The Holy Scriptures are God-breathed, inspired of God. “All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness” (2 Tim. 3:16). “The prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost” (2 Peter 1:21). All this is most blessedly true, and of the greatest importance.
But, someone may ask, What about the original manuscripts of the inspired writings? Where are they? The answer is, They have tracelessly disappeared. It is perhaps as well that it should be so. If they had been in existence, there might have been two likely reactions. The ritualist might make them objects of idolatrous worship, as the children of Israel did with the serpent of brass (see, 2 Kings 18:4). On the other hand the infidel might deny outright that they were the original Scriptures of God. But when many hundreds of manuscripts are found, evidently copies of the originals, men cannot dispute the existence of the originals, nor that they were held in such high esteem, as to be most carefully copied by hand with patient, meticulous care. And that, many, many times over and in hundreds of places, and spread over centuries. No other manuscripts have received such high honour. In this we can plainly see God’s hand preserving to us the Holy Scriptures.
As the word of God spread, many translations in many languages have appeared. Up to the present time these translations, in whole or in part, number over a thousand languages. Translations, however, cannot claim inspiration as the original Scriptures do. Yet the godly and learned scholars, who in the time of King James I produced The Authorised Version of the Holy Scriptures, besought prayerfully the Lord’s guidance, support, and help in their very responsible task. Surely we can see that God has answered their prayers abundantly, when we examine the Scriptures we hold in our hands, and which we can receive with assurance as being indeed the word of God.
Seeing that copyists of the original Scriptures were not inspired, as the Scriptures themselves are, it follows that with all the possible care taken to make a perfectly correct copy, mistakes and errors might creep in. These copyists however were so very careful in their work, that these errors and variations between the many copies are only very slight, and do not in the least degree diminish or weaken the testimony to the great fundamentals of the Christian faith. The proportion of important variations to the whole of the Scriptures is likened to a handful of corn compared with a field of wheat. Or again, if you look into a mirror in which a speck or two of quicksilver has got scratched, you would have no doubt as to what you see in the glass. So it is with the Holy Scriptures, over which God has so manifestly put His powerful and preserving hand.
One great difficulty the translators had to contend with was how best to convey the niceties, the delicate shades of meaning of the Hebrew and Greek languages into plain English. We purpose in this article to furnish a very few examples of this from the New Testament, it may lead others to further searching of the Word of God in that direction.
The word, world, is the translation of four distinct words in the Greek New Testament. They are as follow:
Aiōn, indefinite time, dispensation, occurring 31 times.
Kosmos, arrangement, world, occurring 187 times.
Oikoumenē, habitable earth, occurring 14 times.
Gē, land, earth, occurring only once.
In Matthew 13, we find the expression, “the end of the world,” occurring three times. A reader might naturally suppose that this refers to the end of the world, as described by the Apostle Peter, when “The heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent beat, the earth also and the works that are therein shall be burned up” (2 Peter 3:10). But when we know that the correct translation is “The end of the age [aiōn],” we find it refers to the close of this present age of God’s grace, to be followed by the outpouring of God’s judgments on this guilty world, leading up to the Lord setting up His kingdom on this earth to last a thousand years, commonly called the millennium.
Matthew 12:32 confirms this. We read, “Whosoever speaks against the Holy Ghost, it shall not be forgiven him, neither in this world, neither in the world to come.” This expression, “The world to come,” occurs also in Mark 10:30, Luke 18:30, Ephesians 1:21, Hebrews 2:5 and 6:5. Again some might think this refers to the literal end of the world in which we dwell, but as we have seen the correct translation is “the age [aiōn] to come,” when “The earth shall be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the LORD, as the waters cover the sea” (Heb. 2:14).
There is another passage, which still further confirms the above. We read, “Through faith we understand that the worlds [aiōn] were framed by the word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear” (Heb. 11:3). Here reference is clearly made to God’s initial act of creation. But why should the word, ages, be employed when creation has to do with material things? The expression, ages, is clearly a reference made to time. But how did time begin? How can we, how do we, measure time? The answer is, Only by the fact of the creation of the earth, the sun, the moon and their movements. The revolving of the earth gives us day and night; its orbit round the sun gives us our year. The movement of the moon round the earth gives us a lunar month. “God made two great lights; the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night: He made the stars also” (Gen. 1:16). Creation was necessary to carve out of eternity, the little span, we call time, regulated by the movements of the heavenly bodies and this earth. So we read, “Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven to divide the day from the night: and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and years” (Gen. 1:14). Time will not cease to be till heaven and earth cease to be. We can understand somewhat why the translators used the word, world, where it should have been the word, ages; this latter clearly giving a better understanding of this remarkable passage of Scripture.
