common mistranslations list?

[manimal2878]

I am trying to find a list of commonly mistranslated bibkle words.

There is a lot of study of this going on with the word hell in the new univerisalist movement, so much so that new bible tranlations have no or few referances to hell, they the original words sheol, gehenna, hades, grave, unseen or whatever?

THere is also stuff about the word church and that it's original meaning was group or cingrafgation thus breaking the belief in the need for a hierichal church.

Then there is stuff about wthe original word for work being translated one way to support protastents and then another when it would have supportes RC's.

I have googled a bunch for a simple type list, found lots of articles but no list type document, i have heard there is one or some kind of pamphelet out there, any of you uys got any hints?

[manimal2878]

on a side note, in lookinf for this list i have came across a lot of angry christians who seem to resent the bible errors being corrected in new bible version and hurting there precious KJV.

You would think with there appeals to inerrancy they would be happy to have the errors corrected, but somehow they are not errors but what god intended, weird!

[yalla]

My favourite "mistranslation'' is in Paul's Galatians 1.16. in the RSV:
god..."was pleased to reveal his son [..] me,..."
Put the word "to'' in the bracket and it conveys a certain meaning.
Insert instead the alternate translation for the Gk., which I have read is more valid, and the meaning changes considerably and to the detriment of orthodox interpretation.
The alternate is "in".
Try it.See what I mean?
I have also read that when the text says "servant" the correct translation is frequently "slave".

[Julian]

I have also read that when the text says "servant" the correct translation is frequently "slave".
That is correct. The word in greek is δουλος and it means slave but is frequently (always?) translated as servant. Paul also address his congregations as αδελφοι which means brothers and is translated as brethren in KJV (an okay translation) but as brothers and sisters in NRSV.

To the credit of NRSV they always put the proper translation in the footnotes. There are other examples which can be found with some searching on google.

BTW, you also see �γιοι, meaning holy ones but frequently translated as saints which is somewhat anachronistic.

Julian

[Joan of Bark]

The most common mistranslation is of the sixth commandment word 'RATSACH' (sp?). Some Bibles translate the word as 'kill'; others as 'murder'. Most modern scholars lead toward 'murder' as being more consistent with the rest of the OT. Keep this one in mind whenever arguing with believers over the importance of the Ten Commandments.

[vsop44]

there is at least one book that quotes mistranlations , I got one from my library that I perused but unfortunately I can't remember the title .
My favorite mistranslation is Matthew 19 : 24
.....It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than a rich man......

The mistranslation , here , is pretty obvious , Kamelis in greek is a cable or a big rope and kameles is a camel .
I'll try to find the title of the book for you Manimal .

[manimal2878]

thanks, that would be awesome.

[Diogenes the Cynic]

In 1 Corinthians 6:9 and 1 Timothy 1:9-10 the Greek words, malakoi and arsenokoitai are often falsely translated as "effeminates" and "homosexuals" respectively.

Malakos literally means "soft," but it was often used to indicate moral softness with a particular implication of a lack of moral discipline. To be even more specific, it was used to describe guys who were not the masters of their domains, if you get my drift (I've been told that it still carries this implication in Modern Greek, and translates roughly as "wanker").

It could also be used to indicate womanizers but there is no evidence that it was used to indicate effeminate men or homosexuals.

Arsenokoitai is a huge can of worms unto itself. It seems to have been a term coined by Paul himself and its xact meaning is unknown. It is a compund of two words, arsenos ("male") and koites ("bed"). The word translates literally to "male-bedder." Most of the attestations for the word subsequent to Paul occur in vice lists which do not provide enough context to determine the exact meaning. It might seem like a no-brainer to infer a meaning of homosexuality but it's not that simple. For one thing, the suffix koites pops up in other sexually derisive compounds. You see it used with stuff like "whore," "horse," "mother," etc. It's always derisive and "_____ fucker" is not an unreasonable approximation of the tone The thing is, though, that it always indicates the penetrating partner, never the passive. This would suggest that arsenokoites was not meant to describe both partners in an act, but only the aggressive one, which would let out a blanket definition of homosexuality.

