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So what difference does Aramaic primacy really make?
#1
Hi all,
I've been following this site for several years and am 99% convinced (enough to start learning Aramaic and change my view of my Nestle Greek NT). But having read all the evidences, its left me wondering a little- "so what?" I'm sure that working with the Aramaic unlocks the real meaning of passages so that a small % of the NT now makes sense which it doesn't in Greek. Great. But does it actually make a large enough difference to *really* matter? ie for most purposes isn't the Greek ok? Why or why not? (No I'm not Greek- I'm Aussie-Irish-German). I'm not trying to be funny here, but trying to understand the implications. Does it matter that much that we need to teach Aramaic at theology schools instead of Greek? In what way? What other impacts should it all have??

Also, since by implication of Aramaic primacy, Greek chiastic structures must therefore be based on underlying Aramaic structures, what other Aramaic structures and worldview issues have been missed by the Greek (ie, global level, not just the 20-30 good single verse examples on this site).

Maybe this has been answered before but I couldn't see it.

in Christ,
Fr. John D'Alton
Antiochian Orthodox priest, and President of Melbourne Institute for Orthodox Christian Studies.
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#2
Greek New Testament Flaws.

According to Greek scholars Kurt Aland and Barbara Aland (The Text of the New Testament, 2ndEdition, William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, Grand Rapids, MI, 1989, page 29), almost forty percent of the verses in the Greek New Testament documents are significantly uncertain with at least two or more major words being different among the various Grreek versions. In many cases whole verses or important parts of verses are missing. That doesn't even count the many important differences that depend on single words. The addition of a single sigma in Luke 2:14 in the Alexandrian (Minority) Greek Text significantly and theologically changes the message of the Angels!

To make matters worse, the faulty Alexandrian Greek Text is now used for all popular modern English versions except the NKJV (which uses the superior Byzantine (Majority) Greek Text).

In sharp contrast, the 22 books of the Peshitta have been transmitted with few if any errors in the original Aramaic Text of which the New Testament was composed by the Aramaic-speaking Apostles and Jewish followers of Jesus. This superiority of the Peshitta text has been well demonstrated on this forum and in several excellent books by forum members and others.

Why would anyone want to study variable English translations of uncertain and faulty Greek translation versions that were originally written in Aramaic when we can study the original text and excellent translations of that text?

Otto

Matthew 18: 11 For the Son of man has come to save what was lost! [TRY TO FIND THIS VERSE IN YOUR NIV!]
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#3
Shlama Fr. John and welcome to Peshitta.org,

Firstly I'd like to commend you on your approach, you have patiently stood in the background and considered all the information in front of you before jumping in and voicing your concerns. For someone who belongs to a very traditional church, this is very refreshing to see. You are open-minded and willing to consider the case of our brethren from Mesopotamia, of whom western Christianity has been out of touch for so many centuries.

While akh ograabe has already stated plausible reasons to reconsider your view of the Nestle-Aland/UBS Greek text, before I expand on what he stated, I will address your greater concern:

frjdalton Wrote:But does it actually make a large enough difference to *really* matter? ie for most purposes isn't the Greek ok? Why or why not? (No I'm not Greek- I'm Aussie-Irish-German). I'm not trying to be funny here, but trying to understand the implications. Does it matter that much that we need to teach Aramaic at theology schools instead of Greek? In what way? What other impacts should it all have?? Also, since by implication of Aramaic primacy, Greek chiastic structures must therefore be based on underlying Aramaic structures, what other Aramaic structures and worldview issues have been missed by the Greek (ie, global level, not just the 20-30 good single verse examples on this site)...


The Aramaic primacy movement is still quite a new one (well in the west), and let's be honest here, change is not easy, and most of us would prefer to avoid it if we could. We're not comfortable questioning and second-guessing ourselves and our beliefs. Can we really get it wrong? Actually, we can, the truth is no one has the right to set anything in stone if they haven't seen the big picture. We Greeks (I'm Greek btw), were so self-assured in our traditions, and then our Aramaic brethren from Mesopotamia & Persia had come and ???ruin our party???, declaring to us: ???Now wait a minute, there's a lot that you westerners don't know!??? But they're right, there is a lot that we don't know. But the Assyrians have the right to present their side of the story, and if we brush them aside without taking what they have to say into consideration, then we are not reflecting the love of our Master.

