John 10:11

I've been following along in the Daily Dose of Greek's series on John.  Last week, I noticed an interesting feature specific to the Latin Vulgate translation of John 10:11:  "Ego sum pastor bonus bonus pastor animam suam dat pro ovibus."  In the Greek and in all of the other translations I'm following along in, the phrase "the good shepherd" is repeated in the same order:

ἐγώ εἰμι ὁ ποιμὴν ὁ καλός· ὁ ποιμὴν ὁ καλὸς τὴν ψυχὴν αὐτοῦ τίθησιν ὑπὲρ τῶν προβάτων.

I am the good shepherd.  The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.

Ich bin der gute Hirte.  Der gute Hirte läßt sein Leben für die Schafe.

Je suis le bon berger.  Le bon berger donne sa vie pour ses brebis.

In the Latin, however, the first instance of "the good shepherd" is inverted so that "good" is a post-positive adjective:  "pastor bonus."  Such an inversion results in a chiasm:  "pastor bonus bonus pastor."  The word chiasm comes from Greek letter chi (χ), which resembles a cross.  Between this resemblance to a cross and the context here of the good shepherd's "lay[ing] down his life for the sheep," the Latin Vulgate translation seems to be hinting at the crucifixion.

Matthew 15:19

I've been reading Matthew lately, and I recently remembered something I'd previously noticed about Matthew 15:19 and figured I might as well write about it here.

Jesus says, "For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false witness, slander."

The list of "murder, adultery, sexual immortality, theft, false witness, slander" specifies the "evil thoughts."  This may not be very significant, but this list follows the order of the Ten Commandments:  "You shall not murder.  You shall not commit adultery.  You shall not steal.  You shall not give false testimony against your neighbor."

Mark 13:6

Last week, I watched the Daily Dose of Greek video on Mark 13:6:

I'd always understood this verse and specifically the "'I am he!'" more prosaically, but looking at the original Greek made me realize that this "ἐγώ εἰμι" is a reference to Exodus 3:14 where God says to Moses, "'I AM WHO I AM.'"  Jesus takes up this title multiple times in John's Gospel ("I am the bread of life," "I am the Good Shepherd," "I am the way, and the truth, and the life," "I am the vine," et cetera), but the "many" described here claim it falsely.

Psalm 119:29-30

The Daily Dose of Hebrew has been going through Psalm 119 lately.  While following along in the Latin Vulgate, I noticed a feature in verses 29 and 30 that's obscured in the English translation and that I didn't catch either in watching the videos or while copying out the verses (because I turned pages in my notebook, these verses weren't next to each other).

In the ESV, these verses are translated as:  "29 Put false ways far from me and graciously teach me your law!  30 I have chosen the way of faithfulness; I set your rules before me."

In the Vulgate, however, these verses appear as:

29 viam iniquitatis amove a me et lege tua miserere mei

30 viam veritatis elegi iudicia tua non sum oblitus

The formatting and word order here help to emphasize the contrast between the "false ways" (as in the Hebrew, it's singular in the Latin:  viam iniquitatis) in verse 29 and "the way of faithfulness" (viam veritatis) in verse 30.

Mark 12:30

When I watched the Daily Dose of Greek video for Mark 12:30 last week, I noticed a couple rhetorical features.

"'And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.'"

The repetition of "and" is polysyndeton.  I'm not sure if the repeated "all" is technically anaphora (it is near the beginning of each prepositional phrase, but I'm not sure if that's enough to fulfill the definition).  In any case, these repetitions give a sense of the totality of the self that one should devote to God.

John 8:34

I read John 8:34 in German last week before watching the corresponding Daily Dose of Greek video, and I noticed a small feature about it.  In English, it's "Jesus answered them, 'Truly, truly, I say to you, everyone who commits a sin is a slave to sin.'"  The word order is a bit different in German, however:  "Jesus antwortete ihnen und sprach:  Wahrlich, wahrlich, ich sage euch:  Wer Sünde tut, der ist der Sünde Knecht."  Instead of "a slave to sin," the German has "of sin a slave" ("der Sünde Knecht").  The genitive precedes the predicate nominative it modifies, and this word order illustrates the subordinate position of the slave.

Isaiah 1:4

A couple weeks ago, I read Isaiah 1.  Part of verse four stuck out to me:  "Ah, sinful nation, a people laden with iniquity, offspring of evildoers, children who deal corruptly!  They have forsaken the LORD, they have despised the Holy One of Israel, they are utterly estranged."

Almost the entirety of the chapter exhibits either pairs of related items or parallel clauses.  In this verse, "sinful nation" parallels with "a people laden with iniquity," "offspring of evildoers" with "children who deal corruptly," and "they have forsaken the LORD" with "they have despised the Holy One of Israel."  The clause "they are utterly estranged," however, isn't paired or paralleled with anything, and this lack of a complement emphasizes the meaning.

1 Corinthians 13:7

I read 1 Corinthians 13 recently and noticed epistrophe (the repetition of a word or phrase at the end of successive clauses or sentences) in verse 7:  "Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things."  That "all things" is repeated gives a sense of the entirety of that "all."

Matthew 7:24-27

Near the beginning of the month, I read a few chapters from Matthew.  Matthew 7:24-27 contains Jesus' explanation that those who hear and follow His words are like a man who built his house on a rock, "and the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house, but it did not fall, because it had been founded on the rock" (verse 25).  After I read this, I realized that the house is assaulted from all sides:  the rain descends from above; flood waters rise up from beneath; and the winds come from lateral directions.  While the house built on a rock is contrasted with the house built on sand, which "fell, and great was the fall of it" (verse 27), the fortitude of the house built on a rock is also illustrated simply in the elements it withstands and the various directions from which they come.

Psalm 63:8-9

Near the end of last month, I was reading through some Psalms, and I noticed something in Psalm 63 that may be obvious but that I hadn't realized before.

8 My soul clings to you; your right hand upholds me.  9 But those who seek to destroy my life shall go down into the depths of the earth.

There's a contrast between these two verses, plainly indicated by the "but" at the beginning of verse 9.  Additionally, though, this contrast is illustrated by the opposite directions.  God's "right hand upholds" the Psalmist in verse 8, but verse 9 says that those opposed to the Psalmist "shall go down into the depths."

Romans 11:33

Last month, I read a few verses from Romans 11 and noticed a small feature in verse 33:  "Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God!  How unsearchable are his judgements and how inscrutable his ways!"  There's polysyndeton (the repeated "and") in "the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God," and this indicates that abundance.

John 10:12

I wrote about a small feature in John 10 after Good Shepherd Sunday last year, but when I was following along in my French translation during Worship Anew last week, I noticed something else, in verse 12 this time:  

Mais le mercenaire, qui n'est pas le berger, et à qui n'appartiennent pas les brebis, voit venir le loup, abandonne les brebis, et prend la fuite; et le loup les ravit et les disperse.

He who is a hired hand and not a shepherd, who does not own the sheep, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and flees, and the wolf snatches them and scatters them.

Where the English and the Greek each have a single word ("flees" "φεύγει"), the French has the phrase "prend la fuite" ("takes flight").  Because the verbs here are opposites ("leave" and "take"), there's a stronger sense of the hired hand's abandoning the sheep.  To some degree, the structural parallelism (verb + direct object) between "abandonne les brebis" and "prend la fuite" also highlights this.