Theology

What Makes a Bible Translation Really Bad?

No translation is perfect. But really bad translations are idiosyncratic and mislead innocent Bible readers.

If you find an English Bible translation on your Christian bookstore shelf, it’s almost certainly good. Buy it. Read it. Trust it.

But there are some “bad Bibles” out there, Bibles you won’t find careful evangelical biblical scholars recommending. In my last article I discussed Bible translations that give in to sectarian impulses. In this article, I discuss the second major category of bad Bibles: crackpot translations.

I’ll drastically qualify that word “bad” for some of these; and “crackpot” is about as nice a thing to say as “sectarian,” I’m afraid. Perhaps I should say instead, “idiosyncratic.” Some Bibles are indeed just odd; they rely on ideas about Scripture that are just weird—the kinds of ideas that make you purse your lips and glance from side to side, looking for a way out of this conversation ASAP, the kinds of ideas that get weeded out when translators must have accredited degrees and work in a group with checks and balances.

I have a soft spot in my heart for idiosyncratic evangelical Bible translations. I think they are, from one perspective, a great problem to have. The Bible is such an absorbing interest of American evangelicals that we produce extraneous Bible study resources. (I don’t see Roman Catholics and Eastern Orthodox doing this, though I admit I may simply be ignorant here.) And I assume these idiosyncratic projects usually don’t do much harm. But if they’re not “bad” in the consequentialist sense, they’re not good either. And they merit our attention here. I will give, again, four examples.

The Bible is such an absorbing interest of American evangelicals that we produce extraneous Bible study resources.

1. The Amplified Bible

I hope I don’t offend anyone, but the Amplified Bible is a good example of what I’m talking about. When I first encountered this Bible edition as an 18-year-old, I was intrigued to have provided for me in such a convenient format the “fuller meaning” of the Hebrew and Greek I hadn’t yet studied at the time. It was as a young college student that I bought the Comparative Study Bible, a four-version parallel Bible including the KJV, the NIV, the NASB, and the Amplified. But I didn’t end up using that last one much; it came to feel like the editors were just piling on English synonyms in all those many brackets that fill (and clutter) the Amplified Bible. Who possibly is helped by adding that parenthetical to the following sentence?

We ourselves (you and I) are Jews by birth. (Gal. 2:15a AMP)

And how many readers will understand that systematic theology, and not “the true meaning of the Greek,” has been inserted in a bracket into this statement?

If, in our desire and endeavor to be justified in Christ [to be declared righteous and put in right standing with God wholly and solely through Christ] … (Gal. 2:17 AMP)

(I chose the first two examples my eyes fell upon when I opened the Amplified at random.)

What I came to like about the Amplified was actually that, because its interpolations made it so much longer than the other Bible translations, it opened up margin space at the bottom of pages for me to take notes in. My purposes would have been better served, however, if the column taken up by the Amplified had simply been left blank.

The Amplified Bible was published in 1965 to provide “clarifying shades of meaning” to Hebrew and Greek words. Source

After I learned Hebrew and Greek, I came to feel that the Amplified was mostly harmless but that it raised false expectations among readers—readers who thought they were getting deeper insight than they really were. This isn’t entirely its fault, but the Amplified Bible inserts interpretation into the text in a way that, I discovered, misleads lay readers into thinking that they’re being told something from the Hebrew or Greek that traditional English translations obscure.

2. את Cepher

Cepher is an English Bible translation far weirder than the Amplified. The progenitor of Cepher—whose name I don’t care to give but who, I note, claims to have a doctorate but provides no details regarding it that I could find—is fascinated with the alleged power and depth of the Hebrew language in a way that echoes the Tree of Life Version (discussed here). But he takes his fascination to a level I can only call, well, idiosyncratic—and he places his most eccentric idea on the very cover of his Bible edition. We’ll get there; first, some other oddities in Cepher.

In the introduction to Cepher, we are given examples of the many Hebrew words that are transliterated rather than translated in this volume.

Another wonderful [Hebrew] word we have elected to use in the text is the word yachiyd (יחיד) which in its use declares tremendous meaning. In its first use, we find it in Bere’shiyth (Genesis) with the instruction to Avraham, saying: … “Take now your son, your yachiyd Yitschaq, whom you love.”

But yachid just means “only.” It does not have tremendous meaning. It should not be transliterated in an English Bible at all; it should be translated. But Cepher gets weirder as it traces this “wonderful word” throughout the Hebrew Bible and into the New Testament. At the end of its discussion of the Hebrew word for “only,” Cepher’s introduction says,

It is with these considerations that we have made the following change: “For Elohiym so loved the world, that he gave his yachiyd, that whosoever believes in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.

So a Hebrew transliteration into Roman characters is inserted into an English translation of a Greek sentence. From the middle of this language mélange, two key ideas are dropped out: where is the word “Son”? And where is the “begottenness” that forms such an important part of the doctrine of the eternal generation of that divine Son? I’m not saying the editors in charge of Cepher undercut Trinitarianism on purpose; I doubt that, honestly. My guess is that they are so fascinated with the nifty possibilities provided by faux insights into Hebrew that they got carried away.

Cepher does this with other Hebrew words that, it alleges, “carry … additional meaning” beyond what English is capable of communicating. This is why we get Hebrew transliterations elsewhere in the Cepher New Testament. In John 17, for example, Cepher has Jesus praying that his disciples “all may be yachad,” the Hebrew word for “one.” Exactly whom or how this helps is to me very much unclear.

Cepher also “restores” many Hebrew names by making more tortuous transliterations of them than we already possess in the English Bible tradition (is Avraham really more deep or accurate or even Jewish than Abraham?). Moses is Mosheh in Cepher; Joshua is Husha; Jesus is Yahushua. And Jesus’ name gets a fanciful etymology that contradicts what the angel Gabriel told Mary. Instead of “Yahweh saves,” Cepher says that Yahushua means “Yah is He who makes equal.”

The Cepher translation claims to “restores the Hebrew את” for English readers. Source

The Cepher intro also finds impossible phonemic connections between Hebrew and English, connections that aren’t really there—like seeing the English word “hell” in the Hebrew word the KJV translates as “Lucifer.” This is a game a clever person could play all day long in every language of the world. It is crackpottery.

My last complaint about Cepher (though I could go on, I assure you) regards a Hebrew word on its cover. It’s just two characters long; you could pronounce it “et.” But it’s actually not a word, per se; it’s a grammatical marker indicating that what follows is a direct object. It’s kind of like the practice in German of capitalizing nouns. It’s rare that this is truly needed; it’s just something biblical Hebrew does. But Cepher’s introduction finds great importance in this little non-word—and by doing so it falls into a very, very old Bible translation trap. Cepher’s intro says that this Hebrew word “has escaped translation in all English texts.” I regard that as a very misleading claim. English just doesn’t need the direct object marker to communicate which element of the sentence is the direct object. The word is “translated” properly by simply making good English sentences with proper Subject-Verb-Object (SVO) word order. In “God created the heavens and the earth,” the direct objects are utterly clear. We don’t have—because we don’t need—a direct object marker in English.

But there is an almost superstitious idea abroad—and I’ve seen it among Christians who ought to know better, I’m afraid—that if there’s a “word” in the Hebrew or Greek, there needs to be at least one word reflecting it in any English translation that wishes to regard itself as faithful. This is an old trap because a Jewish Bible translator, Aquila, did almost exactly the same thing twenty centuries ago while moving from Hebrew to Greek, producing impossible sentences.¹ Cepher dials this tendency up to 11. The Cepher intro alleges that the first letter of this two-letter “word” is “a symbol of strength and is often construed as a crown of leadership.” The second letter allegedly “means the mark, or sign, or covenant.” Put all these tea leaves and animal entrails together into a pot with a crack in it, and this is what you get: meaningless untranslated and even untransliterated Hebrew in the middle of English Bible verses:

In the beginning Elohiym created את the heavens and את the earth. (Bere’shiyth 1:1)

This is beyond bizarre. And it is double beyond bizarre—like, actually setting up shop in a real-live bazaar—that Cepher does this even in the New Testament:

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with את Elohiym, and Elohiym was the Word. (Yochanon 1:1)

I feel rather confident that no plow boys will understand this, because there’s nothing there to understand. I, for one, cannot make any sense of it: “God” is not the direct object in that sentence, so why does it need a direct object marker?

At the foundation of the Cepher superstructure, lying underneath the stratigraphic levels archaeologists have excavated so far, are thousands of cracked pots. I deny flatly—and I actually find this to be theologically important—that Hebrew carries “tremendous additional meaning” that English or Russian or Sara Kaba Dem or Lamogai or Urdu cannot. There is not—there is not—something you can know about onlyness or oneness or Jesus or hell or Paul or direct objects (!) that you have to know Hebrew to really understand.