Paul Younan and the other Aramaic primacists on this forum have focussed on the lay believing folk as opposed to the scholarship circles, and if we have to be brutally honest most of the mainstream Bible scholarship community does not consist of believers anyway. Are most the people who translated the NIV true believers in Messiah? I bet not. Bruce Metgzer, one of the greatest NT textual critics was a liberal, and we trust individuals like him with the word of God?

Although it's still early days for Aramaic primacy, the Peshitta NT is getting more attention in the past few years than in the past few hundred years. So how big are the implications for the future of the Church? In my opinion they could be huge. It's one thing for lay Bible readers, to decide ???we want a Peshitta based NT???, but quite another when it comes to Church leaders, theologians and Bible scholarship. Do we have to start from scratch?

Change is not easy but sometimes it's necessary, we are living closer to the last days than ever before and never before has Church unity been more important than it is now. Change might be necessary in this case but it need not be immediate. We must follow the Spirit, and the Spirit does not always take us in directions we expect, but we must follow in the way the Spirit wants us to follow.

You've expressed interest in learning the Aramaic language, in my opinion if you are in a position to do so or ever get the opportunity ??? take it! This is the language our Master spoke while here on earth, I'm sure if you learn it you'll never look back, you'll never regret it. Maybe the world is not yet ready to get rid of the Greek, but I firmly believe that Aramaic should be compulsory in seminaries & Bible colleges. How can we make no effort to preserve this seriously endangered language? The linguistic legacy of our Master's blessed apostles is on the verge of vanishing off the face of the earth forever, and we're not interested in making an effort to keep it alive although we have the means to do so? SHAME ON US!!! So how badly do we really need the Aramaic? Would you say we're doing good enough with the Greek alone? I honestly don't think so. Yeshua's own disciples often had trouble understanding Him in their native language to boot. How can we think that we can do better with a Greek mistranslation? As the Aramaic NT school develops, I believe we're going be in for even more discoveries, and we'll eventually have to face the possibility for changing our traditions about NT transmission.

As for the Nestle-Aland/UBS Greek text, I'm in agreement with ograabe that its definitely not the best Greek text. What really turned me off the Alexandrian manuscripts is a post Paul put up 4 years ago:

Paul Younan Wrote:Shlama Akhay, This most fitting of all footnotes is found in Codex Vaticanus, right at Hebrews 1:3.

amaqestate kai kake, afev ton palaion, mj metapoiei

[Image: vaticanus.jpg]

The translation is "Fool and knave, can't you leave the old reading alone and not alter it!"

I'm not kidding Akhay, this is not like the Assyrian Mercedes thing. This is for real. This is just wayyyyy too precious! <!-- sConfusedatisfied: --><img src="{SMILIES_PATH}/satisfied.gif" alt="Confusedatisfied:" title="Satisfied" /><!-- sConfusedatisfied: -->


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That is no joke, that is the Codex Vaticanus one of the earliest complete Greek manuscripts, and it's one of the manuscripts used for the Nestle-Aland/UBS text, every NT translator consults it. Most of these ???eclectic??? Alexandrian manuscripts were found in a monastery trash can, and this explains why. These manuscripts were REJECTED because the translators tampered with the readings. The vast majority of our modern Bibles are translated from garbage! It's no wonder the Greek churches use the Byzantine text, however the Byzantine text isn't free from errors either, and its transmission history doesn't hold a candle to the Peshitta. The Peshitta is the best preserved NT, it was transmitted since the 1st century by individuals who venerated it and feared it with all their hearts. How can I put my faith in a text that a church itself doesn't trust? In a text that was rejected by a church? If it wasn't good enough for them, then how can it be good enough for me?
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#4
Fr.John,

Christina did such a superb job of explaining Aramaic Primacy that I really have nothing to add, EXCEPT, that in Aramaic (Syriac) all of the puns, and jokes, and plays on words, suddenly become clear for the first time, and we see that Maran Yeshua actually had a sense of humor!

Oh my, what will happen next? lol

And this is ALL MISSED in the Greek.

Shlama akhi, Albion
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#5
Thanks Otto, Christina and Albion for your replies. I see that I failed to make my questions clear enough, since you all replied about the strength of Aramaic primacy which I already agree with. Let me try again to clarify my questions regarding the *implications*.

