[This is one in a series of devotional reflections prepared for Horley Baptist Church during January 2023]
Living languages are, of necessity, dynamic; vocabulary evolves over time. Words are concocted, contextualised, corrupted and then, in due course, consigned to history. For an example we can look at Spurgeon’s “Morning and Evening” published in 1866. His still-popular collection of daily devotional reflections contains words that have radically different meanings from what was intended when originally written. Going back further, we can look at the works by Shakespeare – it’s English but not as we know it.
Social and geographical factors also have an impact; one only has to consider how English is used (or misused) in different parts of the world. A word that, in Australia, identifies a style of footwear is used for a type of undergarment elsewhere. Similarly, an American talking about a flat is unlikely to be referring to an apartment. If we add in the multiplicity of languages that the Bible has been translated into then the potential for diversity in understanding it is compounded.
A third aspect is that of technology. As new ideas become common so terminology evolves to describe them. Those men who originally committed Scripture to writing were doing so under the influence of the Holy Spirit but they were constrained by the vocabulary of their time. The ‘clay and iron’ mix in Nebuchadnezzar’s statue could well be describing reinforced concrete, but such a concept would not have been understood at that time. It is ironic – or perhaps an indication of God’s sense of humour – that the empire usually associated with that part of the statue is also the one accredited with the invention of cement.
In addition to the limits of vocabulary there is also the concept of ‘need to know’. What did Jesus do between the ages of 12 and 30? There were 12 apostles (14 if you count Matthias and Paul) but the Bible recounts the activities of only a few of them – what did the others do after the events recorded in Acts 2? These gaps in the records allow opportunities for speculation and for the development of traditions that may or may not have some foundation in actuality.
Allied with ‘need to know’ is ‘need to be told’ or ‘it goes without saying’. The Biblical accounts and apostolic letters were written with particular people in mind, people whose circumstances and customs were common knowledge and did not need to be spelt out. Without this common knowledge the context of what has been written is lost, with a consequent risk of misunderstanding the message.
Those of us who cannot read the Bible text in its original languages have to trust that the translators did their work diligently. Nevertheless, how can we have any confidence in the words that we read in our modern Bibles? Do we share the doubts of the character in the Gershwin brothers’ opera ‘Porgy and Bess’ who was sceptical about what he read in the Bible?[1] The apostle Paul addressed this question when writing to his protege Timothy:
All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness 2 Timothy 3:16 [NIVUK]
Can we trust Paul’s opinion? Some people who heard Paul preach in Berea were sceptical about what he said so they searched the scriptures to verify Paul’s words.[2] Are we sufficiently familiar with the scriptures to copy that example? Do we need to echo the psalmist’s prayer:
Open my eyes that I may see wonderful things in your law. Ps 119 v18 [NIVUK]
That prayer cannot be answered if our Bibles remain closed.
Resources:
[1] ‘Porgy and Bess’, George and Ira Gershwin, 1935
[2] Acts 17 v11
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Contributed by Steve Humphreys; © the Author
Steve. W.r.t. The acts of some of the apostles we have in our church a family from Chennai or Madras as we knew it. The area was visited by Thomas in the 1st century a.d. and outside Chennai there is the hill of St. Thomas where he was murdered by a local ruler and so Modi the current prime minister of India is talking through the back of his head when he insists that all Indians should be Hindu because the Christian church has been in India for 2,000 years and is not an import of the British!