The Evangelical Universalist Forum

Hebrew thought as a context used in translation

I’ve posted on this before, but was doing some studying and meditating on it today, so here are my thoughts agin :slight_smile:

From time to time discussions come up on what is a common point of dissension among Bible scholars- “In which language was the NT original spoken”?

Some think Greek, some think Aramaic, some think the Pharisees spoke a form of Hebrew in the temple and in their mid-rash and discussions of Torah.

There is one thing I think that is often missed.

To whatever degree the Jews had been Hellenized or Romanized- Jesus did not seem to struggle with that. The things He struggled with the Sanhedrin over were all intrinsically and overwhelmingly Hebrew issues.

Issues of understanding the law and the prophets that WENT BACK FURTHER THAN the contemporary languages of His time, and were still the prevalent points of contention between YHWH and His chosen people.

The Jews were Jewish no matter what language they spoke- and especially among their heirarchy and preisthhood. Always reaching back for that former glory and using the law to rule rather than to serve.

The purpose of translation is to render the “thoughts of the speaker in his time and place” with words that communicate those very same thoughts in the language of the hearer in his time and place.

There is no doubt in my mind that regardless of what various languages may have been spoken by each individual writer of each individual epistle, the mindset of the writers was Hebrew. They were still, culturally and religiously Hebrews.

Going back to the Greek roots of words used translation does not always get to the root thought, if the speaker was a Hebrew thinking like a Hebrew. Thinking from the contextual paradigm of Hebrew cosmology. The fact that the Israelites misused the words of Moses and the prophets does not mean that the cosmology established among them was inaccurate. As a matter of fact it was far more realistic than anything the pagan Romans and Greeks and Assyrians and Egyptians had landed in. After thousands of years of development they were still just recycling the basic myths of the Fertile Crescent, which may have been the “Tales of the Nephilim”( from Gen 6:4).

Looking at the usages of Greek words by Aristotle, Plato and Socrates does not always give an accurate result in understanding the “thought” in the mind of the speaker in his time, if he was speaking from an ancient Hebrew paradigm/cosmology. Pure etymology also does not always give an exact result, because the word being analyzed IS OFTEN A DERIVATIVE WORD, or an INTERPRETED WORD to begin with.

A good example is “aion” versus “olam”.

Did the original speaker(Paul) think in terms of “olam” or “aion”

I hear often among universalists that “aion” means “a period of time with an end and a beginning”. This is often used as evidence that there is no “everlasting” torment.

Olam was a word with a much greater application because it was more an adjective than a noun and it was defined in conjunction with the subject it was attached to…

A definition of olam could be…

An unknown quantity of time defined by the subject or circumstances it defines.

I have heard it said that olam was a “distant long-during time”- but that is not always so, as in the indenture of the bondslave in Deuteronomy 15:16- it was less than a human lifetime.

olam also often had the element of “world” as in an unseeable place like the “world to come”- which it still has today among modern Jews(olam haba- the world to come…“olam haze”- this present evil world"…tikkun olam…“repairing the world”)

I think this is why “aion” is occasionally translated “world” as in Hebrews 1. Aion shows forth that connection to “olam” there. It is an indicator also that the translators were aware of this contextually dependent variety in the meaning of “olam” and supplied the appropriate(in their consensus opinion) “worlds”(altho ages works just as well for me)

So what was Paul, Hebrew of Hebrews, Pharisee of Pharisees thinking when He wrote. Was he thinking like a Greek or a Roman?

What about Peter and James, who hung out with the Jewish brethren and were almost dragged back under the law by hypocrites? Did they think like Greeks or Romans? What about Jesus, who took the words of the prophets as His common context and explained the law from the mind of the giver of it? Was he thinking like a Greek or a Roman?

I personally dont see how anyone could think they did.

So, back to the opening premise. If the goal of translation is to render** the thoughts** of the speaker** in his time and place** into words that communicate those same thoughts** in our time and place**.

Then appropriate weight should be given to the back ground study of context from the Hebrew point of view- in any translation, and in any conversation where it would apply.

So, olam sometimes means “the far distant past”, it sometimes means the “world to come” or “the other world” or “world/age”, it sometimes means “the term of an indentured slave measured by the length of his remaining life”- when connected to YHWH- it may mean “forever” and at least certainly means "unknowably long, unseeable, “beyond the horizon” of anyone’s ability to see.

In every use of “aion” I see that variety and unknowableness of “olam” and the inclusion of the “world” concept, because these will be new and different “worlds to come”. But I am always reminded of the blond slave in Deuteronomy and the fact that we can’t draw the lines to tightly around certain things or we might miss “uncertain things” God wishes to reveal in part, as we do know in part, as we look through the misty glass into the olam.

Yet routinely I read that aion means definitely always means “a period of time with a beginning and an end”, because of the intensity of desire to debunk “eternity” and “everlasting”, but maybe that goes to far.

I like “an unknown period appropriate to”

punishment… “you shall not escape until you have paid the very last penny” “the punishment of the world/age to come” (aionian kolassis)

Not necessarily “age-during”. For some it may only be a few moments of being “divided asunder” in order to have their “thoughts and intentions” made manifest by the sword of the Spirit. For some perhaps longer- if such an experience can be measured in time. Who knows? It is olam! Olam esh! The fire of the world to come.

As pertains to God, God has no end, His duration is unknowable in terms of our ability to see it but most definitely everlasting and eternal…

Eternal and everlasting(forever) are two very different words. To me eternal communicates both the nature of, and the duration of, the life of God and the world(s) to come. Everlasting, only the duration. Yet both words are used to convey aion/aionios, which, imo, are interpretations of olam.

So to me in certain places, based in the context, eternal is in places an appropriate English word to describe unknowable duration AND the unforseeable nature of the “world/ages” to come, especially when connected to the resurrection life of the saints and of divine nature of God.

What I want to know is what Jesus, John, Paul, James and Peter were thinking when they spoke.