NET Bible Blog

The Hebrew word is gēr (גֵּר). What was a sojourner/ foreigner/ immigrant/ resident alien/ stranger? It is not the same thing to be an immigrant in, say, Japan, as it is to be an immigrant in America. Was it the same thing for Abraham to be a sojourner in Canaan as it was for someone to be a sojourner in Israel? The translators of the Septuagint didn’t think so. And for good reason. And does that difference make any difference when Peter calls us “foreigners” (NET)/ “aliens” (NIV)/ “sojourners” (ESV)/ “strangers” (KJV)?

The foremost task of translating is to translate what is there. What do the words say? What does the syntax mean? A translation might need to be more dynamic than literal to make the clearest sense in the target language, but it is still trying to translate what's there.

When should we “translate” what isn't there? And how do we do it?

In this second post about words related to the recent controversy over Rob Bell and his book Love Wins, I examine the word “hades” in the NET Bible. (See the first post on sheol in the NET Bible here.) Again, my goal is to get a better sense for what we are doing with these passages so we can be sure the NET Bible is helping the church with our translations of these key passages.

Because of the recent brouhaha over Rob Bell’s new book, Love Wins, we all have the chance to think more carefully about how we understand key biblical texts on heaven and hell. See, for example, my colleague Darrell Bock’s recent posts on this point. Much of this discussion centers upon key terms for hell in both the Old and New Testaments. To be sure there are many other angles which we can use to discuss this problem, but the discussion has to start here. And in a real sense, how these terms are translated is important because the Church at large will use the available translations to think about these issues. So this recent discussion made me want to look at how the NET Bible translates some of the key terms which are up for discussion, namely, the Hebrew word sheol and the Greek words hades and gehenna. For this post I took a look at the Hebrew term in the NET Bible, and to be honest I was surprised at what I found.

The NET Bible as a translation has been able to plow new ground in two major ways: content and format. Because we have a unique format with extensive notes which explain the translation, we can express valid exegetical decisions which might not be very traditional. One example brought to my attention recently was Ecclesiastes 9:15, which reads like this in the NET Bible:

A reader recently left a comment in our comments database with the following question:

The NET Bible translation of Colossians 2:13 begins “And even though.” I assume this is a translation of the KAI that leads into the statement that follows, because there is nothing else in that statement that I’m aware of that could yield the meaning “even though.” But why not take KAI as epexegetic or explanatory? The translation then could be “that is.” Since the statement that follows the connecting KAI has to do with being “co-quickened” - a term that seems to parallel the “co-raised” in the previous verse - it would seem reasonable that Paul is further explaining what he had just stated. Is there any reason to reject such an understanding of Paul’s meaning?

Although not directly related to the NET Bible,

In the first edition of the NET Bible, Matthew 7:13-14 reads as follows:

7:13 “Enter through the narrow gate, because the gate is wide and the way is spacious that leads to destruction, and there are many who enter through it. 7:14 But the gate is narrow and the way is difficult that leads to life, and there are few who find it.

Dr. Chris Skinner recently blogged about a translation particular to the NET Bible. (Chris and I overlapped at DTS by a number of years, and I consider him a friend, so this is "iron sharpening iron," so to speak.) Let me offer a little background to help set the stage.