Moreover, there are some instances where the word is applied to heterosexuals. In one case, it's used to indicate male prostitutes with female clients. In another, it's lamented that husbands are engaging in arsenokotes with their wives.

The weight of the circumstaniial evidence is that the word was associated with male prostitution and arguments are made both for the word indicating the prostitute and for it meaning the John.

In the {i]Apology of Aristides[/i], the word is used to refer to rape of Ganymedes by Zeus, and that would lend more weight to the argument that the term referred to the aggressor.

My guess is that it referred to pedarasty and to the common practice in Greek cities of men patronizing young male prostitutes. I might be wrong, but the point is that the exact meaning of arsenokoites is unknown, and any confident translation of the word as "homosexual" is quite problematic.

[judge]

there is at least one book that quotes mistranlations , I got one from my library that I perused but unfortunately I can't remember the title .
My favorite mistranslation is Matthew 19 : 24
.....It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than a rich man......

The mistranslation , here , is pretty obvious , Kamelis in greek is a cable or a big rope and kameles is a camel .
I'll try to find the title of the book for you Manimal .

Not only that but Mar Bahal a tenth centry lexiconographer (is that right?) tells us that Gamla in Aramaic is a large rope used to bind ships.

[judge]

My guess is that it referred to pedarasty and to the common practice in Greek cities of men patronizing young male prostitutes. I might be wrong, but the point is that the exact meaning of arsenokoites is unknown, and any confident translation of the word as "homosexual" is quite problematic.

For what it's worth i think the same argument can be made in the Aramaic (for a future time when everyone agrees with me ...:-) )

Here is Victor Alexanders translation of corithians 6:9

Or did you not know that [workers] of abomination will not inherit the Kingdom of God? Do not be at a loss. Neither adulterers, nor idol makers, nor fornicators, nor perverts, nor child molesters,*
10. And neither [workers] of abomination, nor thieves, nor drunkards, nor cursers, nor robbers, these shall not inherit the Kingdom of God.

*1 Cor 6:9 Lit. Ar. expression: "Those who have intercourse with young boys."

Even for those who hold to greek primacy the peshitta is still an early witness of the thinking.

1 Timothy 1 ,9-10 from Aramaic

9. As it is known that the Law was not consecrated for righteousness, except for abominations and desolation, for the licentious, the sinners and the accursed and those who are impure and those who beat their fathers and those who beat their mothers, and the killers,
10. And the fornicators and the molesters of male children and the abductors of the free and the liars and the oath breakers, and for everything that is in opposition to the wholesome knowledge,

[John Kesler]

there is at least one book that quotes mistranlations , I got one from my library that I perused but unfortunately I can't remember the title .
My favorite mistranslation is Matthew 19 : 24
.....It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than a rich man......

The mistranslation , here , is pretty obvious , Kamelis in greek is a cable or a big rope and kameles is a camel .
I'll try to find the title of the book for you Manimal .

This may not be a mistranslation. First, using the "more difficult reading is likely to be correct" criterion, it is more likely that a scribe "corrected" the word for camel by changing it to rope than that the "correction" went the other way. Bruce Metzger believes this is indeed what happened.

Second, later rabbinic literature made reference to an elephant passing through the eye of a needle, so it seems plausible that Jesus, too, referenced a large animal to point out the difficulty of the task.

See this source (http://www.sacred-texts.com/jud/t06/me104.htm) for example:

Said Rabha: "It was taught that it may be transferred to them, but they may not sell it. Such a case happened in Nahardea, and R. Shesheth did not allow the transfer of the property to his relative to be made, basing his decision upon the just quoted Boraitha." Said R. Amram. to him: "Perhaps the Boraitha is taught as Rabha amended it." And he rejoined: "Are you not a Pumbadithan, who tries to pass an elephant through the eye of a needle?

