Sunday, November 24, 2024

James 1:1

Last month, I watched the Concordia University Wisconsin chapel service from the 23rd:


The reading was James 1:1-12.  I was following along in the Vulgate and noticed a small feature in the first verse, specifically in the phrase "Iacobus Dei et Domini nostri Iesu Christi servus."  In the ESV, this is translated as "James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ," and every other translation I lookt at has a similar rendering in terms of word order.  In the Latin, though, the word for "servant" ("servus") comes last in the phrase, and this mirrors a servant's subordinate position.  This is also true of the Greek:  Ἰάκωβος θεοῦ καὶ κυρίου Ἰησοῦ χριστοῦ δοῦλος.