Minding my Ps and Qs

In response to the article by Dr. Fraser, Wayne Grudem sent this reply concerning linguistics and Bible translation in a gender-sensitive society.

While we have already changed the Colorado Springs translation guidelines to account for the problem with 'brothers' that Dr. Fraser mentions, I don't entirely agree with his arguments on generic 'he'. Perhaps it is true that people are more likely to think of a man in a sentence such as: 'If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and eat with him and he with me . . .'

Yet I suspect that ancient Greek readers would have had the same response if polled by the same type of linguistic researcher. Surely this is not because the church addressed in Revelations 3.20 was made up only or primarily of men! Rather, it may be simply that when one thinks of a representative individual out of a group of men and women, one is more likely to think of a man.

The female him

Note that many women also followed Jesus (see Luke 8.3, where 'many others' is feminine). And even when talking to an individual woman, he used generic 'he', telling the woman at the well: 'Whoever drinks the water that I shall give him will never thirst.' (John 4.14). Jesus considered the third person masculine singular pronoun (Gk. autos, 'he, him') to be inclusive when used in general sentences like this, even when speaking to one woman alone.

I suspect that the use of the masculine pronoun in a generic singular statement reflects what J.I. Packer (in the forthcoming issue of Christianity Today) suggests is: 'a pervasive biblical and general revelation witness to a male priority (headship, however precisely defined) in the order of creation.' He adds; '. . . while the debate about this continues, and everyone understands, even if some do not like, the inclusive masculine, the wise way is not to paraphrase it out . . . The rule should surely be: where there is doubt or dispute about the significance of the data, render literally so that readers have access to the wording of the original and so can engage with the problem directly.'

Opening the door

Nor am I persuaded that only minor significance attaches to changing 'he' or 'they'. Of course individuals are included in any group of 'they', but the individual nature of the fellowship between Jesus and a specific believer is simply not conveyed in Revelation 3.20 by 'any one' opening the door - for the door gives entrance into 'them', which will surely be understood as plural. Similar considerations attach to numerous other verses.

Wayne Grudem,
President, Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood

Three small changes to translation guidelines

After considering comments from many people, the signers of the May 27 translation guidelines have agreed to the following changes:

Change 1: A.3.

'Man' should ordinarily be used to designate the human race [DELETE: or human beings in general], for example in Genesis 1.26-27; 5.2; Ezekiel 29.11; and John 2.25.

This is because the phrase was confusing and widely misunderstood. Many people thought we meant that women should always be called 'men', which we surely did not intend!

Change 2: B.1.

'Brother' (adelphos) should not be changed to 'brother or sister'; [ADD: however, the plural adelphoi can be translated 'brothers and sisters' where the context makes clear that the author is referring to both men and women.]

This does not say it has to be translated that way, but that it can be. (Translators still might want to keep 'brothers' for the sake of continuity in Bible translations, for example). This change is a result of much evidence from Greek lexicons and Greek literature that we were unaware of earlier (see further information below).

Change 3: C.

We understand these guidelines to be representative and not exhaustive, [ADD: and that some details may need further refinement.]

The endorsers of the statement recognise that there may yet be new information or more precise ways of formulating certain things, but they would only be refinements, not fundamental changes.

Evidence regarding adelphoi as 'brothers and sisters'

Many times the plural word adelphoi means 'brothers', and refers only to males. But in Greek, the masculine plural form of a word is also used when referring to a mixed group of men and women. In the following actual sentences from Greek literature, the sense 'brother and sister' or 'brothers and sisters' seems to be required:

1. That man is a cousin of mine: his mother and my father were adelphoi
2. My father died leaving me and my adelphoi Ted and Thelma as his heirs, and his property devolved upon us.
3. The footprints of adelphoi should never match (of a man and of a woman): the man's is greater.
4. An impatient and critical man finds fault even with his own parents and children and adelphoi and neighbours.* see footnote

In standard English, we just don't say: 'My brothers Ted and Thelma.' So the Greek plural adelphoi sometimes has a different sense from English 'brothers'. In fact, the major Greek lexicons for over 100 years have said that adelphoi which is the plural of the word adelphos, 'brother', sometimes means 'brothers and sisters'. (so BAGD, 1957 and 1979; Liddell-Scott-Jones, 1940 and even 1869).

This material was new evidence for those of us who wrote the May 27 guidelines - we weren't previously aware of this pattern of Greek usage outside the Bible. Once we saw these examples and others like them, we felt we had to make some change in the guidelines.

One other factor influencing our decision was that the masculine adelphos and the feminine adelphe are just different forms (masculine and feminine) of the same word adelph-, which is again different from English where bro- and sis- are completely different roots. (The root adelph- is from a-, which means 'from', and delphus, 'womb' (LSJ, p.20), and probably had an early sense of 'from the same womb').

Therefore in the New Testament, when Paul wrote: 'Therefore, I urge you, brothers (adelphoi), in view of God's mercy . . .' (Romans 12.1), it seems that the original hearers would have understood him to mean something very much like 'brothers and sisters' in English today. (Or technically 'siblings', but that is not the way anyone speaks to anyone else today: would we say: 'Therefore, I urge you, siblings . . .'?).

Why then does the New Testament sometimes specify 'brothers and sisters', putting both masculine (adelphoi) and feminine (adelphai) forms (as in Matthew 19.29 or Mark 10.30)? Sometimes the authors may have specifically included feminine forms in order to prevent any possible misunderstanding, to make it very clear that women as well as men were included in a certain statement.

These changes will now be included in all future printings of the guidelines. I think they make the guidelines stronger, more accurate, and more likely to gain general acceptance from the broader Christian world.

Footnote:

The quotations are found in the following sources:
1 Andocides, On the Mysteries 47 [approx. 400 BC];
2 Oxyrhynchus Papyri 713, 20-23 [97 AD; with Greek names Diodorus and Theis, not Ted and Thelma];
3 Euripides, Electra 536 [5th century BC];
4 Epictetus, Discourses 1.12.20-21 [approx. 130 AD].

On gender-related language in Scripture