Otto wrote about "Greek New Testament Flaws." Yes I already see that. And I heartedly agree about the faulty Alexandrian Greek Text. My NASB and Nestles are heavily annotated back to the Peshitta :-)

My question is, even with all the Greek flaws, what serious impacts does all this have on our faith? ie, yes Albion, understanding the humour is very interesting, but does it impact the Creed or how we do church in any *substantial* way. ie what is the payoff for a major change. Hey, i'd like to be convinced. Please don't reply about Aramaic primacy- I'm convinced ok!! Its the impact I'm unsure of. And I've read just about every post on the site.
I'm not being picky. I'm somewhat of a perfectionist, So I'd prefer we all change to the Peshitta. But realistically, what *substantial* as opposed to interesting differences would it make in our churches or colleges? I've been trying to arrange an Aramaic class at our seminary and I've been getting interest. But now I'm faced with the question. Why?

Otto points out the superiority of the Peshitta. Fine, I agree. But that's not my question. See, over the last 3 years I suspected that using the Peshitta would unlock many Eastern idioms, but to my surprise, over 95% of what I've read I had already been taught about the meanings. (probably my brethren church roots) ie, even using the Greek mistranslation, somehow scholars had resolved the idioms correctly anyway. So is there enough warrant to change textbooks and a whole theological training apparatus etc for *5% more perspicacity?*

I agree with Christina's comments about Nestle. And the pic was a classic! I already agreed with everything you wrote. The reality is though that colleges are full of Greek NT tools. Why should they change to Aramaic? I'm principal of one- the accounts people will die when we want to replace or add 200 books- they will want to know what justification there is. "Using the language of Jesus" just doesn't cut it. Now if using Aramaic meant a serious new understanding of some aspect of the historic faith then yes, but I'm not seeing evidence for that yet. I'm more than willing to be convinced!

Another way of saying this: Over the last 5 years I've spent considerable time with CoE and Oriental Orth people trying to build bridges from us in the EO church for the sake of unity. And *also* i was wanting to see what "middle-eastern"/Aramaic flavours were *missing* from our more Greek-ised church. What has surprised me is that I saw *very little* difference. Other that a few words in Syriac, the services are analogous. Yes a few words have clearer meaning. Yes its more accurate. And yes as Otto pointed out, its better with a bible that doesn't have so many "possible translations" everywhere. But does this impact my personal faith much? No. Does it change our church much. No. Maybe it should... but noone has yet posted anything clear about this.

I hope my repetition of this question has made it easier for others to answer. I'm not being hard to convince- I already am. I seek outcomes/impacts. As both a priest and Principal, I thought that it *must* have implications- now I'm confused, because i don't see much of *substance* ,... *yet*.

On a personal note, I used some of the material here in a talk to a group of Arabic-speaking Antiochian Orth priests (who would be very happy to hear that Aramaic which is like Arabic in parts, is better than greek!!) and most just did not get it! The evidence for the mistranslation in Luke of "hearts warmed" contra "slow/heavy" just didn't fly because they were so attached to their previous usage. I even showed them the chiasm but most just were not interested. This is the reality we face in the *real world* away from this excellent site. The technical perfection or truth (of using Aramaic) won't mean much unless it has a significant impact on lived theology.

So please, rather than giving me arguments for Aramaic primacy (I'm convinced ok!) Please take my confusion away and address this issue: Q: In what way does Aramaic primacy have "*significant* impact on lived theology"?

Thanks for everyone's efforts. Lots of fantastic stuff here. I hope it *does* make more than a technical difference in the future.

in Christ,
Fr. John D'Alton. Antiochian Orthodox priest and educator. 48 years old. formerly protestant missionary in India. love middle-eastern culture :-)
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#6
Quote:My question is, even with all the Greek flaws, what serious impacts does all this have on our faith? ie, yes Albion, understanding the humour is very interesting, but does it impact the Creed or how we do church in any *substantial* way. ie what is the payoff for a major change.

