L6
Adding and Removing
Ἐάν τις ἐπιτιθῆ προς ταῦτα, ἐπιθήσει ὁ Θεὸς ἐπ᾿ αὐτὸν τὰς πληγὰς τὰς γεγραμμένας ἐν βιβλίῳ τούτῳ· καὶ ἐάν τις ἀφαιρῇ ἀπὸ τῶν λόγων βίβλου τῆς προφητείας ταύτης, ἀφαιρήσεῖ ὁ Θεὸς τὸ μέρος αὐτοῦ ἀπὸ βίβλου τῆς ζωῆς, καὶ ἐκ τῆς πόλεως τῆς ἁγίας, τῶν γεγραμμένων ἐν βιβλίῳ τούτῳ.—ΚΑΤΑ ΙΩΑΝΝΗΝ 22:18-19 [i]
If any man shall add unto these things, God shall add unto him the plagues that are written in this book: And if any man shall take away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part out of the book of life, and out of the holy city, and from the things which are written in this book. —Revelation 22:18-19 [ii]
Translations Must Add & Remove
We are all familiar with the warning in the 22nd Chapter of the Apocalypse concerning anyone who either adds or removes from the “words of the book of this prophecy”. The phrase “shall take away” is a translation of the single Greek word ἀφαιρέω; which is a compound of the preposition ἀπο, meaning “away from”, and αιρέομαι, meaning “to take for oneself”. The same word is translated “smote” or “cut off” in reference to the ear of the high-priests’ servant that Peter removed with his sword. So, ἀφαιρέω has the sense of to remove some smaller piece from a greater whole.
The Greek word translated “add”, ἐπιτίθημι, is a compound of the preposition ἐπι, meaning “superimpose”; and τίθημι, meaning “to place”, particularly to place down in a passive or horizontal position (along with γονύ, knee, it is translated “to kneel”, albeit this is properly kneel prostrate—see Luke 22:41). So, ἐπιτίθημι has the sense of placing over top of.
By the way, ἐπιτίθημι is the same word translated “wounded” when joined with πληγή, a stroke (or, figuratively, a calamity) in Luke 10:30. So, “to add strokes onto”—which is the very same combination found in Revelation 22:19! “Whom the Lord loveth He scourgeth” indeed (Heb 12:6).
It is also interesting to note that it is not the words of the prophecy that are to be left alone, but the words of the book of the prophecy. In other words, it is the text of the Book of Revelation that is to be left unadulterated—the Greek text. This is a good thing for translators and publishers—they can play around with the English words all they want (despite what the KJ-only folks say)—but not so good for Westcott and Hort, and anyone else who has followed their lead and added to and removed from the GNT. In the absence of heavy repentance, they are all in a great deal of trouble.
It is no small thing that the admonition is restricted to the original text and therefore translations are permitted, since the spoken word carries the spirit of the person speaking. When someone preaches from the Holy Spirit within, irrespective of the language or words used, a believer listening will respond to the Spirit and “hear” what the Lord wants him to hear. As with the Day of Pentecost in Acts 2, those who heard the “wonderful works of God” did so in their own mother tongues, regardless of what the Apostles were actually saying. Those today who hear the wonderful works of God from someone’s mouth can then go to the written word to get more of the Word of God—providing they are literate and have a translation in their own language.
However, that being said, a person reading a translation must still keep in mind that it is not the original inspired text of the Word of God and be careful not to cling obsessively to the constructions of his non-biblical language. God will use these “foreign” words to call His sheep, but the translation user must be circumspect in his interpretation and teaching of it.
For us studying the English Bible with the help of the GNT, along with remembering the uninspired nature of our translations, we must also become aware of the types of things the translators added and subtracted from the original texts and why. We must learn what changes are made out of error—whether through malice or incompetence—and out of necessity.
And with that we have our sixth General Principle: Learn the additions and subtractions of the NT.
Warnings in All of Scripture
Of course it can be argued that the above warning from Revelation should not be applied to the entirety of Scripture, since the Apocalypse was not initially written as the final book of the cannon of the Bible. However, it cannot be argued that God was unaware of where this book would end up and therefore must have had it written by John for this very purpose.
In any case, there are plenty of other places throughout the Bible where God warns against adding to or subtracting from His Word:
1 Corinthians 4:6: And these things, brethren, I have in a figure transferred to myself and [to] Apollos for your sakes; that ye might learn in us not to think [of men] above that which is written, that no one of you be puffed up for one against another.
Deuteronomy 4:2: Ye shall not add unto the word which I command you, neither shall ye diminish [ought] from it, that ye may keep the commandments of the LORD your God which I command you.
