Paradise Cafe Discussions - A Place For Bible Research And Christian Encouragement

In my translating, I have worked with several fine brothers, one of whom now argues vehemently that the entire NT was written in Aramaic, and that it was later translated into Greek. So, it is his current position that we can gain a better understanding of the words of Jesus and his Apostles if we go to the available Aramaic texts (which he is now doing and translating into Dutch).

I, on the other hand, have strongly argued against his position, because we have little evidence that the “Greek Scriptures” are in fact a translation. And besides; I have no knowledge of Aramaic, so, I can’t check the veracity of the available English-word translation. In other words; I am quite happy with accepting that the NT was written in Greek.

On the other hand; there are some common-sense issues in favor of his position. For example: It is argued quite successfully that the predominant language of the 1st Century Jews (and the language of Jesus) was Aramaic, so, it was also the language that the Apostles spoke and wrote in. And while others argue that 1st Century Palestine was a multi-language community, the fact that visitors heard the Apostles speaking to them in their own languages during Pentecost and were amazed by this, argues against that theory. For if the multi-language argument is true, then there was no miracle.

The one word that has caused me to question whether other NT Bible books were written in Greek, is the word parousia, which “the Society” has used extensively to make the point that Jesus’ presence began in 1914.

However, the use of this word at Matthew 24:3 disagrees with the same account at Mark 13:4, where Jesus is quoting as using the words hotan melle tauta synteleisthai panta, or, when may/be/about these ending all (when will all these things end). And it disagrees with the same account of Jesus’ words at Luke 21:7, where he is quoted as saying, hotan melle tauta ginesthai, or, when may/be/about these begin (when these things are about to happen).

As you can see, there is no mention of a period of “presence” in Mark and Luke, which there should be if this were an important prophecy foretelling the events of 1914. As the result; it becomes clear that the book of Matthew (which was written by an Aramaic-speaking Jew to the Aramaic-speaking Jews) was in fact a Greek translation, and there were errors in the translating process… I wouldn’t argue this.

But my dear friend and brother claims that the entire NT was written in Aramaic and translated into Greek, and that I would argue. For, the fact that Mark and Luke disagree with the words of Matthew 24:3, and that both writers wrote for people of the nations (gentiles), not Jews, would strongly suggest that they wrote in the common language of the people they were writing to, Greek.

So, if the Greek word parousia is in fact the result of a mistranslation in Matthew, its use at 1 Corinthians 15:23, 1 Thessalonians 2:19, 3:13, 4:15, 5:23, 2 Thessalonians 2:1, 9, James 5:7, 8, 2 Peter 1:16, 3:4, 12, and at 1 John 2:28, would bring into question whether Paul, James, Peter, and John wrote their letters in Aramaic or Greek.

I know that I’ve brought this subject up before, but I’m just reiterating some questions that I have in my mind. For; if that one word was mistranslated from Aramaic into Greek, then there may be other mistranslated words that each of us ought to consider. I know that not all are capable of doing this sort of research, but it’s another area where we should be willing to keep an open mind. Why, "the Society" has built a whole dogma around words that clearly appear to be an ancient mistranslation, and people argue the meanings of Greek Bible words today, that could also be the result of other ancient mistranslations. So, don't be too dogmatic!

Hi Stephen

I read the following article a while back, which also makes the case that at least Mathew was first written in Aramaic.

http://aramaicnttruth.org/downloads/Pesh...enario.pdf

It certainly seems some of Jesus' play on words that are found in Aramaic, are "lost" in Greek, so it sounds plausible to me that Mathew was first written in Aramaic after all.

As for the rest of the New Testament... maybe the question should be asked, what language did the audience speak?

For example, when writing to the Corinthians, what was the primary language of the people of Corinth? When John wrote to the congregations in Asia Minor, what was their primary language?

Also, wasn't Luke writing to Theophilus? Unfortunately, we don't know who this person was... but maybe he was a prominent Roman!

I don't think we need worry ourselves too much over it. The apostles quoted from the Greek Septuagint, which often differed somewhat from the Hebrew, but the essential message got through.

I guess it matters for theologians, who argue over words upon which whole doctrines hang...

... but for the early Christian, their faith was a pretty simple one... belief in Jesus Christ as the Son of God, who died and was resurrected.

This was the faith held in common by Peter, Paul, James and the other apostles and disciples.

Name is not Stephen but Jim.

No I suspect he is not worried too much.
Luke was writing to 'Theophilus'....which means lover of god in .....Greek. Was he Greek?