Hi Fr. John:
The huge payoff is knowing and teaching the truth. There just is no confidence in the Greek New Testament. The various denominations of western Protestant Christianity have fragmented over various doctrinal issues. This fragmentation is partly caused by the different interpretations of the plethora of Greek texts. Amazingly the Textus Receptus, from which the King James Version was translated is a collation of twelve different Greek manuscripts which have been averaged. So what confidence is there in a collage of texts. Where is the extant original.
That to say this. Any discrepancy with the authenticity of the Peshitta New Testament is unfounded. It is fact that synonyms are the result of various independent translations from an original text. Yes, the Peshitta is 22 books rather than the western 27 book canon, but the text has been unaltered since the first century. Quite simply, the variations between Peshitta manuscripts are very slight, contain no synonyms and only very small grammatical differences.That speaks volumes about the Truth of the original Gospel message and the Epistles of Paul. It seems today that Greek oriented scholarship cares less about the truth of God and more about defending individual denominational dogmas. With overwhelming evidence of NO single New Testament Greek text that carries the authority to be central to Protestant Christianity, is it any wonder that many fall away from the faith when hard questions are asked about the credibility of the New Testament. Where in Greek New Testament scholarship is the concensus of the original text. Yet, these various so-called Greek scholars continue to promote the Greek New Testament as the "autograph". This in spite of the fact that Jesus Christ spoke Aramaic fluently. Does this mean that we have nothing first hand from His WORDS? Of course not. We have the very autograph of His words, Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Paul, James and Peter, all in so-called "Palestinian" Aramaic.
It's not so much the examples of errors in the Greek text, though they are numerous and perplexing, but the overall confidence that Aramaic primacists have as to the TRUTH of the Word of God.

Shlama,
Stephen Silver
<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.dukhrana.com">http://www.dukhrana.com</a><!-- m -->
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#7
frjdalton Wrote:Hi all,

Hi yourself. <!-- sSmile --><img src="{SMILIES_PATH}/smile.gif" alt="Smile" title="Smile" /><!-- sSmile -->

frjdalton Wrote:I've been following this site for several years and am 99% convinced (enough to start learning Aramaic and change my view of my Nestle Greek NT). But having read all the evidences, its left me wondering a little- "so what?" I'm sure that working with the Aramaic unlocks the real meaning of passages so that a small % of the NT now makes sense which it doesn't in Greek. Great. But does it actually make a large enough difference to *really* matter? ie for most purposes isn't the Greek ok? Why or why not? (No I'm not Greek- I'm Aussie-Irish-German). I'm not trying to be funny here, but trying to understand the implications. Does it matter that much that we need to teach Aramaic at theology schools instead of Greek? In what way? What other impacts should it all have??

.

I think where it will really make a momentus difference is in New Testament criticism and it's related fields. Using the various greek mss modern scholars and authors have created a framework in which the NT as we have it, was written in greek many years after it records Jesus as living and had been edited and undergone many revisions.
In other words it is unreliable, to some degree and maybe to a large degree.

The acceptance of the peshitta as the original will leave virtually everything in tatters.

1. Many contradictions will vanish, including some which might make the NT appear to have been written by men far removed from the incidents it descibes.

2. An original Aramaic must mean that it is earlier than now thought.

3. An original Aramaic increases the "likelihood" that these documents (or at least some) are in fact written by Jewish men who actually walked with Jesus.

4.The astounding lack of variation will show that the text appears to have come to us unchanged.

The western Institutional churches (mainly "protestant" ones) lame brained insistence on greek originals has created many problems for it as it has tried to insist upon the integrity of the texts. many today doubt the integrity of the texts and with fair reason.

Personally I think it will be a good thing if the credibility of the institutional church is brought further into question by this issue but at the same time the integrity of the documents is strengthened.
Hopefully the crisis in textual criticism that must ensue will be concurrent witha time when the man in the street is open to having a fresh look at the texts and asking "what do these really say?".

<judge hope off his soapbox> <!-- sSmile --><img src="{SMILIES_PATH}/smile.gif" alt="Smile" title="Smile" /><!-- sSmile -->
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#8
shlom lokh abun John D'Alton,

Although I don't have time right now to answer your question, I will answer it over the weekend.

In the Antiochan Syriac Maronite Church we have debated this very same question, and we have explored it on both sides; this resulted from outside interference that our Church has suffered and the regional circumstances of being in what is now called the Middle-East.

push bashlomo,
keefa-morun
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#9
Dear Fr. John,

You seem to be suggesting that it would be more comfortable for the Church to stick with the Greek New Testament versions and avoid the hassle of recognizing the primacy and superiority and of the Aramaic New Testament because it doesn't make much difference with respect to salvation.

The Gospel message is quite redundant in the New Testament and cannot be avoided by the reader. We are called to believe in the Messiah about 50 times. It is hard to miss, and people are brought to Him even with the somewhat variable English translations of the somewhat flawed Greek texts.

But, there is an important ancillary issue. Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God! Shouldn't we be promoting the most accurate rendition of God's Word? From what are we hiding?