And hear me, brothers and sisters: you don’t have to say any name in Hebrew, including the name of God, to get the full power of that name. That’s Harry Potterism, not Christianity. The God who knows what you need before you ask does not demand that you pronounce everything right before he’ll listen. He’s not telling us, “You said, ‘Wingardium leviosa,’ and your prayer will not work until you say, ‘Wingardium levioSA.’ ” You can relate to God in your heart language without fear that you’re missing something essential. Projects like Cepher don’t exactly prey on this fear; they are manifestations of it.

You can relate to God in your heart language without fear that you’re missing something essential.

The things you’ll miss in Scripture if you don’t know Hebrew or Greek are almost always minor grammatical niceties—or, perhaps, technical details that help interpretation mainly at that technical level. You can know God and love him and obey him and have good theology without direct reference to the biblical languages—though, of course, I’m not discouraging you at all from learning them! I’m just trying to encourage those who haven’t had the opportunity not to enter a rabbit trail full of traps.

3. Pure Word

Now to the third crackpot/idiosyncratic Bible: the Pure Word New Testament. This one is so odd that I think it has to be pretty harmless. But I think it has something to teach us, as sort of a reductio ad crackpottem.

The Pure Word is endorsed by the president of One Path Publishing, who said,

There are over 450 English New Testament translations, all containing inaccuracies that never fully reference the original Koine Greek definitions and each word’s original parsings. The Pure Word research project did just that.

And what is One Path Publishing? It’s not a publisher; it’s a website for the Pure Word New Testament. And who is the president of One Path? The same man who made the Pure Word New Testament—and who just claimed that all the other English New Testaments contain “inaccuracies” and “never fully reference the original Koine Greek definitions.” The progenitor of the Pure Word—itself an arrogant title, I must say—speaks with deep gravity in his promo video, insisting that “English is a very imprecise language” and that “only recently, with breakthroughs in monadic-based translation” can we really understand the Bible “exactly the way the early church understood it 2,000 years ago.” This is all uncomfortably close to rhetoric I’ve heard among more responsible Christians; let this be a warning to us. None of this is true.

And yet he sings the same note all idiosyncratic translations love to play so loudly: if we study his translation, he says, we will “receive the full meaning and blessing that Christ always meant for us to have.”

But when you actually look at the Pure Word, searching for the incredible insight its marketing materials promise (or for any kind of serious definition of “monadic hermeneutics”), you get not even a cracked pot, which maybe you could piece together with superglue, but instead one of the potsherds with which Job scraped his skin.

Because, God has Loved in such a manner the satan’s world, so that He Gave His Son, the Only Begotten Risen Christ, in order that whoever is Continuously by his choice Committing for the Result and Purpose of Him, should not perish, but definitely should, by his choice, be Continuously Having Eternal Life. (John 3:16 The Pure Word)

This is ham-handed bunkum, from the awkward capitalization to the first-year-Greek-student over-specificity to the unexpected appearance of Satan in a verse where he actually wasn’t prowling for once. The search for the holy grail of literalness, the translation that has no errors or even that can’t be misunderstood—these are all understandable impulses, but they run aground on reality. God made translation a usually straightforward but sometimes vexingly difficult and imperfect science. And he’s still good. We don’t have to—and we can’t—step in to solve problems God does not regard as problems.

4. The Passion Translation

But we’re not done. I’ve got a fourth idiosyncratic Bible to mention. It’s time to examine The Passion Translation. YouTuber Mike Winger has already done an excellent job critiquing this English Bible translation, even hiring major evangelical biblical scholars to help him. I myself have made some effort at describing the eccentric and impracticable linguistic ideas that were used to create TPT. I’ll add only a few thoughts here.

I could probably have placed this version in the “sectarian” category; it does come from a portion of Pentecostalism considered extreme even by other continuationists. But I think that one of the points I’m slowly making inductively in this long article is that good Bible translations will demonstrate that they have paid attention to the way God’s gift of language actually works. They won’t propose impossible linguistic ideas or promise special insight into “what God really meant” in the originals, insight no other translations provide. They won’t baptize one language as specially divine.

TPT does all these things. Briefly:

TPT translator Brian Simmons’ idea of Hebrew homonymy is simply linguistically impossible. To say that Hebrew words that sound the same can mean both things is somewhat like my joke about “bizarre” and “bazaar” earlier. Ha ha. Dad joke. It’s like going to the Pe’e Pe’e (peh’-ay peh’-ay) Falls in Hawaii—literally around the corner from my sister’s house—and giggling because it “also means” Pee-Pee falls.
Simmons claims special insight into the “passionate heart of God,” insight he allegedly placed into his translation. But anytime I’ve actually looked at real verses Simmons wrote down in TPT, the passion of God is not something he pulls out of the text but something he adds in. Even the simple “Greet one another with a holy kiss” becomes, “Greet each other with a holy kiss of God’s love” (Rom 16:16 TPT). I’m not quite sure what that means, but I am sure that “of God’s love” is not in the Greek (nor in the Aramaic—I checked). Simmons did us the favor of italicizing these words, and there’s nothing wrong with commentary as long as people know it’s commentary—but Simmons has repeatedly claimed that these insights were actually divinely given to him and/or found in the “original Aramaic.”
Simmons at least chose a new candidate for the most holy and insightful and theologically accurate language. He chose not Hebrew, not Greek, but Aramaic, a relative of Hebrew. He is no more successful in this effort than anyone else has been. We have no good reasons to believe that the New Testament was originally written in Aramaic, as Simmons alleges.

Conclusion

I recently saw a funny meme that showed pictures from old TV shows I grew up watching. In the picture from each show, our hero is buried waist-deep in sand, struggling and in deadly peril. The caption read, “When I was a kid I thought quicksand was going to be a much bigger problem on a daily basis than it really is.” This word is truth.

In like manner: for all the terrible warnings people make about the perfidy and error of other people’s Bible translations, I’ve literally never once encountered a Bible-believing Christian who was misled in the ways predicted by the discernment gurus. I’ve never seen someone go soft on sexual sin, or on the exclusivity of Christ’s atonement, or even on dispensationalism or the rapture or whatever the fear-mongers might be concerned to protect—simply because that someone read an allegedly erroneous rendering in a Bible translation. When it comes to Bible translation: never have so many complained so much about so little.

I’ve literally never once encountered a Bible-believing Christian who was misled in the ways predicted by the discernment gurus.

But that doesn’t mean that everything out there is completely hunky or dory. There are some problems to spot. And I think those who are best equipped to spot erroneous or even simply idiosyncratic renderings in modern Bible translations are those who have come to appreciate, positively, why multiple Bible translations exist, and how they can help sincere students of Scripture. To such people, the “bad” Bibles out there will not pose a serious threat. Those who have the best discernment exercise that discernment as part of an overall positive vision. They don’t live in fear or believe all the conspiracy theories they hear.

So I think it’s important now to say something positive about all of the Bibles I’ve called “bad” in this and my last article. Not a single one of them is completely bad. Some of the more fruitcakey ones are mostly harmless; they’re so obviously impossible that I don’t think very many people will take them seriously. And I can often make myself believe that they arise from a good but misguided impulse, an impulse to really know God’s word.

Illustration by Peter Gurry. Photo from iStock
What Makes a Bible Translation Bad?
Sectarian translations go too far beyond the natural bias inherent in something as complex as translating the Bible.
Mark Ward

And even the more dangerous translations are still chock full of truth. Justin Taylor once gave the gospel from the New World Translation. I do not personally think that people are often led astray by “bad Bibles”; I suggest instead that it’s teachers who lead people astray.

I try to keep a taciturn, academic exterior while evaluating Bible translations. But sometimes my righteous soul is qatsared nearly unto death by the kind of linguistic silliness people perpetrate upon the Bible. I feel defensive for the sheep who are distressed and confused by some of the ideas that give rise to the “bad” Bibles I’ve surveyed in this article on crackpot Bibles and my previous one on sectarian ones. Sometimes I just want to nakah some Pilishtim.

I do just want to see regular Christians reading and trusting all the good English Bible translations we have.

You can watch this as a video.

Notes

1
See William A. Ross and Gregory R. Lanier, The Septuagint: What It Is and Why It Matters (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2021), 90–91.

What Makes a Bible Translation Bad?

Sectarian translations go too far beyond the natural bias inherent in something as complex as translating the Bible.

Mark Ward

If you find an English Bible translation on your Christian bookstore shelf, it’s almost certainly good. Buy it. Read it. Trust it.

But there are some “bad Bibles” out there, Bibles you won’t find careful evangelical biblical scholars recommending. Consider this article to be like the list of possible adverse side effects that are rattled off in monotone at the end of drug commercials on TV. Hopefully you’ll never need this information. But if you accidentally buy a bad Bible at Goodwill and you develop an odd tic, you’ll know what happened.

More seriously, I don’t think most of my readers will ever hold in their hands a truly “bad Bible.” But by seeing Bible translation done badly, you will gain better understanding and appreciation for the many good Bibles we have in English.

What, indeed, makes a Bible translation bad? Bibles are bad—when, on rare occasions, they are bad—for two major reasons: sectarianism and crackpottery.

In this article: sectarian translations. In my next article: crackpot translations.

