Jonah 3:6

Near the end of March, I started going through Jonah in the archives of the Daily Dose of Hebrew.  A couple weeks ago, I went over Jonah 3:6:  "The word reached the king of Nineveh, and he arose from his throne, removed his robe, covered himself with sackcloth, and sat in ashes."  I think there's some significant word choice in the Hebrew here.  "Word" (דָּבָר) and "arose" (from the verb קוּם) also appear at the beginning of the book, in Jonah 1:1-3a:  "1 Now the word of the LORD came to Jonah the son of Amittai, saying, 2 'Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and call out against it, for their evil has come up before me.'  3 But Jonah rose to flee to Tarshish from the presence of the LORD."

Using the same words in these two sections highlights the contrast between Jonah in chapter 1 and the king of Nineveh in chapter 3.  When the word of the LORD comes to Jonah, he rises to try to avoid it, but when the word reaches the king of Nineveh, he rises to take action.

John 6:2, 5

Recently, the Daily Dose of Latin started John 6.  I noticed that in John 6:2 and 6:5, the Greek word ὄχλος is translated in the Vulgate as multitudo.

This struck me as a bit unusual.  Most of the time, ὄχλος is translated as turba.  I did a search with the STEP Bible, and while my numbers might not be entirely accurate, it seems that out of 171 occurrences of a form of ὄχλος, 155 of them are translated as a form of turba.

These instances in particular seem odd because "multitudo magna" and "multitudo maxima" are redundant; both mean something like "a great multitude."  (Maxima is the superlative form of magna.)  Perhaps this is intended to indicate the exceedingly great size of the crowd.

As I've been following along with the Daily Dose of Latin, I've been reading the New King James Version.  There, both of these phrases are translated as "great multitude."  In the ESV, they're both "large crowd," and in the NIV, "great crowd."

Hebrews 4:12

Recently, I was thinking about Hebrews 4:12:  "For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart."  I had to look up the Greek text to make sure, but "living" is a participle there too:  "ζῶν γὰρ ὁ λόγος τοῦ θεοῦ καὶ ἐνεργὴς..."  I think this is significant.  Because a participle is a verbal adjective, there's some of the dynamic nature of a verb here, and this goes well with the meaning of the word "living."

1 John 3:5

Since February, I've been going through 1 John in the archives of the Daily Dose of Greek.  A few weeks ago, I copied out 1 John 3:5 and then read it in a few different translations.  The ESV made me cringe.  The Greek text is καὶ οἴδατε ὅτι ἐκεῖνος ἐφανερώθη ἵνα τὰς ἁμαρτίας ἄρῃ, καὶ ἁμαρτία ἐν αὐτῷ οὐκ ἔστιν. but the ESV renders this as "You know that he appeared to take away sins, and in him there is no sin."  In the intended reading, "appeared" has the sense of "showed up," and "to take" is an infinitive of purpose, but this translation could be misread so that "appeared" has the sense of "seemed" and (if my parsing is right) "to take" is an epexegetical infinitive.  Understood this way, the clause is saying that this "tak[ing] away [of] sins" was merely an illusion ("he seemed to take away sins"), but this is obviously not the meaning of the Greek text.  Simply adding "in order to" clears up this ambiguity:  "You know that he appeared in order to take away sins...."

The NIV has a much better translation:  "But you know that he appeared so that he might take away our sins.  And in him is no sin."

Matthew 20:24, Mark 10:41

A couple weeks ago, I watched the Concordia University Wisconsin chapel service from 23 March 2015:

The reading was Mark 10:35-45.  I'm pretty sure that Dr. Feiertag reads the NIV, where verse 41 is translated as "When the ten heard about this, they became indignant with James and John."  I was following along in my French New Testament, where this verse is rendered as "Les dix, ayant entendu cela, commencèrent à s'indigner contre Jacques et Jean."  Where the NIV has "indignant with" and the ESV has "indignant at," the French translation has "s'indigner contre."  (In Greek, the preposition here is περὶ.)  In French, contre also means against.  This carries a greater weight than de (the other preposition, meaning with or at, used with this verb), so in this particular translation, there's a greater sense of opposition between the ten disciples and the two brothers.

Matthew 20:24 is comparable.

My French translation has:  "Les dix, ayant entendu cela, furent indignés contre les deux frères."

The ESV has:  "And when the ten heard it, they were indignant at the two brothers."

And the NIV has:  "When the ten heard about this, they were indignant with the two brothers."

