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3. The Bible from Greek to English

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When you come across a word in another language, or a word you haven’t seen before, what is your reaction? How do you work to understand the word? Do you try to find someone who can translate it or do you look it up in a dictionary or on the internet?

Translation Approaches

Before we look at the Bible’s journey from Greek to modern English we need to consider the two approaches to translation.

  • Word-for-word translation attempts to render each word in the original language in its equivalent word in the new language, and to retain the original word order as much as possible.
  • Thought-for-thought translation is a modern approach that attempts to render each thought or expression in the original language in a phrase that expresses the thought as well as the feeling in the new language.

Most translation up until the twentieth century was word-for-word. The New Living Translation, Good News Bible and New English Bible use thought-for-thought translation.

Jerome and the Latin Vulgate

The first major step was translating the Bible into Latin – the language of the church after the fall of Rome. In 382, Pope Damasus I commissioned a priest and scholar, Jerome, to revise and consolidate the older Latin translations of the scriptures. Jerome worked over the next twenty years, translating the Gospels first and then moving to the Old Testament and the rest of the New Testament. The “Vulgate” (common or “not royal”) included the canons of both the Old and New Testaments, plus the ten books Jerome called “apocrypha,” or disputed.            

Even though the pope had commissioned the translation, he died in 384, and the Vulgate had no official support until 1545. Nevertheless, it was the accepted authority in the Roman Catholic Church for more than a thousand years. As such it had significant influence on the translation of the Bible into English and other European languages (which in turn influenced the ongoing evolution of those languages into their modern versions). The Council of Trent in 1545 declared the Vulgate should be “held as authentic; and that no one is to dare, or presume to reject it under any pretext whatever.”

Note . . . Even though there were a number of translations of New Testament material into the common languages of the Roman Empire, the Catholic Church conducted services in Latin, which only trained priests could read.

Old English translations            

Parts of the Bible were translated into Old English (the predecessor of modern English) as early as 700. In almost all cases these translations were made to help priests whose Latin was not good enough to understand the Vulgate. Some examples include:

  • A version of John’s Gospel by Bede in 735
  • Translations of the Psalms in 850.
  • Passages from the Ten Commandments and the Torah around 900 at the direction of King Alfred.
  • The four Gospels in 990 (the Wessex Gospels).

Wycliffe’s Bible

John Wycliffe, a scholar at Oxford University, was the first to translate the complete Bible into (Middle) English. He finished the New Testament in 1382 and the Old Testament within the next fifteen years, working exclusively from the Latin Vulgate. He was a reformer who believed – one hundred years before Martin Luther – that every person should have a personal relationship with God and, therefore, every person should study the Bible.

Wycliffe also spoke against the privileges of the church: land, political office, multiple church positions and indulgences. These reformist ideas ultimately angered the English nobility as well as the church hierarchy. Parliament removed Wycliffe from his post at Oxford and banned his version of the Bible (even though he died in 1384, a church council in 1415 had his bones dug up and burned as a heretic).            

In 1455 Gutenberg printed the Bible (the Latin Vulgate) with moveable type. In 1517 Martin Luther published his “95 Theses,” which ignited the Reformation in Europe.

Tyndale’s Bible

William Tyndale became a priest in England in 1521, the same year the pope named English King Henry VIII “Defender of the Faith.” In 1522 he gained a copy of Martin Luther’s German New Testament and started to produce an English version of the New Testament. The Bishop of London denied permission to produce “heretical text,” so Tyndale went to Hamburg, Germany, to complete his work – which was published in 1525. Even though the English church immediately denounced the book and tried to suppress it, the translation standardized the English language and became the basis for the King James Version of the Bible (more details below).  Tyndale then started work on the Old Testament, but he was burned at the stake as a heretic in before he could finish. Some of the men who worked with him continued, publishing Genesis through Chronicles in 1537.            