Sectarian translations are those that have more than the natural bias inherent in the effort of any person or group to do something as complex as translating the Bible. Escaping all bias whatsoever is impossible; it’s not even desirable. I have a bias toward seeing the Bible as coherent, for example. I think that’s good. But some biases merit the label “sectarian.” I won’t cover all of them, just four.

1. The New World Translation

I have a regular YouTube commenter who is a courteous and intelligent Jehovah’s Witness (JW). He frequently points out places where his New World Translation, produced by the Watchtower Society in the 1950s, makes a fine rendering of a Bible word or phrase I’ve just discussed in a video. Numerous times he has done this, and I don’t remember ever having to disagree with the NWT in these instances.

But the NWT earns the sectarian badge because of the classic complaints evangelicals have made about it since its release 60-plus years ago.

The New World Translation is used worldwide by Jehovah’s Witnesses. Source

First, the NWT manipulates John 1:1 to support the JW’s anti-trinitarian bias, turning “the Word was God” into “the Word was a God.” I’ve heard this charge my entire life, and I tried again to listen to the JW’s counterarguments as I wrote this article. I remain unconvinced. It appears to me that the argument between Christian orthodoxy and the JWs—modern Arians—over John 1:1 has never made any real advances, because they haven’t needed to. The matter is reasonably straightforward.¹ There’s nothing more to say: the NWT mistranslates a text that teaches the deity of Christ, and not only here.²

As with the Son, so with the Spirit: the NWT regularly turns what should properly be “the Holy Spirit” into “a holy spirit” (Acts 8:15, 17–19; 10:38; 19:2; Luke 2:25; 11:13; John 20:22).³

The KJV translators, in their justly famous preface, urge their readers to judge Bible translations by their predominant character.

A man may be counted a virtuous man though he have made many slips in his life (else there were none virtuous, for, “in many things we offend all”), also a comely man and lovely, though he have some warts upon his hand.⁴

I find myself continually quoting this portion of the KJV preface as I work to smother the flames of the never-ending social media Bible wars. Some people are ready—no, eager—to distrust whole Bible translations based on the tiniest of alleged blemishes.⁵

But intentionally and repeatedly subverting the deity of Christ and the doctrine of the Trinity are rather large warts for a Bible translation to have protruding from its genuine leather cover. The NWT is a bad Bible because it is openly sectarian in multiple places that matter.

The New World Translation is a bad Bible because it is openly sectarian in multiple places that matter.

2. The New Revised Standard Version (Updated Edition)

I wouldn’t quite say the same of the second sectarian translation, the New Revised Standard Version, Updated Edition (NRSVue). Consensus so far among people I trust is that this revision does not have a bad predominant character (I have not read the whole thing, I confess; I am merely reporting on the buzz). The one wart that has received real attention since its recent release is in the NRSVue’s rendering of 1 Corinthians 6:9–10:

Do you not know that wrongdoers will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived! The sexually immoral, idolaters, adulterers, male prostitutes, men who engage in illicit sex, thieves, the greedy, drunkards, revilers, swindlers—none of these will inherit the kingdom of God.

It is true that the two Greek words at issue here require translators to make some judgments. But into a crack of minor uncertainty the NRSVue has wedged a whale-sized obfuscation. These words almost certainly refer to the passive and active partners in a male-to-male homosexual pairing. The NRSVue is “sectarian” here because it overspecifies the first word and overgeneralizes the second—just as the sect that produced the translation, the sect called mainline Protestantism, would prefer Paul had done. One of Paul’s clear condemnations of male homosexuality is thereby removed from his writings.

That wart is significant enough, I would think, to keep those of us who uphold an orthodox sexual ethic from using the NRSVue as the main pulpit Bible in our churches. But whereas I never check the NWT, I will happily check the renderings in the NRSVue in my Bible study in years to come. The (yes, mostly—but not entirely—liberal) translators behind that work appear to me to have been generally responsible and careful.

3. Certain Bible translations for Muslim nations

I am a signatory of the Arlington Statement on Bible Translation, which alleges that certain Bible translations that were made for Muslim-majority languages have soft-pedaled the deity of Jesus, and specifically his status as “Son of God.” I was asked by several friends to sign the statement, but I actually resisted for quite some time—because I felt like I wasn’t hearing anything from the other side, and I wasn’t seeing the dispute laid out in any responsible academic venues. Also, I had no way of checking the offending translations for myself. I don’t like being asked to take sides without hearing from the best of all parties.

But then I listened to Georges Houssney in his guest appearance on the Working for the Word podcast, with my friend (and Text & Canon contributor) Andrew Case. Houssney was obviously knowledgeable: he was an Arabic Bible translator from Egypt. He immediately won me over, and he helped me understand why I wasn’t hearing from his opponents. I signed the statement based almost solely on his testimony—and to hear more, you really must listen to Houssney.

As an example of the concerns that have driven Houssney and the Arlington Statement, The True Meaning of the Gospel of Christ, an Arabic translation available on YouVersion, translates Mark 13:32 this way:

No one knows when that day and that hour comes, not even the master of humanity and the angels. For Allah, the father, the All-Beneficent, the All-merciful alone possesses knowledge of the hour.⁶

Jesus calls himself “the Son” in Mark 13:32; this translation adjusts to Muslim sensibilities and calls him “Master of humanity.” And instead of doing what Jesus did here and calling God simply “the Father,” The True Meaning adds three Muslim-friendly titles—“Allah,” “All-Beneficent,” and “All-merciful”—that don’t occur in the Greek. (To be clear: “Allah” is not exclusively an Islamic word; it is the generic word for God used by Arabic-speaking Christians. But the word “God” does not occur in the Greek in this verse.)

Jesus calls himself “the Son” in Mark 13:32; this translation adjusts to Muslim sensibilities and calls him “Master of humanity.”

Another Arabic translation of the New Testament is called The Honored Injil. This translation is actually paired with an English back-translation on its website, so in this same verse you can see for yourself that the Son is called “the beloved Amir,” or “Prince”; and the Father is called “Al-Malik Al-Rahman,” or “the Gracious King.” Now, the Son is a Prince, and the Father is a King; but Jesus could have used those words (in Greek) and he did not. Once again, a translation is bowing not just to Muslim preferences but to actual Islamic doctrine.

I call these offending translations “sectarian” because they end up doing the same thing to the deity of Jesus that the NWT does. At best, they confuse the Bible’s picture of Jesus; at worst, they draw up the blueprints for a sect in which you can hold on to Muslim-style monotheism (denying the doctrine of the Trinity) and still consider yourself a follower of Jesus Christ. These are bad Bibles.

4. The Tree of Life Version

The fourth sectarian Bible I’ll describe is not “bad,” not that I know of. Even to use the word “sectarian” feels a little harsh. But I regret that I must. It’s the Tree of Life Version, a Messianic Jewish translation released in 2011. A few well-known names participated (namely Richard Averbeck and Craig Keener), and the TLV has not raised any public hackles that I have seen. I’m not going to posit inaccuracies in it.

But the constant use of transliterated Hebrew is nothing if not characteristic of Messianic Judaism; my inner William Tyndale balks every time I read in an English Bible words like Ruach Elohim instead of “Holy Spirit”—or “Yeshua finished all his drash,” instead of “Jesus finished his sermon.”

Though I honor Abraham’s seed as, yes, God’s chosen people, God is not a respecter of languages. Hebrew transliterations are not holier or more accurate than English renderings. They’re nifty, but they don’t merit the creation of a fresh Bible translation.

The more Christian groups with “their own Bible,” the more it looks to outsiders like some funny business is going on.

Perhaps it’s a little self-aggrandizing or grandiose for the ESV or CSB or NASB or NRSV to put “Standard” in the names of their Bible translations, but there’s some good in this common practice: I read it as an attempt to acknowledge that the Bible is for the whole church—the whole world. The more Christian groups get to have “their own Bible,” the more it looks to outsiders like some funny business is going on.

Also: sprinkling Hebrew words that English speakers don’t know throughout your Bible translation (or Christian-synagogue service) runs counter to Paul’s principle that edification requires intelligibility. This raises the question: intelligible to whom? Not just those who’ve picked up the patois. At 1 Corinthians 14:23, the TLV itself reads,

If Messiah’s whole community comes together and everyone speaks in tongues, and uninstructed or unbelieving people come in, won’t they say that you are crazy?

The more jargon the man on the street has to master before he can understand what you’re saying in your services, the more in tension you are with 1 Corinthians 14.

The TLV preface says that it was born out of a fear of seeing the Bible lose its “actual Jewish essence.” I don’t at all deny that that the Bible’s Jewishness gets overlooked or even self-consciously muted by Gentiles. I welcome better understanding of my own wife’s Lithuanian-Jewish roots. And I’ve heard a very responsible and intelligent, ethnically Jewish Presbyterian pastor make a careful case that Protestant Gentiles have something to learn from the Messianic Jewish movement. Also, I found it thought-provoking to see Torah in the place of “the law” at places in the New Testament.