We all know very well the verse of Scripture, continually on the lips of Gospel preachers, and called by Martin Luther, The Miniature Bible, “God so loved the world [kosmos], that He gave His only begotten Son … ” (John 3:16). In this verse this word, world, does not stand for a definition of time, and therefore the Greek word, aiōn, is not employed. Kosmos is the Greek word employed here, setting forth, not the material world in which we live, but its inhabitants, the people to whom this wonderful message is sent. This word occurs frequently in the New Testament. The diligent student can find many instances of the care exercised by God in choosing the exact word to express His meaning.
The Greek word, oikoumenē, means the habitable earth, thus bringing the earth and its dwellers together as one whole. We read of Satan as one, “which deceives the whole world” (Rev. 12:9). There are vast stretches of the world uninhabitable, but wherever man is found, there Satan is active.
The Greek word, Gē, meaning land, earth, occurs only once, “All the world [gē] wondered after the beast” (Rev. 13:3). This passage foretells a universal wonderment, stretching to earth’s remotest bounds, wherever man is found.
There are two words for crown in the New Testament. One is the Greek word, diad ē ma, meaning the monarch’s crown, from which we derive the English word, diadem. It occurs three times, and the Lord is the only rightful wearer. “On His head were many crowns” (Rev. 19:12). The other word translated crown is the Greek word, stephanos, describing the crown awarded to the successful athlete in the Olympian games. We see this clearly used as an illustration in the following Scripture, “When the chief shepherd shall appear, ye shall receive a crown of glory that fades not away” (1 Peter 5:4). The laurel wreath placed on the head of the winner in the Grecian games would soon wither. The crown which our Lord will award to His faithful servants will never fade away.
There are two words for Temple in the Greek New Testament. Hieron embraces the whole of the Temple area, the Court of the Gentiles, the Court of the Jews, the Place where they bought and sold the animals for sacrifice, the Place where the money-changers had their seat (Matt. 21:12). This word occurs 71 times. The other word, naos, has an exclusive meaning, designating the inner sanctuary of the Temple, the Holy Place where the priests ministered, the Holiest of all to which the High Priest alone had access on the great Day of Atonement. This word occurs 45 times. These two words are carefully distinguished in Scripture. For instance we read of Peter and John going into the Temple [hieron] to pray (Acts 3:3). They were Galileans, and not priests, so therefore the wider word was used. When our Lord cried on the cross those triumphant words, “IT IS FINISHED,” which have brought peace to the hearts of millions, “the veil of the Temple [naos] was rent in twain from the top to the bottom” (Matt. 27:51), thus showing that the way into the holiest was made manifest. It is very reassuring to see the care Scripture takes to present these shades of meaning. No uninspired writings would exhibit this care.
It is hoped this sketchy article may encourage some of our younger brethren to study the Scriptures, and find out these delicate shades of meaning, so difficult to translate. Without any knowledge of Hebrew and Greek, it is quite possible to follow up this subject. Over sixty years ago the writer purchased a copy of Young’s Analytical Concordance, which he prizes and uses more than any other book outside the Bible. In it is given against every word the corresponding Hebrew or Greek word. A most valuable Index-Lexicon is appended at the end of the concordance, in which each Hebrew and Greek word is listed, and under each word are appended the different words employed in the English Bible to represent the one Hebrew or Greek word, sometimes running into scores.
But here just a word of warning. A little knowledge is sometimes a dangerous thing. The writer knew an old brother, a most estimable man, who managed to learn a few Greek words. His little knowledge became a perfect nuisance as he paraded his few words on every occasion. One day he said most triumphantly this Greek word differs altogether from that Greek word, so they cannot mean the same thing. We replied, Suppose there is a biography of your life printed in the English language. A Greek Christian knowing a little English reads it. In chapter one he reads that you are a brave man. In chapter three he reads you are a courageous man. He tells us these are two very different words in their spelling, and therefore they cannot mean the same thing. But they do.
A little knowledge of another language is useful, if it shows us how slight and superficial our knowledge is, leading us to be careful how we press our views. Knowing such words as we have dealt with, does not carry with it the knowledge of cases of nouns, tenses of verbs, pronouns, and all the intricacies of a flexible language. But even the bare meaning of the original word may help at arriving at a shade of meaning, not apparent in its English dress. It is blessedly true that a Christian knowing no language but his native English is better equipped for knowing the mind of God in reading the Scriptures, than the most learned Hebrew and Greek scholars, who have scholarship but lack the illuminating grace of God in their hearts.
Timothy was a most highly gifted young man, of whom the Apostle Paul could say, “I have no man like-minded, who will naturally care for your state” (Phil. 2:20). Yet he felt it incumbent to press upon Timothy some weighty advice. “Give attention to reading meditate upon these things, give thyself wholly to them … take heed to thyself, and to the doctrine; continue in them: for in doing this thou shalt both save thyself, and them that hear thee” (1 Tim. 4:13-16). This instruction given to Timothy, we may well pay heed to and practice ourselves.