While Tyndale and his followers were translating and publishing an English version of the Bible, King Henry began fighting the secular power of the church in England, and, ultimately, its power to prevent his divorce and remarriage to gain a male heir. He broke with the Catholic Church in 1533 and made himself head of the church inEngland. He died in 1547 and his son, Edward VI succeeded him. In 1552 the Anglican (English) Church published the Book of Common Prayer, which standardized worship practices (though still very similar to Catholic worship). Henry’s daughter, Mary Tudor, was raised by her Catholic mother in France; when she succeeded Edward in 1553 she restored the Catholic Church. Six years later, Elizabeth succeeded her sister and took the country back to the Anglican Church, although she practiced religious tolerance in order to build the power of the crown and the military.

Henry had also initiated an English translation of the entire Bible, published in 1539 as the “Great Bible,” (which was primarily based on Tyndale’s work). In 1568 the Church of England revised the Great Bible to better align it with the Anglican view of the nature and role of clergy. The revision was issued as the “Bishops’ Bible;” but it never gained popularity. Finally, exiled Catholic scholars produced the English Douay-Rheims New Testament, which was published in France in 1582.

Bible Trivia
The Bible was not divided into chapters and verses
until 1551 (Greek New Testament) and 1558 (Latin Vulgate).

The King James Bible 

Elizabeth died in 1603 without an heir to the throne. Parliament, which had greatly increased its power during the unsettled time, chose Scotland’s current – and Calvinist (Presbyterian) – king, James to take the English crown. As part of his acceptance he pledged “no changes” in the Anglican Church. The next year James convened a conference of Anglican leaders at Hampton Court to deal with the alleged problems of the earlier translations brought forward by the Puritan group within the English church. 

James wanted to make sure the new version did not promote anti-monarchial positions so he issued a list of instructions to the translators (47 scholars from the Church of England, all but one clergy). The instructions prohibited any interpretive notes and directed the translators to work from the Bishops’ Bible as the primary basis, although the scholars could also consult the Tyndale, Great and Geneva Bibles. The scholars worked in committees which were assigned different parts of the Bible. The initial translation was completed in 1608, and then reviewed and edited for the next three years. The King James Bible (formal title is “Authorized Version”) was published in 1611. Even though the king had initiated this work, it took more than forty years to become widely accepted as the primary Bible of the Church of England.            

The King James Bible was updated in 1881 (New Testament) and 1885 (Old Testament) as the “Revised Version.” American Biblical scholars participated in this revision project and published their own “Revised Version, Standard American Edition” (more familiar as the “American Standard Version”) in 1901.

Revised Standard Version

The Revised Standard Version is a revision of the American Standard Version. It was begun in 1936 with the goal of a readable and literally accurate American English translation (“as literal as possible, as free as necessary”). The translators used the best available Greek texts for the New Testament and the Hebrew Masoretic Text (not the Septuagint) for the Old Testament. The New Testament was published in 1946, and the Old Testament in 1952.

This was the translation that finally eliminated the archaic “thy,” “thee” and “thou,” as well as the verbs with “st” on the end (“hadst”) in favor of the modern “you” and “had.” The RSV also restored the use of “Lord” and “God” for the divine name.

The Revised Standard Version was updated again in 1989 to use gender-neutral language throughout both testaments.

Contemporary Translations

Today there is a wide variety of translations of the Bible, for example: New English Bible (1970), New International Version (1973), and New Living Translation (1996, revised in 2003). There are also many different versions with notes and study guides for specific groups of people, such as Life Application Bible, Women’s Study Bible, the Student’s Bible and the Good News Bible for Teens.

Bible Trivia
Both ancient Hebrew and Greek had singular pronouns
that included both male and female genders, but English does not.
This is why we have to resort to “she or he” or even “s/he.”

NOTES . . .

John 1:1-5: You can see the differences among an exact word-for-word trans-lation with its awkward English word order, two more fluid word-for-word translations (KJV and NRSV), and a thought-for thought translation (NLT).

Literal Word-for-Word
In the beginning was the word, and the word was towards the God, and God was the word. This was in the beginning towards the God. Everything through him became, and apart-from him became not-even one-thing. What has-become in him life was, and the life was the light of-the men. And the light in the darkness shines, and the darkness it not overcame.

King James (Authorized) Version
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.The same was in the beginning with God.All things were made by him; and without him was not anything made that

was made. In him was life; and the life was the light of men.And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not.

New Revised Standard Version
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. What has come into being in him was life, and the life was the light of all people. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it.

