All Greek (or Hebrew) to Me
Additional context is good...but we don't need to be experts.
May, 2016
As was mentioned last month, a major goal of BibleRef.com is accessibility. We want the material to be easy to find, easy to navigate, and easy to use. We strive to make it meaningful enough that anyone, regardless of experience, can benefit from it. In particular, though, our purpose is to encourage deeper study. For that reason, you'll notice that BibleRef often includes references to the original Hebrew and Greek words…just not too often.
Whether or not to delve into ancient languages, for any given verse, is judged on the same principle used to gauge commentary length. Too little information makes the verse harder to understand. Too much makes it intimidating and overly complex to study. There are some places in Scripture where, frankly, any translation is going to lose a bit of the original flavor. Those spots, in particular, are the ones we target for additional depth, using Greek or Hebrew.
Those who study the Bible for any length of time will quickly run across the example of the English word "love," as opposed to the various Greek words it is translated from. There are important differences between agape, phileo, eros, and storge, most of which are lost when moving to a single English word. One reason we're casual about our use of Greek is that some readers are not particularly comfortable with deep, academic study—and that's fine. Discipleship doesn’t have to be like getting a Master's degree. But "love" is a good example of why some basic, layman-level information about Greek, given at the right time, can help the reader better interpret the Bible.
Another example, much less commonly known, comes in Philippians 3:8. There, Paul describes his significant worldly accomplishments, in comparison to knowing Christ, using the Greek word skubalon. Major translations interpret this using English words such as "garbage," "rubbish," "dung," or "filth." Those are reasonably accurate, but they don’t have quite the punch of the original. The term Paul uses, in Greek, almost always refers to the contents of an animal's intestines. Meaning digestive waste matter. Feces. Poop. You can probably imagine other synonyms.
Paul's intent in that verse isn’t to be crude or vulgar, rather he's making a deliberately pungent comparison. In essence, he says that there is no comparison: there is the knowledge of Christ, and then there is…excrement. One only gets the vague idea from the English translation. But having a better sense of the Greek restores some of the impact carried by Paul's original turn of phrase. After listing his own outstanding earthly credentials, Paul puts a relationship with Christ so far above them that he reaches for a metaphor which is vivid and visceral, no pun intended.
One of the great advantages of our modern world is the amount of information we can access. Reading and understanding the Bible has never required great intellect, or extensive education. And yet, the common person today has access to resources prior generations never dreamed of. Some of the most useful are sources explaining the Greek and Hebrew in which the Bible was originally written. For that reason, because BibleRef is targeted at the "typical" Christian believer, we feel it's important to touch on those ancient words. At least, in those places where it greatly helps to explain the meaning of the author.
So, don’t be intimidated when you see the occasional reference to original languages at BibleRef. It's all Greek—or Hebrew—to us, too.
-- Editor