Tricky to nail those multi linguists down.

vicky

Sorry, Jim... don't know why I saw Stephen. :shocked::shocked::shocked:

The controversy about the NT being first written in Aramaic then later translated into Greek in my view does have a high degree of credibility – but there are definitely questions both pro and con. I studied this fairly deeply dating from years back when i–witness first began looking at this and had presented some of the lines of reasoning.

I’ll present some of the overview of the issues and some source material that I used to get there. I’m working from memory so won’t go into any specifics at this point, and until I find my two Peshitta Bibles with the commentary therein I will present some food for thought and maybe present more detail later.

History
Professor George M. Lamsa was one of the primary movers behind the “Aramaic Primacy” question and much or most of what is out there today is probably a result of his work. Lamsa was born and raised in a totally remote area of ancient Mesopotamia in the early 1900’s, and that before World War I was completely isolated from western influence both religiously, culturally, and economically. Aramaic was Lamsa’s native language.

At a young age Lamsa had an intense interest in becoming a priest and was able to be accepted into a monastery arrangement for training in Biblical matters according to the traditions the Ancient Church of the East. According to their ancient traditions this area received the Holy Scriptures directly from the apostles themselves, in Aramaic, and for thousands of years preserved these Scriptures in Aramaic. The process of copying manuscripts as they wore out was along the lines of what the ancient Israelite scribes did in counting letters etc to maintain accuracy down through the years.

In the 1950’s Lamsa began translating the Aramaic Scriptures into the English Peshitta version (meaning straight and true) , that contains both the Old and New testaments.

The oldest extant dated Aramaic manuscript dates to the 5th century (the 400’s), and one interesting thing about the Aramaic is that the versions are all the same as opposed to the Greek manuscripts which contain many variant readings from one to the next such as the Alexandrian versus the Byzantine texts. A point that Lamsa makes is that the Aramaic Scriptures were physically, culturally, and religiously (as far as official church councils etc) isolated from the west and did not fall prey to the work of the various groups that fought over the accuracy and wording of the Greek manuscripts, especially the work of Constantine which apparently produced the Alexandrian and Sinai manuscripts and upon which many Greek manuscript Bibles today are based outside of the Received Text and various other Greek manuscripts.

The physical and cultural isolation, and the fact that Aramaic manuscripts from the 400’s are virtually identical down through the hundreds of copies into modern times certainly speaks to the ability of their copyists, but does it speak for the primacy of the Aramaic over the Greek? It might.

Lamsa presents numerous words in the Greek manuscripts that were incorrectly translated – in his view – because whoever translated the (as he claims) original Aramaic scriptures into Greek mistook words in Aramaic that look very close to other Aramaic words but that have different meanings. I invite readers to obtain Lamsa’s Peshitta reference Bible of the New Testament that goes into much detail on this.

An example is Jesus statement “easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God”. According to Lamsa what Jesus really said was “easier for a rope to pass through the eye of a needle…" (etc etc). The seeming strangeness of having a camel (an animal) jumping through the eye of a sewing tool does seem strange – of course it is hyperbole - but it does present the idea that it is totally impossible for a rich man to enter the kingdom - which obviously can’t be true.

Anyway the Aramaic script for “camel” is very close to the Aramaic word for “rope”, because in ancient times camel hair was used to make rope. Thus a non-native Aramaic speaker could easily mistake these two words – and incorrectly translate them into Greek. Lamsa presents many examples of this and that would rightly appear to account for the sometimes nonsensical readings as well as variant readings contained in all the Greek manuscripts.

One other notable example is what Jesus said while dying on the cross, “46 About the ninth hour Jesus called out with a loud voice, saying: “E´li, E´li, la´ma sa•bach•tha´ni?” that is, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” 47. (Matthew 27:46-47)

The words Jesus said are straight up Aramaic words, contained right in the Greek text, that Lamsa reasons were transliterated in tact and not translated into a Greek equivalent because the Greek translator didn’t know what they really meant. Further Lamsa translates these words in the Peshitta as “My God, my God, for this I have come!” – which does seem to make more sense than for Jesus to ask the Father why he had forsaken him, when Jesus knew all along why he was coming, accepted it, and that he would be murdered as a criminal.