[fta]

One Xian apologist assured me there was a gate in Jerusalem called the "Eye of the Needle" which camels regularly walked through, i.e. Jesus was making a clever pun. Can anyone confirm or deny this?

[Soul Invictus]

One Xian apologist assured me there was a gate in Jerusalem called the "Eye of the Needle" which camels regularly walked through, i.e. Jesus was making a clever pun. Can anyone confirm or deny this?

I can confirm how utterly stupid this apologetic is.

[Diogenes the Cynic]

The camel gate thing is bullshit (http://www.biblicalhebrew.com/nt/camelneedle.htm).

[yalla]

Thanks Julian, I wondered who those saints in Paul were.

Another major "mistranslation", so I have read, is "betrayed" instead of "delivered up".
When used in the context of Judas etc. it completely alters the meaning.

Actually I'm presenting these for verification as I have no Gk. whatsoever.

I suspect these mistranslations are influenced by apologetic motives, pehaps subconciously. In the case of ''to'' vs. ''in'' in Galatians, a change to "in" strongly contradicts "Luke's" version of Paul's vision as an external rather than an internal "event".
Any comments?

[Chris Weimer]

Diogenes, the male-bedders is almost certainly taken from the Lev. 18.22. See this link (http://neonostalgia.com/forum/index.php?topic=163.0) for a discussion I was having about it.

[Diogenes the Cynic]

Diogenes, the male-bedders is almost certainly taken from the Lev. 18.22. See this link (http://neonostalgia.com/forum/index.php?topic=163.0) for a discussion I was having about it.
I'm aware of this argument, and while the LXX translation of Lev. 18:22 does contain the words arsenos and koites separately (and divided by another word), there is still no known usage of arsenokoites as a compound before Paul and the proximity of those two terms in a verse in Leviticus, while suggestive, is not absolute proof of the meaning of Paul's compound. This is particularly true when we add in the fact that there are known attestations of aresenokoites to refer to heterosexuals.

Not only that, but even the Leviticus passage probably only referred to cultic prostitution.

[S.C.Carlson]

I might be wrong, but the point is that the exact meaning of arsenokoites is unknown, and any confident translation of the word as "homosexual" is quite problematic.

The OED Supplement defines "homosexual" as "pertaining to or characterized by sexual propensity for one's own sex." As far as I am aware, no Greek word, much less arsenokoites, has this meaning.

Stephen

[Chris Weimer]

This is particularly true when we add in the fact that there are known attestations of aresenokoites to refer to heterosexuals.
Diogenes, I'm confused by this. Can you explain? And yes, I do think it refers only to the Levites, the "abomination" actually meaning ritually unclean.

[Diogenes the Cynic]

Diogenes, I'm confused by this. Can you explain? And yes, I do think it refers only to the Levites, the "abomination" actually meaning ritually unclean.
There is a quotation from John the Faster saying, "some men even commit the sin of arsenokoitai with their wives."

There is ( I think a Roman) attestation for aresenokoites being used to refer to male prostitutes who serviced women.

In addition to the hetero references there is also a reference from John Chrysostam who uses it to mean child molestation.

I mentioned above the use of the word to describe Zeus' Rape of Ganymedes in Aristide's Apology. There is one other literary use of the term for male -on-male rape in Hippolytus' Refutatio where it describes the rape of Adam by an evil angel named Naas.

Virtually all of the other attestations I'm aware of occur in vice lists which do not supply sufficient context.

As SCC said above, there wasn't really a Greek word for "homosexual" as we would define the word. The idea of homosexuality as a fixed orientation didn't even exist yet. The ancients didn't think in terms of "gay" and "straight," it was all just behavior and the words described specific acts rather than orientation.

I believe that, circumstantially, aresenokoites is most closely associated with male prostitution (particularly with young, enslaved "rent boys") which was a common practice in Hellenistic cities like Corinth and which was probably the most observable example of "male-bedding" that Paul would have been familiar with.

[Chris Weimer]

The OED Supplement defines "homosexual" as "pertaining to or characterized by sexual propensity for one's own sex." As far as I am aware, no Greek word, much less arsenokoites, has this meaning.