But replacing the perfectly legitimate English rendering “slander” (in 1 Pet. 2:1) with the opaque Hebrew transliteration “lashon ha-ra” (Hebrew for “tongue of evil”) is, I’m sorry, a rather arbitrary and linguistically suspect way of restoring people’s appreciation of the Bible’s Jewishness. The uniqueness of Judaism in its own original context was that its God, Yahweh, wasn’t just the God of the valleys or of the hills but of all the earth. And the founding promises to Abraham include precisely a prediction that through his seed, God will bless all the families of the earth. God’s own lashon is not shackled to ancient Hebrew.

The TLV is produced by the Tree of Life Bible Society for Messianic Jewish. Source

I’m not persuaded, either, by the TLV’s practice of replacing “Lord” in the New Testament with “ADONAI.” I understand the reasoning: it’s analogous to what ancient Jews apparently did with Yahweh.⁷ But if Jesus himself was happy to translate both adonai and Yahweh with the Greek kurios (Lord) in his discussion of the all-important Messianic passage Psalm 110:1,⁸ then I tend to feel safest retaining the English word “Lord” in the New Testament. And to any of the multiple translations in this article that give special focus and attention to getting the name of God just right, I observe that God himself permitted the correct pronunciation of his name (possibly “Yahweh”) to fall out of Jewish tradition—a difficult feat among that heavily traditional people, I tend to think.

Illustration by David Fassett
How Was the Pronunciation of God’s Name Lost? Part 2
Ancient tradition divides on the use of God’s name, with no clear reason why some banned it.
Andrew Case

As with names, so with languages. It is a very, very common thing in religion for people to invest a particular human language with divine sanctity and authority—and then with a depth and accuracy that no other language can match. Roman Catholics do this with Latin; Muslims do it with (a particular variety of) Arabic; Ethiopians do it with Geʽez; KJV-Onlyists do it with Elizabethan English. Messianic Jews have, I allege, done this with Hebrew.

Again: I’m not saying that the TLV is a “bad Bible,” as in erroneous or dangerous. From what I’ve read, it’s mostly a traditional Protestant translation with a bunch of Hebrew transliterations bobbing up and down on the surface. But I will say that the effort falls completely flat for me. If you have to resort to translating the Greek New Testament back into Hebrew every so often to get people to see its Jewishness, I think you’re taking a superficial, sectarian shortcut that actually undercuts your purpose.

The solution to sectarianism

I do think Bible translations need to do what they can to avoid the appearance of sectarianism. My own beloved ESV has been charged with sectarianism on behalf of the translators’ complementarian viewpoint. Though I think this criticism is overblown, sticking with the literal/traditional translation in Genesis 3:16 probably could have saved them significant grief. In general, retreating to the literal in sticky places is a wise policy.

And here’s another: I like the tradition, going back at least to the NIV, of involving many Christian denominations—from complementarians to Messianic Jews—in a Bible translation committee, as a method of both eliminating and of appearing to the public to eliminate denominational bias. I acknowledge at this point my own (inerrantist evangelical) biases, and my own fallenness and finiteness and situatedness. But I cannot sit nowhere, or in heaven; so from where I sit, some Bibles are, at least sometimes, sectarian. I’m okay checking such Bibles in my study, but I wouldn’t use them as the official translation of a church or other institution.

In our balkanized Christian world, no English translation will ever be trusted by the whole English-speaking church. But translators (or rather revisers, because we don’t need any more mainstream translations) should still aim for that possibility instead of giving in to the temptations of sectarianism.

The next essay will cover a second mark of bad translation that I call crackpottery. You can watch this as a video.

Notes

1
I say this despite the now twenty-year-old book by Jason BeDuhn, Truth in Translation: Accuracy and Bias in English Translations of the New Testament. (Lanham, MD: University Press of America, 2003). See Robert H. Countess, The Jehovah’s Witnesses’ New Testament. A Critical Analysis of the New World Translation of the Christian Greek Scriptures (Phillipsburg, NJ: Presbyterian and Reformed, 1982).
2
See Kenneth J. Baumgarten and Kevin Gary Smith, “An Examination of the Consistency of the New World Translation with the Stated Philosophy of the Translators,”Conspectus Volume 6 (2008).
3
See N. E. Barry Hofstetter, “Review of Truth in Translation: Accuracy and Bias in English Translations of the New Testament by Jason BeDuhn,” Westminster Theological Journal 66, no. 2 (2004): 448.
4
David Norton, ed., The New Cambridge Paragraph Bible with the Apocrypha: King James Version, Revised edition., vol. 1 (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2011), xxviii.
5
One KJV-Only Facebook commenter, for example, recently insisted that English Bibles must “retain the distinction between singular and plural second person pronouns”; if they don’t, “that’s a deal killer for me.” Never mind that many other grammatical features—such as the distinction between singular and plural relative pronouns—are “lost” on the trip from Greek to English. Actually: context is nearly always sufficient to communicate this distinction.
6
For this back-translation and all examples in this section, I am indebted to linguist Mike Tisdell. His review of La Bible en arabe tchadien contains more detailed examples.
7
Though actually, the linguistic situation that obtained then is not at all the one that exists in English. Ancient Jews replaced the vowels for YHWH with those of adonai; the way to do this in English would actually be something like Larsder—figure that one out and be the first to email me, and you’ll get a prize.
8
See Luke 20:42, for example. Even if Jesus was not speaking Greek when he uttered those words, the inspired (Greek) text given to us is an authoritative translation of his words.

Providence and Preservation

The different methods and modes of divine providence help us better understand God’s role in the Bible’s preservation.

Richard Brash

Christians believe that all Scripture is inspired by God (2 Tim. 3:16). But what has God done to preserve his written word? In particular, what is the relationship between God’s work of preservation and the work of sometimes sleepy scribes, whose pens might slip, and whose parchments might disintegrate? The concept of “providence” can help us here. What does it mean to say that God has preserved the text of Scripture “providentially”? And what degree of textual preservation does a biblical assessment of the work of providence give us reason to expect?

What is providence and how does it work?

“Providence” is not itself a word found in the Bible. But it is a theological term that sums up Scripture’s teaching about one particular work of God. This work includes the biblical concepts of God’s purpose (prothesis, πρόθεσις), foreknowledge (prognōsis, πρόγνωσις), and predestination (proorismos, προορισμός). The word “providence” itself (which has the etymology of pre-seeing) is sometimes linked to the introduction of God as “Jehovah Jireh” or “the Lord who sees/provides” in Genesis 22:14.

The thirteenth-century theologian Thomas Aquinas defined providence as God’s ordering of all things towards their end. He further distinguished two parts to this “ordering”: (1) God’s eternal arrangement of all things, and (2) his temporal execution of that order by means of his government of the universe (Summa Theologica, I.22.1). After the Reformation, many Protestant theologians basically accepted Aquinas’s definition, commonly discerning three elements of God’s work of providence in the world: preservation, concurrence (i.e., co-operation with secondary causes), and government. It’s important to notice that providence encompasses all things: in the most basic sense, if something is (or happens), it is (or happens) providentially.

Two methods of providence

Can we be any more specific? Here we may introduce two useful distinctions, which are frequently misunderstood or confused. Theologians distinguish first between “ordinary” and “extraordinary” providence. This distinction is about the method of providence. “Ordinary” providence perhaps sounds boring, but it doesn’t necessarily indicate something humdrum: the term comes from the Latin ordinarius, which means “according to rule.” In this case the “rule” is God’s own, which we find established in the divinely given laws of nature. In his ordinary providence God works through and according to creaturely means. For example, your birth was hardly a boring or everyday event, but it was very much part of ordinary providence.

Your birth was hardly a boring or everyday event, but it was very much part of ordinary providence.

Extraordinary providence, on the other hand, is outside, above, or against regular, creaturely means. We see this in the biblical miracles. When Jesus walks on water, that is outside or beyond God’s normal way of ruling over the physics of water. The really key thing to remember is that, whether God’s providence is ordinary or extraordinary, it does not change the fact that God is always working, and his work is always praiseworthy. All God’s works praise him, and should lead us to bless his name (Ps. 145:10).

Two modes of providence

A second distinction (found, for example, in the Westminster Confession of Faith, 5:7) is sometimes made between “general” and “special” providence. This distinction is about the mode or object of providence. General providence is about God’s work with respect to all things. Special providence, on the other hand, is particularly applied to God’s care for his church. By extension, it could reasonably apply to God’s particular plan and purposes for the lives of individual believers. When Christians say, “That was providential!” we are often referring to God’s special providence.

Two important points need to be made about these distinctions before we consider how they might apply to the text of Scripture.

First, we must be careful not to confuse these categories, as the mode does not in itself determine whether or not God makes use of means. “Ordinary” providence is not necessarily “general” providence, just as “extraordinary” providence is not necessarily “special” providence. One way to see this is to closely compare Psalm 104 with Psalm 105. If Psalm 104 is a psalm about general providence (“preservation” of the world), Psalm 105 focuses on special providence (“preservation” of God’s people). Yet both psalms are full of examples of both ordinary and extraordinary providence. Whether by miracle or by various “means,” both psalms celebrate the wonderful works of God!

