HOW ACCURATE IS YOUR BIBLE TRANSLATION?: HEBREWS 12:18-19

 

Many Christians make a big deal out of their favorite translation being the most accurate, by which they often mean “the most literal.” Just to demonstrate that the most literal is not always the most reliable for an English reader, I chose a random example out of the New Testament – Hebrews 12:18-19. (I will do the same thing for an OT passage in another post.)

The first obvious step in a translation is to look at the Greek original of the text in order to have something to translate. I won't subject you to the actual passage in Greek, but here is the word-for-word “literal” translation based on the Textus Receptus (“received text”) of 1624 used as the basis for the King James Version.

“For not ye have come to being touched mount and having been kindled with fire, and to obscurity, and to darkness, and to tempest, and trumpet's to sound, and to voice of words; which they that heard excused themselves but to be addressed to them word.”

If that has too much obscurity for you, here is another literal translation, this time based on the revised Nestle's Greek text of 1904:

“For not ye have approached being felt and having been ignited with fire and to darkness and to deep gloom and to whirlwind and of trumpet to a sound and to a voice of words, which the hearing entreated not to be added to them a word.”

I am not sure that this rendering is any more understandable than the first. So right off the bat, we must all admit that the Greek language does not lend itself to be easily rendered “literally” into English. That fact will not be surprising to any of you who have mastered a second language, whatever that language might be. Word order and grammatical rules are quite different in each language. So it takes a real knowledge of Greek to be able to attempt an accurate translation of the NT into English.

There is a second thing to point out after comparing the two word-for-word renderings of the Greek texts above. The meanings of some of the individual words differ somewhat in these two versions. Thus, which is the more accurate translation: kindled or ignited, obscurity or deep gloom, tempest or whirlwind, excused or entreated? Some of the differences in wording are a matter of sheer preference and do not appreciably affect the meaning of the text. In other cases, however, the differences may be due to quite diverse understandings of the meanings of the Greek words. Again, only a translator who is thoroughly familiar with the ancient usage of the original words within and outside of the Bible would be able to make an educated ruling.

A third point that you may have picked up on already is that at the start of the passage there seems to be a completely different Greek text behind the two examples above. Thus, the Received Text (the term was coined as a marketing ploy by the Dutch firm that first published this Greek version) has the word “mountain,” which is not even present in the Nestle version. And, in fact, if you compare the two Greek texts, you will see that the latter does not contain the word for mountain. Some of you may suggest at this point that we should just consult the original Greek text of the Book of Hebrews kept in the Vatican to see who is correct. It is not that simple.

This brings up the whole issue of textual criticism. The fact is that the Vatican does not have the original document and neither does anyone else. But we do have hundreds of copies of copies of the original to compare with one another. They do not all agree 100% with one another because of the myriad of small accidental or purposeful mistakes that cropped up over the years. So textual scholars have needed to study each one of them and make value judgments based on their knowledge and experience to come up with the most accurate Greek text.

Getting back to the two literal translations of the Greek text that I started with, when the first one was compiled 500 years ago scholars had not yet uncovered all of the ancient Greek manuscripts that were found later and so they were working with limited data. Secondly, they pretty much stuck with the majority readings to put together their standard Greek text. By contrast, the more recent Nestle Greek text took advantage of the added manuscripts at hand. And in addition, it gave a much heavier weight to the older manuscripts than the more recent copies. This was a valid move since the later the copy, the more likely that additional errors would have crept in.

Now, to demonstrate how the above factors and others influence English translations of the Hebrews text, let us look at various versions for comparison.

KJV: “For ye are not come unto the mount that might be touched, and that burned with fire, not unto blackness, and darkness, and tempest. And the sound of a trumpet, and the voice of words; which voice they that heard intreated that the word should not be spoken to them any more.”

This is certainly more readable that the literal word-for-word version. And you can see that it adheres fairly closely to the Received Text. The modern reader might be a little put off by the misspelling of “entreat,” the use of the archaic “ye,” and the seeming duplication of thought between blackness and darkness. One might also ask what was the “word” that they didn't want spoken to them anymore. But the translation is basically understandable (if a bit clunky by today's standards) and literal as long as one agrees that the Greek text upon which it was based was the closest to the original (which in this particular case is doubtful).

RSV: When this translation first came out in 1952 it was subjected to major fire from pulpits across America as being communistic, demonic, liberal, heretical, etc. etc. I can barely remember those controversies, but I do know that our church continued to staunchly adhere to the KJV. And because of that, I recall that more than half of each sermon had to be devoted to explaining what each passage meant in terms that we could actually understand. That left little time left to delve into any possible applications of the words to our lives. Here is how RSV renders Hebrews 12:18-19:

“For you have not come to that which may be touched, a blazing fire, and darkness, and gloom, and a tempest and the sound of a trumpet, and a voice whose words made the hearers entreat that no further messages be be spoken to them.”