Deuteronomy 12:32: What thing soever I command you, observe to do it: thou shalt not add thereto, nor diminish from it.
Proverbs 30:5-6: Every word of God [is] pure: he [is] a shield unto them that put their trust in him. Add thou not unto his words, lest he reprove thee, and thou be found a liar.
Psalms 119:160: Thy word [is] true [from] the beginning: and every one of thy righteous judgments [endureth] for ever.
Psalms 138:2: I will worship toward thy holy temple, and praise thy name for thy lovingkindness and for thy truth: for thou hast magnified thy word above all thy name.
The Modern GNT Text
Since we are not reading from manuscripts, we must also be aware that the modern GNT texts have been added to and subtracted from—not the words, thankfully, in the case of the Textus Receptus, but the punctuation and formatting. As the introductions in the front of our interlinear NT’s will tell us, the autographs of the GNT were written entirely in capital letters, called “uncials”, with no punctuation, paragraphing and few, if any, spaces between the words. Lowercase letters, or cursives, were not developed until the 10th Century or so. Diacritical marks, like breathings and accents were added to some later manuscripts, but their forms were not yet standardized and their application haphazard. If the autographs were posted on an internet forum, it would look like the Apostles were shouting insanely.
Here’s what the original manuscript text of John 1:1-2 looked like:
ΕΝΑΡΧΗΝΟΛΟΓΟΣΚΑΙΟΛΟΓΟΣΗΝΠΡΟΣΤΟΝΘΕΟΝΚΑΙ ΘΕΟΣΗΝΟΛΟΓΟΣΟΥΤΟΣΗΝΕΝΑΡΧΗΠΡΟΣΤΟΝΘΕΟΝ
So, a great deal of addition was done to transform the original into this:
᾿Εν ἀρχῇ ἦν ὁ λόγος, καὶ ὁ λόγος ἦν πρὸς τὸν Θεόν, καὶ Θεὸς ἦν ὁ λόγος. οὗτος ἦν ἐν ἀρχῇ πρὸς τὸν Θεόν.
The Modern English NT
Of course, an even greater deal of addition was done to transform the original into this:
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God.
A quick list of other things added to our modern English NT:
- Chapters and verse numbers (note the damage done to the dialogue from the insertion of a chapter break between chapters 9 & 10 of John’s Gospel)
- Subheadings (chapter & verse subheadings are editorial commentary, not translated Scripture)
- Capital letters on proper names (note all the times the word “spirit” was capitalized in Rom 8; the translators were guessing whenever the word stood alone)
- Indefinite articles (there are no a’s or an’s in Greek. Unless a noun is a predicate nominative, like the second “God” in John 1:1, its up to context to determine if an “a” or “an” should be added)
- Gender in 3rd person singular verbs (see Mat 8:15 & Mark 1:31; in both verses the “she” could be replaced by “he” or “it” and still be translated correctly)
- Synonyms (the word πίστις is translated “faith” and “belief” see 1 Pet 1:21; the word ἐκλεκτός is rendered “chosen” and “elect”; see Mark 13:20)
Here’s a quick list of things removed from the GNT by our modern English NT:
- Gender and Case (Matt 1:16 “of whom” ἐξ ης Reflx pron, gen, sing, fem)
- Number in the 2nd person plural (see the switch from singular to plural “you” in the Greek text of Luke 22:31)
- The middle voice (The word ἐκλεγομαι means “to elect” but as it is a middle voice form, it carries the added sense of “the benefit of the chooser”. See Mark 13:20)
Cultural Context
There is another very important element of the GNT that has, in some sense, been both added and removed in our English NT’s. Turn to Acts 19:35 in the English translation, the KJV, where we read the following:
And when the townclerk had appeased the people, he said, “Ye men of Ephesus, what man is there that knoweth not how that the city of the Ephesians is a worshipper of the great goddess Diana, and of the image which fell down from Jupiter?”
The first thing we should notice is that the words “ye” and “image” are in italics. As we all know, italics indicate a word that does not appear in the original text, but has been inserted for the sake of readability—however, be advised that, in the case of the KJV, not every single word added is in italics (see below).
Now, let’s take a look at the verse in the Greek text:
καταστείλας δὲ ὁ γραμματεὺς τὸν ὄχλον φησίν, Ἄνδρες ᾿Εφέσιοι, τίς γάρ ἐστιν ἄνθρωπος ὃς οὐ γινώσκει τὴν ᾿Εφεσίων πόλιν νεωκόρον οὖσαν τῆς μεγάλης θεᾶς ᾿Αρτέμιδος καὶ τοῦ Διοπετοῦς;
Let’s do a line by line comparison:
And when the townclerk had appeased the people, he said,
καταστείλας δὲ ὁ γραμματεὺς τὸν ὄχλον φησίν,
The “when” does not exist in the Greek text. It was added because the word καταστείλας is an aorist active participle, a verbal noun equivalent to the English participle “appeased”, and the tense and voice tell us the activity took place prior to the next verb (“he said”). To reflect this in English one adds “when”; one could've added “having” or “once he” before “appeased”.