New Living Translation
In the beginning the Word already existed. He was with God, and he was God. He created everything there is. Nothing exists that he didn’t make. Life itself was in him, and this life gives light to everyone. The light shines through the darkness, and the darkness can never extinguish it.

Lesson 4
Genesis 1-2: Creation of the heavens, the earth and humans.

Rich Nelson Bible Study, Commentary, Faith

2: Development of the Bible

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Does your family have a family history? Is it written down in a book or scrapbook? Or is it a collection of old letters and photographs? Or is it the stories that an older member of your family recounts to the younger members of the family?

The Scriptures

The Bible is an old book. Most scholars agree that parts of the Old Testament were written as early as 1200 BCE. The Bible itself talks about the existence of a physical “Book of the Law” in 630 BCE during the reign of King Josiah: The high priest Hilkiah said to Shaphan the secretary, “I have found the book of the law in the house of the Lord,” [2 Kings 22:8]. A couple of centuries later (in 444 BCE) Ezra, the high priest, read “The Book of the Law of Moses” to all the Israelites who returned from Babylon
[Neh 8:1-8].

Torah

Tradition says that Moses wrote the first five books of the Old Testament – called the “Torah” (Hebrew: “teachings”) or referred to as the “Pentateuch” (Greek: “five books”). However, some modern scholars believe they were written by an unknown scribe sometime during the early part of the Israelite kingdom around 900 BCE (we will discuss this in more detail in the introduction to each book). 

The Torah includes the creation of the world, the early history of humanity, the early history of the Hebrews and their exodus from Egypt and travel to Palestine, and the Jewish “Law.”  

Initially the writings were not bound into a single book, but were maintained as a set of scrolls (and remember, these scrolls did not have paragraph or verse or chapter breaks). Scholars generally agree that the five books were accepted as authoritative at least by the rebuilding of the temple in 444 BCE.

Historical Books

The next several books in the Old Testament continue the history of the Israelite people and the development and eventual disappearance of their kingdom. Joshua may be one of the earliest books to be written, probably by a secretary or aide to the Israelite commander. Judges, Ruth, Samuel, Kings and Chronicles were probably written some time after the events each describes, though specific authors are not known. Ezra and Nehemiah were written either by the person or an assistant. The historical books may have been edited into their current versions by a scribe or committee of scribes to preserve the Israelite history during the Babylonian exile (around 550 BCE).

Writings

The next books in the order of our current Old Testament are a collection of poetry, wisdom and fiction or legend. Poetry includes Psalms, Ecclesiastes and Song of Solomon. Proverbs is the wisdom entry; and Esther and Job are the fiction/legends. The events in Esther take place during the Jewish exile and may be historical. Job is a fictionalized account of a discussion about good and evil which many scholars believe to be the oldest writing in the Bible.

Prophets

The writings of the prophets are grouped into “major” and “minor” categories, based on the extent of the writing, not necessarily the subject matter. A prophet is someone who spoke God’s word to the people; sometimes this involved predicting future events. All the prophets spoke and wrote during the period of the divided kingdom, from 931 to 538 BCE. During this period the Jewish kings led the people into idol worship (with a very few exceptional kings who tried to follow the law) which gave the prophets plenty to talk about. Scholars generally accept that the prophet (or an assistant) wrote the book ascribed to him.

Septuagint

When the Jews returned from Babylon in the sixth century they began using Aramaic, a dialect of ancient Hebrew, as their primary language. In addition, Alexander the Great conquered all of the Persian Empire, including Palestine, by 326 BCE, making Greek the primary language of government and commerce. This created a situation in which the Jews could no longer read and understand their scriptures. One of Alexander’s successors, Ptolemy in Alexandria, Egypt, wanted to be able to read “the books of the law,” so he convened a group of Jewish scholars to translate them into Greek. The tradition is that there were six scholars from each Jewish tribe, so the group – and the translation – became known as the “Septuagint” (70 in Greek – it is often abbreviated LXX, which is 70 in Roman numerals). The translation began with the Pentateuch and then moved to the prophets and other writings over a period of several years, beginning around 250 BCE. As noted earlier, the Septuagint includes a number of writings (the Apocrypha) that are not accepted by Jewish or Protestant authorities.