You can see that, for the most part, the wording in the RSV actually adheres quite closely to that in KJV wherever possible, with a little updating to make it much more understandable to modern audiences. The major sticking issue for KJV aficionados is that we now have an English text that utilizes the Nestle Greek Text rather than the Received Text. You can see that in the fact that “mount” is no longer present. If you want to know why “that” is the preferred translation, you would have to look at Bruce Metzger's book A Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament. In it, he explains that “mountain” is not found in the oldest available manuscripts or in the early Aramaic and Coptic translations. And when that word is present, it is placed in various locations within the verse. All this is strong evidence that “mountain” was added to the text by an early scribe in light of verse 22.

Jumping ahead a number of years, see how the NRSV reads:

“You have not come to something that can be touched, a blazing fire, and darkness, and gloom and a tempest, and the sound of a trumpet, and a voice whose words made the hearers beg that not another word be spoken to them.”

Little has been changed from the RSV. One can see that “something” replaces “that” and “beg” is used instead of “entreat” in order to update the language slightly. In addition, “word” at the end of the passage in place of the earlier “messages” actually returns to the more literal rendering found in the KJV. But the major improvement of the NRSV over RSV is the inclusion of textual footnotes at the bottom of each page. In the case of Hebrews 12:18-19, there is a note attached to the word “something” reading “Other ancient authorities read a mountain.” This gives a nod to the Greek text underlying KJV so that the reader can make up his/her own mind which text to follow. The above changes should have endeared KJV devotees to the NRSV, but instead they were up in arms concerning some of the “feminist” language in the new version, which in fact was put in to more accurately render the meaning of the Greek of NT times. For example, on occasion and only when appropriate, NRSV will use the translation “others,” “humanity” or “men and women” in place of “men.”

The three above translations are all reasonably “literal,” as are NAS and ESV, for example. Now moving on to versions that do not adhere as rigorously to the exact Greek wording, look at two popular modern translations, starting with the New International Version.

“You have not come to a mountain that can be touched and that is burning with fire; to darkness, gloom and storm, to a trumpet blast or to such a voice speaking words that those who heard it begged that no further word be spoken to them.” (NIV)

Concerning NIV, you can see that in this case (but certainly not in other passages where the translation is a little freer), it reads the same as NRSV, except that except that it puts “mountain” into the text, as was true in KJV. So why did even a modern translation such as NIV put that word in when most scholars feel it was not in the original? Probably in order to make it more obvious to the reader what the “something” or “that” referred to. Next we have the New English Bible.

“Remember where you stand: not before the palpable, blazing fire of Sinai, with the darkness, gloom and whirlwind, the trumpet blast and the oracular voice, which they heard, and begged to hear no more.” (NEB)

In this case, the translators have gone out of their way to explain to the reader what the author of Hebrews is referring to, namely the giving of the law on Mt. Sinai. But to do this, they have added the phrase “remember where you stand” and the word “Sinai,” neither of which appear in any ancient manuscript at all. That is not to infer that it is an heretical or even a poor translation, since there is no attempt to mislead the reader, only to make the passage more clear to the reader. However, since it is a translation prepared in England and one made suitable for reading in liturgical settings, the language employed is somewhat more “highfalutin'” than our American audience is used to seeing – witness the words “palpable” and “oracular.”

In stark contrast to the elevated verbiage of the NEB is Today's English Version (also known as Good News for Modern Man). It was originally designed for general reading by those of any education level, and so it purposefully avoids vocabulary that might not be understood by everyone. It is not really a paraphrase, because it adheres fairly closely to the Greek original whenever possible. In the case of the model passage we are considering, its version of v. 19 is practically indistinguishable from the NRSV or NIV, but v. 18 starts out a little differently:

“You have not come, as the people of Israel came, to what you can feel, to Mount Sinai with its blazing fire, the darkness and the gloom, etc.”

Here it is abundantly clear to all that the giving of the Law is the background to this passage.

So much for what might be called actual translations. Now we move into the area of the paraphrases where the comprehension of the modern reader is the prime consideration, even if it means departing quite a bit on occasion from how the Greek original reads. I will quote from three examples:

“You have not had to approach things which your senses could experience as they did in the old days – flaming fire, black darkness, rushing wind and out of it a trumpet blast, a voice speaking human words. So terrible was that voice that those who heard it begged and prayed that it might stop speaking.” (J.B. Phillips translation)

“You have not had to stand face to face with terror, flaming fire, gloom, darkness and a terrible storm, as the Israelites did at Mount Sinai when God gave them his laws. For there was an awesome trumpet blast, and a voice with a message so terrible that the people begged God to stop speaking.” (The Living Bible)

“Unlike your ancestors, you didn't come to Mount Sinai – all that volcanic blaze and earthshaking rumble – to hear God speak. The earsplitting words and soul-shaking message terrified them and they begged him to stop.” (The Message)

Besides the obvious fact that none of these paraphrases feels the need to adhere woodenly to the Greek text in order to get the same message across, note how much more vividly these accounts are worded than actual translations. Because of that factor, they have more power to fully engage the reader. For that reason alone, they certainly deserve to be read even if one has to take some of their interpretive license with a grain of salt.

For example, you may have noted that J.B. Phillips implies that it was the loud sound of the voice that caused the Israelites to want it hushed; The Living Bible says that it was what the voice was saying that caused them to be alarmed; and finally, The Message states that it was both of these factors. In addition, The Message appears to attribute the fire to volcanic activity, which may or may not have been the case.