The word translated “townclerk” is γραμματεύς, which is literally “a person who writes”, a “writer”. Therefore, not surprisingly, in the 66 other times in the GNT where this word occurs it is translated “scribe”. In all those other places (except for 1 Corinthians 1:20), however, the γραμματεύς was in Jerusalem.
“Ye men of Ephesus, what man is there
Ἄνδρες ᾿Εφέσιοι, τίς γάρ ἐστιν ἄνθρωπος
The “ye” is added to indicate the Vocative case of “men of Ephesus”. The vocative case is the case of direct address. The phrase “of Ephesus” (for᾿Εφέσιοι) could be “Ephesians”, since the Greek is simply an adjective qualifying “men”.
The “there” in the English is not there in the Greek. This is an addition called the “preparatory there”—a “there” which prepares the reader for the fact that the subject follows the verb. Note that the Greek is literally “what for is (a) man”—the “for” being post-positive, meaning it should be read as the first word. The “for what is a man” is the clue that this is preparatory.
that knoweth not how that the city of the Ephesians
ὃς οὐ γινώσκει τὴν ᾿Εφεσίων πόλιν
Like the example of Matthew 1:16 given above, the “that”/ὃς is another example of how English doesn’t show case and gender in reflexive pronouns.
is a worshipper of the great goddess Diana,
νεωκόρον οὖσαν τῆς μεγάλης θεᾶς ᾿Αρτέμιδος
Notice that the translators have changed the Greek Artemis into the Latin Diana. This could be either a result of a translator’s preference for the Roman name or because the Ephesian Artemis was not the same Artemis, the sister of Apollo, of Greek Mythology. The Ephesian Artemis had much more in common with a Persian moon-goddess, and Diana is the archetypical name for a moon-goddess.
and of the image which fell down from Jupiter?”
καὶ τοῦ Διοπετοῦς;
Again, the word “image” is marked as not being in the Greek text, but notice how over-translated the whole Greek clause is! Here’s what’s going on:
The word Διοπετοῦς is the genitive singular form of διοπετής; which is made up of Δίς, an obsolete form of the Greek word for “Zeus”, the supreme deity in the Greek Pantheon; and πίπτω, meaning “to fall”. So, τοῦ Διοπετοῦς means “of the fallen-from-Zeus”. Jupiter is the Roman equivalent of Zeus, so, possibly to maintain the continuity of changing Artemis to Diana, the translators said it “fell down from Jupiter”.
What is being referred to here is a statue of Artemis that sat in the Temple of Diana in Ephesus. The statue was reputed to have fallen from the heavens—hence “from Zeus”.
As to adding and removing, notice in the case of the statue of Artemis, the translators both added some things—the word “image” and the Roman names—and removed some things—the Greek names. While it could be argued that these changes made a more sensible sentence than a straight word for word translation would’ve done, I think it would’ve been better to have given a literal, word-for-word translation, and then, for the sake of clarity, added a margin or footnote to explain what was being referred to.
In any case, there are a multitude of these kinds of cultural and historical references in the Bible and to understand them we are forced to consult the historical and archaeological records. Happily for us, there are just as more reference books explaining them than there are references: Books like F. H. Wight’s Manners and Cultures of Bible Lands, or the books of Alfred Edersheim (available free on e-sword or as a pdf download on the internet). One the best is McClintock and Strong's Cyclopedia—a fantastic resource which is, unfortunately, out of print, but still available on line (don’t pay hundreds! You can get a disc or download of it for less than $25).
Conclusion
So, with all that, we see that both the modern Greek texts and the English translations of the New Testament have all been added to and had things removed—of necessity and through questionable decision making. The only defence we have as students of the Bible is to heed our sixth General Principle and learn the additions and subtractions of the NT.
[i] All Greek citations from THE NEW TESTAMENT IN GREEK ACCORDING TO THE TEXT FOLLOWED IN THE AUTHORISED VERSION TOGETHER WITH THE VARIATIONS ADOPTED IN THE REVISED VERSION, edited by F.H.A. Scrivener; CAMBRIDGE: At the University Press 1949.
[ii] Whilst all English Bible verses are taken from the King James Version, modern punctuation and quotation markings will often be used where appropriate without reference (I.e. Capitalization after question marks; double inverted commas on opening quotes, then single inverted commas for internal quotations.).
