judgment and reconciled to God. But He who died is risen no more to die, and in His undying life the saved believer finds a sphere and atmosphere of eternal abiding and security, which assures him he shall never lapse into a condition of enmity and incur wrath anew. So important is this short sentence: “We shall be kept safe in His Life,” that it first suggests that phrase which from this point on becomes the dominant phrase of the inspired Word—recurring hundreds of times: “in Christ,” or “in Christ Jesus,” or its equivalents, “in Him,” “in whom,” etc.comp.Ephesians 1:3-13. In these ten verses we have “in Christ” or its equivalent at least nine times, covering all God’s gracious plans from His eternal choice “in Him,” to the obtaining of the inheritance “in Him.”
[1] Dr. Moule on Romans.
Resemblances between words, both beautiful and instructive, are not always easily transferred to another tongue. In 1 Timothy 3:11, “not slanderers” is in the original, “not diabolic,” hinting at accusation in a malignant, devilish spirit.
1 Timothy 4:5—“Sanctified by the Word of God and prayer.”
Here the last word means holy converse or communion with God, a personal meeting and conference with Him. The word, prokopé, “advance,” how like proskopé—“stumbling-block?” The close resemblance between the original words helps to hint the lesson, that a trifling difference may turn what would be progress into hindrance, both to self and others; and again, prokrima, “prejudice,” how like prosklisis, “partiality—,” “Without prejudice, doing nothing by partiality” (1 Timothy 5:21). May not the resemblance here hint kinship?
James uses two kindred words, both rendered “gift,” James 1:17; one means the act of giving—giving in its initiatory stage; the other the gift, as bestowed, the boon when perfected. “Every good giving and every perfect gift” (comp. Rotherham and Canon Fausset). The best commentary on Scripture is Scripture itself—“comparing spiritual things with spiritual”—which yields a threefold result, interpretation, illustration, illumination. The Bible is its own lexicon, defining its terms; its own expositor, explaining its meaning; its own interpreter, unlocking its mysteries. Astonishing acquaintance with God and the things of God become possible through familiarity with this one Book, and surprising skill in handling and wielding his sword of the spirit, is attainable through practice in its use without recourse to outside aid.