Second, the Bible gives us cause to be cautious about determining exactly where special providence is operative and what it should look like. It is often a good deal messier than we might prefer: look at the history of God’s people! Believers are encouraged to acquiesce—and even to rejoice—in God’s loving working of all things for our good (Rom. 8:28), rather than to presume access to the divine counsel in respect of the details, many of which are hidden from us (Deut. 29:29). This explains why our judgments about precisely how God is at work can be quite wrong. We simply don’t share God’s view of all things to know how he is working in the midst of so many details.

What has all this got to do with the preservation of the Bible? I suggest that there are indications in Scripture itself that God has preserved the text of the Bible according to his ordinary providence, in a combination of special and general modes. This indicates a more complex picture of providential preservation than is sometimes allowed.

Providence and preservation

The Bible’s own teaching about God’s written revelation leads us to expect, at the very least, adequate or sufficient preservation of the autographic or original texts. Adequate to what? Here the answer depends on stated ends and purposes. Scripture is principally for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus (2 Tim. 3:15–17). It is inconceivable, on biblical presuppositions, that God would allow his written word to be so lost or corrupted that his saving purposes might fail. God’s providence ensures this.

But this is only a minimum. Other biblical evidence indicates that we should expect extremely accurate preservation of the text. (Etymologically, “accuracy” refers to the property of having been taken care of, in this case primarily by God himself.) The biblical writers, along with Jesus himself, cite copies of Scripture with the authority of the divine voice. Both testaments, in claiming the relevance of past written revelation for new generations, acknowledge the ongoing authority of Scripture as it is mediated through copies (Isa. 8:16; Rom. 15:4).

Since God’s word “stands forever” (Isa. 40:8; 1 Pet. 1:25) we should expect his canonical, written word also to be preserved for us. In a famous passage, Jesus teaches that “until heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot, will pass from the Law until all is accomplished” (Matt. 5:18). This likely points to the work of special providence. However, the verse does not tell us exactly where the words of the Law are to be found, nor does it promise perfect and immediate access to those words for every believer. How, then, is providential preservation achieved?

First, let’s consider the category of extraordinary providence, or miracle. At various times in church history, it has been popular to apply this category to the preservation of the biblical text, as I describe in chapter two of my book on preservation. It is not a priori impossible that God should have used miracles to preserve his written word. But the Bible does not give us any examples of miraculous preservation or copying of texts, except perhaps Exodus 34:1. Rather, the few biblical references to making copies of texts (such as Deut. 17:18 and Jer. 36:32) seem to indicate the meticulous but still mundane process of transcribing by ordinary means.

Preservation as a work of ordinary providence implies that scribal error or willful corruption of the text are realities. The real possibility of deliberate changes to the text explains the need for biblical warnings not to add to or subtract from the word (Deut. 4:2; Rev. 22:18–19), just as reference to “the lying pen of the scribes” (Jer. 8:8) indicates that some copyists felt free to corrupt the written word to their own advantage, even during the Old Testament period. Jesus’ correction of the faulty assumptions contained in the text of the Samaritan Pentateuch is another biblical example of deliberate textual changes being implicitly recognized and criticized (John 4:20–22). It is likely that one reason why the Levitical priests were to be on hand while Israel’s kings copied the law was to prevent either deliberate changes or errors in copying. The biblical evidence thus suggests that accurate copies of Scripture are to be distinguished from inaccurate ones.

Recognizing providence

But how is this identification to be made, and by whom? At this point, the distinction between general and special providence becomes helpful. From Scripture itself, we can acknowledge clear examples of special (albeit ordinary) providence at work in the preservation of the biblical text. The involvement of the priests in approving copies (mentioned above) is one. Another is the divinely ordained requirement to keep the Book of the Law by the ark of the covenant in the tabernacle (Deut. 31:26). In much of the Old Testament period, then, we find providential preservation of Scripture closely tied to God’s providential preservation and government of his people and their ordained leadership. This is akin to special providence.

It is unwise to tether our doctrine of providential preservation to a particular “approved” manuscript or manuscript tradition.

In the New Testament era, the picture is more complicated. The church is called to be “a pillar and buttress of the truth” (1 Tim. 3:15) and part of this calling is surely to take care of the text of the Bible. God’s providential preservation of his people is still tied closely to the providential preservation of his written word. It is therefore reasonable to identify the process of canonization as an instance of special providence. But just as it can be spiritually dangerous to attempt to define the precise contours of special providence in our own lives, or even with respect to the preservation of the church, it is unwise to tether our doctrine of providential preservation to a particular “approved” manuscript or manuscript tradition. The Bible does not give the church today the authority to do this.

We cannot always tell where general providence ends and special providence begins, and this is all the more true outside the church. Unbelieving Jewish scholars helped preserve the Old Testament text for some centuries after Christ, and God certainly used their work. We therefore have no reason to exclude the work of general providence in the copying of, preservation of, and even discernment between, the manuscripts that lie behind our translated Bibles today.

Conclusion

In conclusion, God has preserved his written word by his singular care and providence, with great accuracy and in great purity. Despite its complexities, preservation by ordinary providence in both special and general modes (though we cannot always discern the difference between these two) seems to be the best theological account of providential preservation based on the biblical data.

The Jefferson Bible and the Faith of an American Founder

Thomas Jefferson’s cut-and-paste version of the Gospels reveals important facets of the famous founder’s faith and the Bible’s role in American history.

Thomas S. Kidd

The “Jefferson Bible” is arguably the most controversial religious text in American history. Perhaps the other most obvious contender is Joseph Smith’s Book of Mormon. But while the Book of Mormon has become one of the most printed and widely distributed books in world history, Thomas Jefferson never published his Bible in his lifetime. Indeed, the Jefferson Bible never got published at all during the 1800s, despite publishers’ offers to do so. Congress finally produced an edition of it in 1904, after the Smithsonian obtained the compilation from a Jefferson descendant. In 2011, the National Museum of American History restored the fragile text, allowing for its long-term preservation and the production of a new, beautiful facsimile edition.

The Origins of Jefferson’s Bible

What we call the Jefferson Bible is Jefferson’s cut-and-paste edition of extracts from the Gospels. Partisans cannot agree what Jefferson’s intentions for the Bible were, however. Secular devotees of Jefferson see the Jefferson Bible as the epitome of his skeptical religious views. Some Christian admirers of Jefferson have argued, conversely, that the text reveals Jefferson as a Christian, albeit an enigmatic one. Such Christians say that the text was actually a simplified version of the Gospels, one intended for education or evangelism of people unfamiliar with the Bible, especially the “Indians.”

The four-columned, cut-and-paste Jefferson Bible after recent preservation work. Image credit

The “Indians” were explicitly named as the audience for the first version of the Jefferson Bible, which the president produced in 1804. Unfortunately, the text of that first edition was lost, but the title page survived. He called this “wee little book” The Philosophy of Jesus of Nazareth … Being an abridgement of the New Testament for the use of the Indians. Scholars have debated whether “Indians” literally referred to Native Americans, or perhaps to Jefferson’s Christian enemies in the Federalist Party, who reviled him as a heretic and closet atheist. Whatever Jefferson meant, he explained later to John Adams that he composed the first Bible for his “own use.” Like the second edition, the first apparently contained a distillation of Jesus’ moral and ethical teachings. Unlike the second version, however, the first run at his Gospels compilation was only in English. The second was a polyglot edition, with side-by-side passages in English, French, Greek, and Latin.

The fact that Jefferson was capable of compiling the Gospels in four languages testifies to the man’s enormous intellectual accomplishments.

The fact that Jefferson was capable of compiling the Gospels in four languages testifies to the man’s enormous intellectual accomplishments, including in his studies of the Bible and biblical languages. Jefferson seems to have read the Bible regularly, including the Greek New Testament, and the Septuagint, or the ancient Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible. Other prominent founders, including James Madison and John Adams, could also read Hebrew, but Jefferson never learned that biblical language. Indeed, Jefferson got irritated at Adams for suggesting that a truly educated man needed to be able to read both the Old and New Testaments in the original languages. In any case, Jefferson’s deep perusal of the Scriptures and his large collection of Bibles (some of which he dismantled to use in the compilations) could easily give a Christian observer the idea that the man was a devout Christian.

Diamonds in a Dunghill

Over his life, Jefferson did develop increasing reverence for Jesus’ ethical teachings. A close look at the Jefferson Bible reveals that it was a fundamentally skeptical project, however, when viewed from a traditional Christian perspective. Most notoriously, Jefferson literally used scissors to cut out sections of the Gospels that he pasted into his compilation. Thus, it was not so much that Jefferson cut out miracles in the Gospels, but that he left them behind, as tattered remnants in the New Testaments he mined for Jesus’ ethical principles. Why would Jefferson do this? Because, as an early advocate of what became known as “higher criticism” of the Bible, Jefferson regarded much of the New Testament as mythology. The stories of Jesus’ wonder-working powers were largely crafted and imposed on the man by misguided followers after his death. Jefferson saw Jesus’ ethics as the philosophical treasure of the Bible. But getting at that treasure was like picking out “diamonds in a dunghill,” he wrote. Jesus’ morals were the diamonds; the rest of the Bible was a veritable dunghill.