The Septuagint became the accepted version of the Jewish scriptures throughout the Greek – and then Roman – world. It is the version Jesus and the Apostles and other early Christian writers would have used; and it was the basis for Jerome’s translation of the Old Testament into Latin. Modern Jewish scholars prefer an older version of the original Hebrew called the Masoretic Text.

The Christian Scriptures

The development of the New Testament parallels that of the Old Testament: various people recorded what they knew about Jesus or wrote letters about Jesus and Christian beliefs; eventually some of these writings were acknowledged as authoritative for helping other people know about Jesus and become his followers.

Gospels and Acts

Peter told the story of Jesus to the Jews at Pentecost as soon as fifty days after his resurrection and other Apostles told what they knew about Jesus equally soon. But Mark did not write the story down until approximately thirty years after Jesus’ death and resurrection. Matthew’s Gospel followed shortly after and Luke wrote his two-part story of Jesus’ life and ministry and the early church around 70 CE. John wrote last and no doubt had the benefit of the three synoptic Gospels when he put his story on paper near the end of the first century.

Letters

All of the letters in the New Testament were written during the first century. As the Apostles spread the “Good News” about Jesus and salvation and started communities of believers throughout the eastern Mediterranean region, Jews and others spread false information and different interpretations of the Gospel. Paul and the other leaders wrote letters to confront this false teaching and encourage believers to follow the truth about Jesus and his ministry. While Paul wrote letters to specific churches or individuals, the other writers (James, Peter, John, Jude and the author of Hebrews) wrote letters to the general church about specific subjects or problems. The letters were usually hand carried to the various churches and read aloud and then copied before being passed on to the next group. In this way individual churches developed a collection of letters that were accepted as good teaching.

Revelation

John wrote the last book of the New Testament while he was in exile on an island off the coast of Asia Minor – probably around 95 CE. By this time the Roman emperors were worshipped as Gods and Christians were severely persecuted for refusing to join such worship. John’s work circulated in the region to strengthen those who were already Jesus’ followers by describing God’s eventual and complete triumph over the forces of evil (primarily the Roman Empire in John’s time).

Development of the New Testament

The various writings about Jesus and his teaching circulated among the churches in the eastern Mediterranean region during the last half of the first century. But they were separate letters or scrolls; they were not collected into one group or book. As the church grew other – newer – leaders began referring to some of the letters in their writings.

  • Clement of Rome wrote in 95 indicating his knowledge of Matthew and Luke, plus Hebrews, Romans, Corinthians and Ephesians.
  • Polycarp wrote around 110 about the practice of circulating the letters and reading them as part of the service in churches.
  • Ignatius wrote seven letters (around 115) to churches in Asia 
    Minor (modern Turkey) that were paraphrases of the Gospels.
  • A writing called “The Teaching of the Twelve Apostles,” (around 120) included some passages from Matthew.
  • Justin Martyr (100-165), an early Christian teacher used material from Matthew and referred to Romans, Galatians, Colossians and Thessalonians, among others. He also refers to “Memoirs of the Apostles” being read in churches along with the Old Testament prophets – the earliest indication that New Testament writings had equivalent authority with the Jewish scriptures.

The term, “New Testament,” first appeared in a letter by an unknown writer in 193.

By the end of the second century the list of writings accepted by many church leaders was taking shape. The Muratorian Fragment, written between 170 and 200, includes four Gospels (Luke and John are named but the names of the other two are missing from the fragment), and Paul’s letters, plus the Apocalypse (Revelation), 1 and 2 John, and Jude (Hebrews, 1 and 2 Peter, James and 3 John are not listed). Origen and Eusebius, church leaders at the time, wrote expressing concerns about the letters of James and Peter and the last of John’s letters.

A church council in Nicaea in 325 came to informal agreement on the books of the New Testament as the books we include today. Athanasius, the bishop of Alexandria, Egypt, listed the books in his Easter letter of 367. The Council of Carthage in 397 formally affirmed the canon of the New Testament – thereby validating the practice of the church for the previous two hundred years.

By the end of the fourth century the Bible included the books that we read today. But we would not have been able to read them unless we knew Koine (“common”) Greek. Almost a thousand years would pass before there was an English translation of the full Bible.