One question I have is why there are so few early manuscripts in any language extant. Was it because the Roman Empire was very effective in burning them - along with their owners - during the couple hundred years of post-apostolic persecutions and before Christianity became the official church of Rome? If the original NT was written in the native language of the apostles and taken with them to the entire known world of their day, that would not seem unreasonable to me. A point that Lamsa brings out is that the Aramaic originals would naturally and quickly cease to be used after having been translated into the local languages such as Coptic or Greek, and would sit there on the shelf of the local ecclesia until it fell apart from age. A point along that line is that from ancient Mesopotamia clear to India and China, the Aramaic versions of the Holy Scriptures are to this day used in the Christian Church of the East – areas that escaped Roman and Greek linguistic and religious influence?

So, there are some of the issues – and a very interesting study worth diving into.



v r

Thank you "guys" for some well-thought-out research and comments.

The true problem, as I see it, is that people so dogmatically argue their views based on fine word differences in Greek (and especially from Matthew), which likely weren't the true words at all. The word "parousia," around which the WTS has built an entire dogma, is an excellent example of this.

Despite the fact that their view of the use of the word in the Matthew account disagrees with Jesus' same words at Mark 13:4 and Luke 21:7 (which fact goes completely ignored by all JW's), they continue to hang onto an obviously wrong belief. And of course, the reason why, is that the other quotes (which DO seem to be in Greek) dispel the thought that Jesus "came in Kingdom power" in 1914, and thereafter appointed their GB as "the faithful and discreet slave," and that the JWs were then accepted as "God's chosen people" and false religion ("Babylon the Great") saw its fall. (For more information, see the link Coming, Presence, or Nearness?).

I agree that "trusting in Jesus" and loving each other is far more important in the eyes of God than accepting doctrines. However, even here (where we should know better), "Christians" continue to beat each other up over doctrines and words that may never have been written.

As to why Jehovah has allowed some of the information to be lost or mistranslated: I am beginning to believe that He has left many things vague just to see what the disagreements would bring out in us... do we have the identifying mark of true Christians, love among ourselves?

And by the way: Did you notice that Aramaic texts say that Jesus was really named EliAzar, but he was called Jesus? How many things we really don't know!

The Matthean great-grandfather of Joseph, the husband of Mary the mother of Jesus (Matt 1:15) was Eleazar.

The name EliAzar is a compound of two elements. The first part is the word Eli the common abbreviation of Elohim. The second part comes from the verb Azar meaning help, support.
This verb is quite common in usage. the most notable being the elationship of Eve to Adam, 'It is not good for the man to be alone, I will make him a helper for him' (Gen 2:18).

The meaning of the name Eleazar is God Has Helped.

The parallels between Abraham's servant Eliazar and Lazarus in the bosom position of Abraham, and then Lazarus the brother of Martha and Mary are symbolic I believe.

I definitely agree with this comment. God could have made sure that Scriptures that he inspired were preserved in tact. So the evident fact that the Scriptures were tampered with is an interesting study of itself. I used to think that God would have wanted his word to be accurately preserved word for word – until I started participating in the wild world of online dbs. It seems clear to me that the quest for Truth goes way above any mere written words and into the realms of motive – as JWHVACR put it – “He has left many things vague just to see what the disagreements would bring out in us”.

Persons that want to be told exactly what to think and do are not the kind of persons that YHWH wants to have worshipping him. Having persons that need to be told exactly what to do and say are not persons that fit the model of how people were intended to be, persons with free moral agency, with total authority over how they act and what they think. God wants people that are empowered to do whatever they want to do, and that choose to worship him. The fact that persons have different ideas as to exactly what it means to worship God of itself defines the meaning of worshipping the Father in spirit and truth. While there are general guidelines of moral conduct, there is much room for variance in exactly how proper “worship” can be carried out.

The variance in Scripture causes persons to really search for Truth as opposed to having it all laid out page by page. I think that John 17:3 holds the secret in that coming to know the Father and the Son as persons holds the real key, since when you know someone, you get a feel for how they think on topics. So seeking to know God and Christ as persons helps us deal with Scriptures that may or may not be completely word for word what was originally intended to be said.

Or, did God’s inspiration process on Bible writers ever dictate exactly what to say to begin with? I suspect not - at least not in all cases - because that of itself gave Bible writers the levity to write from their hearts and of itself is a testimony to how God empowers us to speak from our hearts. Consider that we may look back on these dbs in 500 years and come to understand that what we are here writing and discussing was the exact same process by which Paul wrote his letters to the ecclesias of his day. Letters from spiritual persons - using guidelines that are imprinted upon the heart - and that express into written words?



v r