One of two English source copies used by Jefferson to make his Bible. Image source

Jefferson called the second volume, which he completed in 1820, “The Life and Morals of Jesus of Nazareth.” The 84-page book focused primarily on Jesus’ teachings, parables, and some episodes from his life and ministry. It is tempting to characterize the Jefferson Bible as the Gospels without miracles. Most notably, Jefferson’s Gospel narrative ends with Jesus’ burial, and includes no resurrection. To traditional Christians of any denomination, it would be impossible to accept a version of the Gospels that does not include the empty tomb. Christians therefore should be hesitant to go along with some evangelical popularizers’ efforts to cast the Jefferson Bible as being within the bounds of historic orthodoxy.

Neither is the Jefferson Bible as naturalistic as some secular observers would suggest, however. There are miracles in the Jefferson Bible, or at least references to supernatural events. There are also suggestions that Jesus operated under divine inspiration. Jefferson’s Jesus has foreknowledge of the future, and the Jefferson Bible includes references to hell, the end times, the Second Coming, and the general resurrection of mankind. So Jefferson was not as rigorous about excising all supernatural content from the Gospels as a casual observer might assume. Why Jefferson left such supernatural references in the compilation is uncertain. He never exactly explained his rationale for what got included, and what got cut.

Principles of Production

The beginning pages of the Jefferson Bible suggest how he proceeded, however. Jefferson skipped over the account of the angel Gabriel’s appearance to Mary in Luke 1, and went straight to Luke 2:1: “And it came to pass in those days, that there went out a decree from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be taxed.” Jefferson included historical material about Jesus’ life, but he tended not to include passages where supernatural beings or miracles were driving the narrative. Thus, he stopped at Luke 2:7, with the baby Jesus being laid in a manger, and skipped the angels appearing to the shepherds and declaring “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.” He picked up again at Luke 2:21a, Jesus’ circumcision, but he excised the note in 2:21b that the child was called Jesus, “so named of the angel before he was conceived in the womb.”

But Jefferson didn’t always follow his angel’s rule, either. He included Jesus’ remarkable prediction in Matthew 13:41–42 that “the Son of man shall send forth his angels, and they shall gather out of his kingdom all things that offend, and them which do iniquity; and shall cast them into a furnace of fire: there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth.” Here we have references both to angels and to a fiery judgment in hell. This is exactly the sort of stuff you would think Jefferson wouldn’t put in his Bible. But this passage apparently “made the cut” (pun intended) because it was part of Jesus’ interpretation of a parable. Jefferson liked the parables, so he sometimes included supernatural references if they were part of those teachings. Jefferson perhaps did not obsess over the exclusion of supernatural happenings as much as we might expect. The biblical text is obviously interwoven with miraculous claims and accounts, so he may not have found it easy to be entirely naturalistic in his selections.

Whatever his rationale for the selections, Jefferson was an early example of a long tradition in elite studies of the Bible: judging Scripture’s authenticity by one’s own standards of reason. Most of the secular and liberal academic study of the Scriptures assumes that the Bible contains some content that was added by later authors or transcribers. Some of the Bible’s contents could be historically reliable, such critics reckon, but other parts were tacked on for ideological or polemical purposes or to enhance Jesus’ messianic claims. To discover the “historical Jesus,” one must dispense with the accretions and identify the more “authentic” content. This type of higher critical approach reached its apex in the oft-lampooned “Jesus Seminar” of the 1980s and ’90s. This meeting of prestigious higher critical scholars famously voted on the authenticity of Gospel passages by using colored beads to indicate their confidence in the authenticity of individual verses.

A Sect unto Himself

The problem with such approaches is that the Jesus who emerges after the requisite excisions tends to look like the critic’s “Personal Jesus,” as a 1989 Depeche Mode song put it. If you want a hippie Jesus, you get one. If you want a non-divine Jesus (as Jefferson wished), you get one. Once you assume that parts of Scripture are erroneous, unreliable, or ahistorical, your decisions about what should “stay in” tend to become fatally subjective.

Once you assume that parts of Scripture are erroneous, unreliable, or ahistorical, your decisions about what should “stay in” tend to become fatally subjective.

Of course, even biblical inerrantists are tempted to emphasize certain parts of Scripture over others. But while lots of people have implicitly cut out sections of Scripture they don’t like, Jefferson literally did so. Doing this could not produce anything but a radically individualized, cut-and-paste version of Christianity. Jefferson admitted as much in 1819, while he was beginning to compose the Jefferson Bible. He told a correspondent that year “I am of a sect by myself, as far as I know.” To Jefferson, being a sect by yourself was a good thing. But such radical individual judgment of the text certainly doesn’t foster confidence in the Bible’s plenary inspiration. No matter how you “cut it,” there’s no doubt that the Jefferson Bible was an attack on the reliability of Scripture.

Part 5: The Servant Who Sees Light after Anguish

Some ancient manuscripts of Isaiah 53:11 say the servant sees light after his suffering. Does this predict Jesus’ resurrection?

Anthony Ferguson

During Holy Week, Christians often turn their attention to the servant songs of Isaiah, and to Isaiah 53 in particular, because these passages depict the work of God’s salvation through a coming servant, a servant the New Testament writers identify as none other than Jesus (1 Pet. 2:22; Luke 22:37). In this series, we have reflected on several textual issues related to the servant’s identity and work.

As today is Easter Sunday, we turn our attention to the beginning of Isaiah 53:11 to ask whether Isaiah’s prophecy includes not only the servant’s death, but also his resurrection. A quick survey of a few of our English Bibles illustrates the nature of this textual problem and highlights the issue of what the servant sees.

ESV         Out of the anguish of his soul he shall see and be satisfied
NASB     As a result of the anguish of His soul, He will see it and be satisfied.
CSB         After his anguish, he will see light and be satisfied.
NIV         After he has suffered, he will see the light of life and be satisfied;

These four English translations take a slightly different approach to identifying what the servant sees. They range from an unidentified object to a specific object. On the one side, the ESV does not specify what the servant sees. The NASB identifies the object imprecisely as simply it.The CSB is more specific by describing the servant as seeing “light.” Finally, on the opposite side of the continuum, the NIV not only identifies the servant as seeing light but as seeing the “light of life.”

Witnesses

The difference between our English Bibles at the beginning of Isaiah 53:11 illustrates for us an ancient variant that scribes and Bible translators have considered for at least two thousand years. Here is a survey of how Hebrew, Greek, Latin, Aramaic, and Syriac scribes have approached this variant.

Reading	Witness	Text
1. He shall see	MT	From the anguish of his soul, he shall see; he shall be satisfied מֵעֲמַל נַפְשׁוֹ יִרְאֶה יִשְׂבָּע
	Theodotion, Aquila	he shall see; he shall be filled ὄψεται ἐμπλησθήσεται
	Symmachus	he shall see; he shall be filled ὄψεται χορτασθήσεται
	Vulgate	Because his soul labored, he shall see and he shall be satisfied pro eo quod laboravit anima eius videbit et saturabitur
	Targum	He will deliver their soul from the servitude of the nations. They will look on the vengeance of their enemies. They will be satisfied with the plunder of their kings. מִשִׁעבוּד עַמְמַיָא יְשֵׁיזֵיב נַפשְׁהוֹן יִחזוֹן בְפוֹרעָנוּת סָנְאֵיהוֹן יִסבְעוּן מִבִזַת מַלכֵיהוֹן
	Peshitta	And from the labor of his soul, he shall see and he shall be satisfied ܘܡܢ ܥܡܠܐ ܕܢܦܫܗ ܢܚܙܐ܂ ܘܢܣܒܥ
2. He shall see light	1QIsa^a	From the anguish of his soul, he shall see light and he shall be satisfied מעמל נפשוה יראה אור וישבע
	1QIsa^b	From the anguish of his soul, he shall see light; he shall be s[atisfied מעמל נפשו יראה אור יש֯[בע
	4QIsa^d	From the anguish of his soul, he shall see l[ight] and be satisfied מעמל נפׄשו יראה או֯[ר ]וׄשבע֯
	LXX	From the pain of his soul to show him light and to form ἀπὸ τοῦ πόνου τῆς ψυχῆς αὐτοῦ, δεῖξαι αὐτῷ φῶς καὶ πλάσαι

A survey of witnesses to Isaiah 53:11

Although we could discuss multiple textual issues here, we will focus on the problem of what the servant sees. These ancient translations provide us with two basic options.