Stephen
I'm not at home at the moment, but when I get there I'll check my Latin-Greek dictionary for a translation of cinaedus.

[Chris Weimer]

There is a quotation from John the Faster saying, "some men even commit the sin of arsenokoitai with their wives."
Could that be a threesome?

There is ( I think a Roman) attestation for aresenokoites being used to refer to male prostitutes who serviced women.
If you could find that, I would greatly appreciate it.

As for Carlson's remark, paiderasths and cinaedus seem to work well for male-male relationships, although not exactly. Indeed, male-male sex was not only typical but approved of in Graeco-Roman societies, as long as you weren't the bitch (cinaedus).

[S.C.Carlson]

Could that be a threesome?

By the time you get as late as John the Faster, it probably just meant that they buggered their wives.

As for Carlson's remark, paiderasths and cinaedus seem to work well for male-male relationships, although not exactly. Indeed, male-male sex was not only typical but approved of in Graeco-Roman societies, as long as you weren't the bitch (cinaedus).

That final qualification is crucial and brings up another problem with the translation "homosexual"--it fails to capture the distinction, important in antiquity, between the man who was the dominant one and the male (usu. a boy, slave, or prostitute) who was the submissive one.

Stephen

[Diogenes the Cynic]

Could that be a threesome?
Doubtful. The exact phrasing is that "some men engage in the male-bedders' sin with their wives." I think most people just take it for granted that J the F was talking about anal sex, although, theoretically, I suppose it could have referred to women "pegging" their husbands or (even more remotely) husbands prostituting their wives.
If you could find that, I would greatly appreciate it.
I can't seem to find anything linkable (my google-fu is weak when it comes to this kind of thing) but I'm pretty sure I read it in one of John Boswell's books.

[Chris Weimer]

Blasted, I forgot again to look up cinaedus in my lexicon. Tomorrow though, I promise.

[seebs]

Diogenes, do you have links for this stuff? I have been trying for ages to find historical usages of arsenokoites outside the Bible, and I've come up with a couple of unsourced web pages asserting various things which would be convenient to the authors if true.

[Diogenes the Cynic]

Diogenes, do you have links for this stuff? I have been trying for ages to find historical usages of arsenokoites outside the Bible, and I've come up with a couple of unsourced web pages asserting various things which would be convenient to the authors if true.
I don't know of a free linkable site which would have a comprehesive listing for all attestations of the word, but the Thesaurus Linguae Graecae Database (http://www.library.mcgill.ca/cdroms/tlg.htm) is a subscription service which I think contains most, if not all of the extant attestations (42 of which are from vice lists).

[Chris Weimer]

Hrm, forgot about this. But as most should know by now, cinaedus comes from kinaidos, so Greek actually has a word perfectly suitable for homosexuality but is unused in the GNT...

[S.C.Carlson]

Hrm, forgot about this. But as most should know by now, cinaedus comes from kinaidos, so Greek actually has a word perfectly suitable for homosexuality but is unused in the GNT...

Well, the Greeks and Romans weren't content with just one word for homoeroticism in their system of sexual identity. Some of them are even being discovered just recently. (See, e.g., David Bain, "Two Submerged Items Of Greek Sexual Vocabulary from Aphrodisias," Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik 117 (1997) 81–84 PDF (http://www.stoa.org/diotima/essays/117081.pdf)).

In fact, one of the terms referring to the homoerotic role of the cinaedus even occurs in the NT. Specifically, this Princeton paper (http://web.archive.org/web/20010330045618/http://www.princeton.edu/~clee/paper.html#link) traces the history of the word malakos which pops up in 1 Cor 6:9.

Stephen

[S.C.Carlson]

More discussion about this topic is found on About.com's Non-Standard Roman Male Sexuality (http://ancienthistory.about.com/library/weekly/aa011500a.htm).

[Chris Weimer]

I always saw Paul's use of malakos as effeminate...