Accounting for Translation Differences

Look for background to describe what you're seeing.

Having noticed differences between translations, you begin sorting the information you have gathered so far. What accounts for the differences you have seen?

Exegesis with English Only

If you are working only in English, look for help in sources like these:

Footnotes that Are Part of the Translation

These are the same notes you began by looking at. They were written by the committee responsible for the translation you are reading.

Footnotes in a Study Bible

Sometimes the commentators who write study Bible footnotes will discuss translation options.  For example, at the beginning of the Beatitudes (Matthew 5:3), the Harper Collins Study Bible has this note:  "Blessed, i.e., 'happy' or 'fortunate' (see Ps 1.102; Prov 8.32, 34)."  Here, the author of the notes gives us synonyms for the word that begins each beatitude, as well as some Old Testament texts to look at for additional background on the word, "blessed."

Translation Preface

At the front of your Bible, in a section titled something like, "To the Reader," the translators will tell you their goals for the translation. 

• This is where you learn, for example, that the NRSV editors have changed singular Greek constructions referring to generic human beings to plural English ones where needed to ensure the inclusion of both men and women. 
• Reading the NIV preface, you will learn this conclusion by its editors: "Because for most readers today the phrase 'the Lord of hosts' and 'God of hosts' have little meaning, this version renders them 'the Lord Almighty' and 'God Almighty.'" 

A translation preface will not answer all your questions, but it may explain some of the quirks of the translation.

Exegesis with Greek

If you are working also in Greek, you have these additional resources at your disposal.

Greek New Testament

If you read Greek, your copy of the Greek New Testament is a great source for gathering background on differences between translations. The Greek text of Matthew 27:65, our example of different verb forms above, will tell you that Pilate's speech to the Pharisees includes the words .  The fact that both indicative and imperative verb forms are spelled the same explains the difference between the NASB's "You have a guard" (meaning something like, "Stop bothering me; take care of it with your own temple guard.") and the NIV's "Take a guard (meaning more like, "Here are troops. Rome will help you guard the tomb.").

A Lexicon

A lexicon works like a dictionary, giving you the range of meanings a word has at certain points in its life.  The standard lexicon for studying New Testament Greek is A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature, 3rd ed., Frederick Danker, ed. (Chicago:  Univ. of Chicago Press, 2000). To use the lexicon, you have to know enough Greek to be able to use the alphabet and find the dictionary form of your word.

BibleWorks, available on Luther Seminary computers or through the Homelab, can help you find the range of meanings for Greek words even in you do not have much Greek knowledge. Read the text in the New American Standard version, and when you mouse over a word, the Greek dictionary form will appear as a pop-up beside the English word. BibleWorks also has a lexicon window that will give you the dictionary entry of the word you are mousing over.

Tools for Understanding Manuscript Differences

The Greek Text's Apparatus

When the wording of a particular verse is disputed, the apparatus (those footnotes at the bottom of a critical text of the Greek New Testament) will give you information about which words appear in which manuscripts. If you know some Greek, you can begin to make sense of the apparatus for yourself. Online tutorials can help orient you to textual criticism and help you see what the editors of your Greek text were looking at as they made their decisions about what should be in the text and what should be placed in the footnotes.

Interpreting Ancient Manuscripts is a tutorial on text criticism from Timothy W. Seid, Assistant Professor of New Testament, Earlham School of Religion.

Textual Criticism is a PowerPoint presentation posted on the web by Jame Boyce, Professor of New Testament, Luther Seminary.

Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament

Metzger, Bruce. A Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament, 4th revised edition. Stuttgart : Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft ; New York : United Bible Societies, 1994. This book, widely available in academic libraries and on permanent desk reserve at Luther Seminary, lists important textual variants and explains the choices of the United Bible Societies editors for what to put in the text and what to put in the apparatus notes.

You can also find variants in the gospels discussed in TCG 2005—An Online Texual Commentary on the Greek Gospels compiled by Wieland Willker.

What's Next: Judging Translation Differences

After you have noticed translation differences and gathered information about how they came to be, you still have to decide which translation is best suited to the purpose you have in mind when reading a particular text. The next page describes two steps in that judgment process

Next: Judging Translation Differences