“He will see” MT, Theodotion, Aquila, Symmachus, Vulgate, Targum, Peshitta
“He will see light” 1QIsa^a, 1QIsa^b, and 4QIsa^d, LXX

External Evidence

The first reading is widespread, occurring in Hebrew, Greek, Latin, and Syriac texts. Moreover, it is early since Aquila dates to the second century AD, and Theodotion probably dates to the first century. Despite these facts, it is not surprising that these texts agree with the Masoretic Text (MT) since they were all translated from a text very close to the MT. The Targum interprets an MT like text by adding the phrase “on the vengeance of their enemies, showing the textual difficulty in this verse.

The second reading is also widespread, occurring in the Dead Sea Scrolls and the Hebrew parent text of the LXX. It is even earlier than the first reading since the Great Isaiah Scroll (1QIsa^a) dates to the second century BC. 1QIsa^a is, in fact, our oldest biblical manuscript preserving this verse, and it reads “light.” Unlike the first reading, the external evidence for this second reading can be described as “surprising” since three Isaiah manuscripts from Qumran attest it. Most surprising of all is the testimony of 1QIsa^b, a first-century BC manuscript, that usually reads very closely with the MT. Here, however, it agrees with the LXX and two other Dead Sea Scrolls against the MT.

Overall, the external evidence favors the second reading: the servant sees “light.” Now, we turn to the internal evidence.

Internal Evidence

When considering internal evidence, we are asking the following questions: which reading was more likely to derive from a scribe, and which reading was more likely to derive from the author? We can answer these questions by comparing the reading of 1QIsa^b and the reading of the MT.¹ The use of the Masoretic vowel signs didn’t develop until the fifth through seventh centuries so we will only compare the consonants.

MT מעמל נפשו יראה ישבע
From the anguish of his soul, he shall see; he shall be satisfied

1QIsa^b מעמל נפשו יראה אור יש֯[בע
From the anguish of his soul, he shall see light; he shall be satisfied

Could the MT have lost the word “light” (אור)?

First, let’s consider if the MT lost this word by scribal error. Scribes, at times, omitted text when their eyes skipped over words. This is known as parablepsis (lit. “to look beside”). Parablepsis can be caused when words start with the same letters (homoioarcton) or when they end with them (homoioteleuton). These are not uncommon scribal errors. Yet, when we compare the reading of the MT with the reading of 1QIsa^b, parablepsis is not a likely explanation. Notice how the words אור (ʾôr) and ישבע (yiśbāʿ) do not begin with the same letter, ruling out homoioarcton. Likewise, יראה (yirʾeh) and אור (ʾôr) do not end with the same letter, ruling out homoioteleuton. Thus, the scribe of the MT likely did not commit parablepsis. If this was a scribal error, the error was simply a “random omission.”²

What about an intentional omission? At times, scribes could intentionally omit words for the sake of clarity. But this cause, in my experience, is rare. Moreover, the immediate context of the MT does not provide a basis for omitting this word. That is, the effect of omitting this word does not achieve any apparent goal like providing greater clarity; if anything, it makes it less clear. This explanation seems unlikely.

Could the other witnesses have added “light” (אור)? First, could the word have been added through scribal error? At times, scribes accidentally add words. Reasons for adding content include errors such as dittography (a scribe writes a word twice instead of once), but the letters of the word “light” are not written twice so that explanation does not account for the data. In other instances, scribes may incorporate marginal readings into the text, but there is no evidence for that happening here. It is improbable that the other witnesses added this word by accident.

Second, could the other texts have added this word intentionally? This explanation is possible since the verb “to see” (ראה) often takes an object. People see “something” or “someone.” Even though this verb often takes objects, objects are not always specified.³ It is possible that the lack of an object led a subsequent scribe to add an object. Although this is possible, several witnesses have this object. How did this reading become so widespread if it was a scribal addition?⁴

To See Light or Not?

Finally, we should ask what’s at stake. What would it mean for the servant to “see light” here? There are two idiomatic phrases in Hebrew that are especially relevant. First, the phrase “see light” (יראה אור) is an idiom for describing life while the phrase “not seeing light” is an idiom of death.⁵ Job 33:28 and 30, for example, describe life—resurrected life—as “seeing light.” Moreover, in Psalm 36:9, “seeing light” is associated with the “fountain of life” which is the opposite of death according to Proverbs 13:14 and 14:27. Furthermore, death is described in Job 3:16 and Psalm 49:19 as “not seeing light.” Second, a related Hebrew idiom means “to regain strength” (תארנה עינים).⁶ This idiom is used by Jonathan to describe the effect of honey. Although famished and weak, the taste of honey caused his eyes to be bright (1 Sam. 14:27, 29).⁷ Overall, the idea of “seeing light” describes life. And not just any life, but specifically the revival of life or resurrected life.

Isaiah describes the servant as smitten, afflicted, pierced, crushed, and oppressed. He is described as a lamb led to the slaughter. The climax of this suffering is none other than his death (Isa. 53:8) and being buried (Isa. 53:9); yet, out of this anguish, the servant “sees light” and is satisfied (Isa. 53:11). The reading of 1QIsa^a, 1QIsa^b, 4QIsa^d, and the Hebrew parent text of the LXX describes the servant’s death and resurrection idiomatically as “seeing light.” Thus, what’s at stake, is nothing short of the servant’s resurrection after death.

The question remains: which reading is more original? The two (opposing) explanations with the best support are that:

the reading “light” was lost due to a scribal error
the reading was added for the sake of clarity

Among these options, my conclusion is that the more original reading is likely “he shall see light” because it is more likely that the small word “light” was lost in the MT tradition because of scribal error rather than the reading being a secondary addition preserved in three early Hebrew manuscripts from Qumran and the LXX. The fact that the reading “light” appears in 1QIsa^b is especially important since this text aligns closely with the MT tradition but disagrees here.

Conclusion

The textual problem in this text concerns the resurrection, a matter of first importance for the gospel according to Paul. He says this happened according to the Scriptures (1 Cor. 15:3–6). Without the resurrection, humanity is still lost and under the curse of sin. Without the resurrection, we stand before God still under our first father, Adam. The servant, however, as a new Adam, rewrites our past and gives us a new history through his resurrection.

The servant, as a new Adam, rewrites our past and gives us a new history through his resurrection.

This idea is taught in Isaiah 53 since the servant is “cut off from the land of the living”—an idiom for the curse and spiritual death (Isa. 53:8). Remarkably, Isaiah’s servant receives the covenantal blessings of an inheritance (Isa. 53:12) and, despite dying, he “shall see light” (Isa. 53:11). The dead can see light, and this is our hope for this Easter season. He is risen!

Notes

1
Although 1QIsa^a is older than 1QIsa^b, we will compare the MT to 1QIsa^b because this is the only difference between these texts. 1QIsa^a has other minor differences when compared to the MT.
2
Tov uses this language to describe this error in TCHB, 221.
3
See DCH, s.v. ראה.
4
See Dominique Barthelemy Studies in the Text of the Old Testament: An Introduction to the Hebrew Old Testament Text Project, Textual Criticism and the Translator 3 (Winona Lake: Eisenbrauns, 2012), 399.
5
John Meade mentioned this connection to me in a private conversation.
6
See DCH, s.v. אור.
7
Moreover, in Ben Sira 13:26, the author describes the happy heart as a “bright countenance” פנים אורים.

Part 4: Who Does the Servant Intercede For?

The servant is identified with the many rebels and yet distinct enough from them in order to carry their sins.

John D. Meade

With this next problem in Isaiah 53, we come to a couple of textual problems that again touch on the servant’s vicarious death for the many. The problems in the prologue (52:14–15) showed us a servant who is an anointed high priest above others (rather than a disfigured person) and who sprinkles many nations. In 53:8–9, Isaiah describes the servant as one stricken to death and then subsequently assigned a tomb with a rich man.

The NIV is representative of our English translations for the final two lines of Isaiah 53:12:

For he bore the sin of many,
and made intercession for the transgressors.

Is this the correct text and translation?

In what follows, we (1) give the manuscript evidence for the word “sin” in the first line and for the phrase “for the transgressors” in the last; (2) summarize the readings and make some observations about them; (3) treat the difficulty in our received Hebrew text or the Masoretic Text; and (4) conclude with my preferred translation and a few points on the relevance of the reading.