Genesis 3:15

When I went to church a couple weeks ago, the pastor referenced Genesis 3:15 in his sermon.  I noticed that the second half of the verse has a chiastic structure:  "He shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel."  The study notes in my Bible explain that "This points to Christ and His defeat of Satan on the cross."  It may be coincidental, but even the structure here (the cross form of the chiasm) seems to point to Christ's crucifixion.  I lookt up this verse in the STEP Bible, and while the possessive adjectives for "head" and "heel" are implied, this structure is present in the Hebrew too.

Luke 15:11-32 (The Prodigal Son)

The Gospel reading last week was Luke 15:1-3, 11-32, the parable of the prodigal son.  While watching Worship Anew, I realized that the father acts the same way toward both of his sons.  There's a sort of parallelism between "while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and felt compassion, and ran and embraced him and kissed him" (verse 20) and "His father came out and entreated him" (verse 28).  Clearly, the father cares for both of his sons, and while the situations are different, he goes out to each of them and shows his compassion.

Acts 9:1-3

I've been reading Acts lately and noticed a feature specific to the ESV in Acts 9:1-3:

1 But Saul, still breathing threats and murder against the disciples of the Lord, went to the high priest 2 and asked him for letters to the synagogues at Damascus, so that if he found any belonging to the Way, men or women, he might bring them bound to Jerusalem.  3 Now as he went on his way, he approached Damascus, and suddenly a light from heaven flashed around him.

In this translation, there seems to be a contrast between "the Way" in verse 2 and "his way" in verse 3.  Saul is persecuting the church, so his "way" (in a more metaphorical sense) is opposed to "the Way."

When I lookt up the Greek, however, I discovered that these two words are unrelated.  The "Way" in verse 2 is ὁδοῦ, and - if I understand it aright - the whole construction "he went on his way" in verse 3 comes from the verb πορεύω.

Genesis 22:7-8

Recently, I watched the Concordia University Wisconsin chapel service from 24 February 2015.

The text was Genesis 22:1-14.  I was following along in the Latin Vulgate and noticed that where the ESV has "the lamb for a burnt offering" in verses 7 and 8, the Vulgate has "victima holocausti."  Instead of "lamb" or "goat" specifically (which is also what's in the Hebrew:  הַשֶּׂה), the Vulgate has a more generic word that means "victim" or "sacrifice."

There are some elements in this account that prefigure the crucifixion of Christ (who is called "the Lamb of God" in John 1:29).  Because the Vulgate uses a more generic term for "sacrifice," the metaphorical language is stripped away, and these connections may be a bit easier to see.

Genesis 7:17-19

After running across a reference to Genesis 1 in Les Misérables recently, I've been reading chapters of Genesis.  I noticed that in the ESV, successive verses in Genesis 7:17-19 have more adverbs:

17 The flood continued forty days on the earth.  The waters increased and bore up the ark, and it rose high above the earth.  18 The waters prevailed and increased greatly on the earth, and the ark floated on the face of the waters.  19 And the waters prevailed so mightily on the earth that all the high mountains under the whole heaven were covered.

First, there's just a subject and a verb ("the waters increased"); then there's one adverb ("the waters prevailed and increased greatly"); then there are two adverbs ("the waters prevailed so mightily").  The increasing number of adverbs reflects the rising level of the waters.

I lookt up this passage in the STEP Bible and found that this feature is also present in the Hebrew.  מְאֹד is used once in verse 18 and twice in succession (for a greater degree) in verse 19.

Luke 6:20-26

On Worship Anew last week, the Gospel reading was Luke 6:17-26.  In verses 20-26, Jesus presents some contrasts:  "Blessed are you who are poor" (verse 20) but "woe to you who are rich" (verse 24), "blessed are you who are hungry now" (21) but "woe to you who are full now" (25), "blessed are you who weep now" (21) but "woe to you who laugh now" (25), and "blessed are you when people hate you" (22) but "woe to you when all people speak well of you" (26).

I was following along in my French New Testament, and I noticed that in that particular translation, these opposites have a sharper contrast because the French words for "blessed" ("heureux") and "woe" ("malheur") come from the same root.

Ecclesiastes 1:5

Earlier this month, I read a few chapters of Ecclesiastes, and I realized something about the structure of Ecclesiastes 1:5:  "The sun rises, and the sun goes down, and hastens to the place where it rises."  The verse starts and ends with the sun's rising, so even the structure of just this one verse illustrates the vanity that the preacher talks about.