Witnesses

Here, we will list all the witnesses in original language and English translation. The textual problem is indicated in each witness by the use of italics so that one can see the different readings most clearly.¹

Reading	Witness	Text
sin; rebels	MT	yet he bore the sin of many and he intercedes for the rebels (?) וְהוּא חֵטְא רַבִּים נָשָׂא וְלַפֹּשְׁעִים יַפְגִּיעַ
	Latin Vulgate	and he carried the sin of the many and interceded for the transgressors et ipse peccatum multorum tulit et pro transgressoribus rogavit
sins; rebellions	1QIsa^a	yet he bore the sins of many and at their rebellions he intervenes והואה חטאי רבים נשׂא ולפשׁעיהמה יפגע
	1QIsa^b	yet] he bore the sins of many and at their rebellions he intervenes והוא חטא]י רבים נשׂא ולפשׁעיהם יפגיע
	4QIsa^d	yet he bore the sins of many and at their rebellions [he intervenes] והוא חטאי רבים נשׂא ולפשׁעיה[ם יפגיע
	LXX	and he bore the sins of many and due to their sins he was handed over καὶ αὐτὸς ἁμαρτίας πολλῶν ἀνήνεγκε καὶ διὰ τὰς ἁμαρτίας αὐτῶν παρεδόθη
sins; rebels	Theodotion	… and he will torture the wicked ones … et impios torquebit
	Aquila	… and he will resist those mocking him … occurret irridentibus eum
	Symmachus	and he took the sins of the many upon himself and he stood against the traitors αὐτὸς δὲ ἁμαρτίας πολλῶν ἀνέλαβε καὶ τοῖς ἀθετοῦσιν ἀντέστη
	Syriac Peshitta	and he bore the sins of the many and he attacked the wicked ܘܗܘ ܚ̈ܛܗܐ ܕܣ̈ܓܝܐܐ ܫܩܠ ܘܒܥ̇ܘ̈ܠܐ ܦܓܥ
	Aramaic Targum	yet he will beseech concerning the sins of many, and to the rebels it shall be forgiven for him וְהוּא עַל חוֹבִין סַגִיאִין יִבעֵי וֻלמָרוֹדַיָא יִשׁתְבֵיק לֵיה

A survey of witnesses to Isaiah 53:12

Isaiah 53:12 in Codex Leningrad (1008 AD), 1QIsa^a (2nd c. BC), and Codex Sinaiticus (4th c. AD). Images from Sefaria, Wikipedia, Codex Sinaiticus

Observations

From these sources, we can discern two problems, one in each line of the verse.

Isaiah 53:12a

“he bore the sins of many” 1QIsa^a, 1QIsa^b, 4QIsa^d, LXX, Symmachus, Peshitta, Targum
“he bore the sin of many” MT, Vulgate

Isaiah 53:12b

“and at their rebellions he intervenes” 1QIsa^a, 1QIsa^b, 4QIsa^d, LXX
“and he intercedes for the rebels” MT, Theodotian, Aquila, Symmachus, Vulgate, Peshitta, Targum

What does the servant bear?

Regarding the first problem, the testimony for “sins” over “sin” is very strong. The difference between texts regards whether the single letter yod (י) is present or lacking. It’s a small letter and therefore could have easily dropped out accidentally. Another possible explanation is that the MT and Vulgate assimilated their texts to the singular “sin” already mentioned in the singular in 53:6 “iniquity” and 53:8 “transgression, rebellion.” In either case, the singular “sin” should be considered secondary, and we should choose the text containing the plural “sins” along with the best and majority of witnesses.

In the second problem, the reading “their rebellions” also enjoys the best external evidence. There is also a clear explanation for how the MT reads “transgressors”: the scribe assimilated his text here to the first instance of “transgressors” earlier in v. 12. In other words, the text containing “for the rebels” can best be explained as a secondary modification of the original “at their rebellions,” while the reverse is more difficult to explain.

In his analysis, Dominque Barthélemy wisely chose to handle the three textual problems in 53:11–12 together because 1QIsa^{a, b}, 4QIsa^d, all agree with LXX’s Hebrew text against the MT in these three well attested real variants among witnesses. Thus, for these verses, we are dealing with an ancient text type (attested by three Qumran texts and the Hebrew parent text of LXX) from which the MT is different in these three variants. Significantly, 1QIsa^b only contains notable variants to the MT in these verses and nowhere else. This gives us reason to suspect error in the internal transmission of the MT for these verses.² Therefore, the MT has probably suffered error in these three crucial places.

The external evidence for these two problems, as for the one in 53:11, is quite impressive, and we should choose its text. But what about the traditional reading of the MT: “and he will intercede for the transgressors”? We must say a word about the implausibility of this reading.

What does he intercede for?

Although most English translations have something like “he intercedes for (יַפְגִּיעַ ל) the transgressors,” this syntax is otherwise unattested in MT, and therefore this reading is uncertain. The Hebrew verb paga‘ means “to meet” “come upon” (cf. Exod. 23:4), often in either the sense of entreat (e.g., Gen 23:8) or encounter with hostility (e.g., Exod. 5:3). Thus, in the causative stem, the verb means “to cause x to come upon y” as it does in Isaiah 53:6: “and Yahweh caused the (הִפְגִּיעַ אֵת) iniquity … to come upon (ב) him.” In Jeremiah 36:25, three individuals make entreaty with (הִפְגִּעוּ ב) the king. In each of these cases, the Hebrew beth preposition marks the person with whom the entreaty is or upon whom something is coming. But in the MT of Isaiah 53:12, we encounter the lamed preposition governing a person (i.e. “transgressors”).³

Although our English translations interpret the syntax positively (“intercession for the benefit of the transgressors”), the Hebrew could be read negatively. In fact, very early Jewish translations of this text into Greek (Theodotion, Aquila, Symmachus) plainly render the proto-MT something like, “he will attack the rebels”; that is, he will encounter the wicked with hostility, describing the servant as defeating enemies. Given the MT’s syntax, both readings are possible. But in contrast to the ambiguity of the MT, the reading of the three Dead Sea Scrolls plus the LXX shows that only the servant could intervene at the rebellions of the many.

Based on the external evidence, there’s a more satisfactory solution for the ending of the song: he intervened at their rebellions. In Isaiah 59:16, another instance of our verb appears without any prepositional phrases: “then he [Yahweh] saw that there was no man and wondered that there was no one who intervened (מַפְגִּיעַ).” This usage is akin to the one in our verse, since its complement is now lamed + impersonal object. That is, the lamed preposition does not mark the relation of an event to a person but rather defines the situation or event at which the servant intervenes, i.e., at the rebellions of the many. Note the LXX’s translation “due to their sins” comes close to this meaning showing that the sins of the many are the cause or situation for the servant’s intervention.

The original text changes the way we analyze the grammar of this line. We should also note how the usage in Isaiah 59:16 increases the tension concerning who will intervene for the people. The text claims no man intervenes, but in Isaiah 53:12, the servant does intervene which increases curiosity over his identity.

Putting all this together, we should translate the line: “Yet he bore the sins of many and at their rebellions he intervenes.”

Why it matters

In Isaiah 53:10–12, the song focuses on the relationship between the one and the many. For example, at the end of v. 11, the one servant is described as “righteous,” and he thus declares the many righteous. The many share in the verdict of the one. Also, in the one’s victory, the many are given a portion and with the numerous the victory spoils are divided (cf. Isa. 53:12a). In 53:12b, the servant is numbered with the rebels, and in 53:12c, he intervenes at their rebellions.

The one servant is both identified with the many rebels and yet distinct enough from them in order to carry their sins and intervene at their rebellions. Only the king would be in solidarity with the nation’s plight and at the same time distinct from the nation to rescue it from it (cf. Isaiah 49:1–6 which already prepares the reader for this conclusion).

Only the king would be in solidarity with the nation’s plight and at the same time distinct from the nation to rescue it from it.

One last note on the readings of “sins” and “transgressions / rebellions” in this line. The New Testament authors in many places describe Jesus’ atoning death as “due to our trespasses” (e.g., Rom. 4:25) or “for our sins” (e.g., 1 Cor. 15:3; cf. 1 Pet. 2:24). The reading of Isaiah 53:12 proposed here is right in line with how the apostles interpreted the Messiah’s vicarious death “according to the Scriptures.”

Notes

1
For Theodotion, the reading is found in Armenian translation of a Greek work incorrectly attributed to Chrysostom but presented in Latin translation here. For Aquila, the reading is found in Armenian translation of a Greek work incorrectly attributed to Chrysostom but presented in Latin translation here. Theodoret cites Symmachus and follows with “and so also the Rest [of the translators];” that is, Aquila and Theodotion must have rendered the Hebrew similarly, but he does not give their exact readings.
2
Dominique Barthélemy, Critique Textuelle de l’Ancien Testament. 2. Isaïe, Jérémie, Lamentations, Orbis Biblicus et Orientalis 50/2 (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1986), 405; cf. also Jan de Waard, A Handbook on Isaiah (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 1997), 197–8.
3
Ernst Jenni, Die hebräischen Präpositionen. Band 3: Die Präposition Lamed (Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 2000), 122, suggests, “to minister to someone,” interpreting the lamed as indicating the relationship between the event of ministering and the entity of the transgressors. All the major Hebrew lexicons (e.g., BDB, HALOT, Gesenius; cf. פָּגַע Hi) render the lamed “for,” i.e., for the benefit of the transgressors.

Topics

Levels

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1. The Amplified Bible

2. את Cepher

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1. The New World Translation

2. The New Revised Standard Version (Updated Edition)

3. Certain Bible translations for Muslim nations

4. The Tree of Life Version

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The solution to sectarianism

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Two methods of providence

Two modes of providence

Providence and preservation

Recognizing providence

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The Origins of Jefferson’s Bible

Diamonds in a Dunghill

Principles of Production

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A Sect unto Himself

Witnesses

External Evidence

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Internal Evidence

To See Light or Not?

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What does the servant bear?

What does he intercede for?

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