Pastors and priests study Greek so they can rightly interpret God's Word. It seems to me that to accurately discharge this duty requires the best possible transcription of the New Testament. I have heard many sermons based on some variations in meaning of some Greek words from some lexicon. What good is such an explication of Greek words when the Gospel is semitic?

Since the Greek texts are translations of the original, they are going to have imprecise and even misleading variations from the original text. We may be comfortable with our old dogma but we should not take acceptance of the Greek NT texts as a matter of faith. I believe that we should strive to come closer to the Messiah and the Apostles in their own words.

Sincerely,

Otto
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#10
Shlama Fr. John,

What about when it comes to apologetics? Our agnostic, Muslim & other unbelieving critics are more than capable of finding the skeletons in our closet. They find out the dirty history of Greek textual transmission and throw it our faces. They point out contradictions in the Greek texts and we can't answer them. The Peshitta does make a difference when it comes to faith, especially when it comes to the most important issue - defending the Faith. When I used the Greek NT my opponents would eat me for breakfast, since I switched to the Peshitta they all shut-up. They may not want to believe that the Bible is the word of God but they can't discredit the Peshitta no matter how hard they try, its transmission history is spotless and it contains absolutely no contradictions, they have nothing to throw back in my face. The Greek texts can't boast this, it's only with the Peshitta that I can say "you have no proof, and are arguing from conjecture".

The theological implications for Aramaic primacy might not be so big with doctrinal matters within the Church, but the implications are gigantic when it comes to the Church's relationship with the unbelieving world. Yeshua gave us only one mission: "go forth and make disciples of all nations", and quite frankly with the Greek NT we're not doing as well as we used to. Today we live in an age of information overload, the lost soul that we are witnessing to can easily dig up the dirty laundry of our forefathers, then come back to us and say "how can you believe this, didn't you know...". Many Muslims for example even accuse the "Romans" of deliberately destroying the original Aramaic "injeel" (which supposedly foretold the coming of Muhammad, go figure) and replacing it with a Greek "corruption". Do we value our comfort zones more than the great commission?

The Greek NT has contributed hugely to Church division, we have so many different Greek texts so we shouldn't be surprised that we have so many different denominations, the connection is unmistakable. Yeshua said that a house that is divided against itself cannot stand, and this is what the enemy wants. If we value our traditions above the word of God - the true word of God then we are giving the adversary ammunition to destroy us.
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#11
I don't know about the rest of you, but I've printed off Khatan Christina's replies here and tacked them to the wall of my office. I'll be the first to nominate Christina as our official PR manager - anyone second that?

I would love to create a "Why the Peshitta?" part to the introduction on the website, and would love to have everyone's contribution in that in the verbiage if you all approve, of course!

+Shamasha
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#12
Paul Younan Wrote:I don't know about the rest of you, but I've printed off Khatan Christina's replies here and tacked them to the wall of my office. I'll be the first to nominate Christina as our official PR manager - anyone second that?

I would love to create a "Why the Peshitta?" part to the introduction on the website, and would love to have everyone's contribution in that in the verbiage if you all approve, of course!

+Shamasha

Shlama Akhi Paul and kudos to Christina:
I've been attentive since Christina first posted here. Christina, you have a teachable spirit. If it's appropriate, I'd like to be the first to encourage you to follow Paul's lead here and be the peshitta.org Public Relations Manager. Christina, you are gifted in dipomacy and languages, as well you have a balanced understanding of the issues at hand. I definitely second the nomination of Christina as PR Manager. <!-- s:biggrin: --><img src="{SMILIES_PATH}/biggrin.gif" alt=":biggrin:" title="Big Grin" /><!-- s:biggrin: -->

Shlama w'Burkate,
Stephen P. Silver
<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.dukhrana.com">http://www.dukhrana.com</a><!-- m -->
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#13
Shlama Shamasha Paul,

I'm speechless, and I'm such an uneducated and broken vessel myself. I can't wait until I get a copy of akh Andrew's Mari, and settle in London and start attending St. Mary's Parish, perhaps I'll get an opportunity to study Aramaic professionally some day, I would love that.

As for your "Why the Peshitta?" idea - go for it!

And akh Stephen thanks for the encouragement, I'm gonna need a moment to take it all in, LOL.
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#14
Christina Wrote:Shlama Shamasha Paul,

I'm speechless, and I'm such an uneducated and broken vessel myself.

Shlama,

You've got my vote too. Gentle speech is needed by all.

You didn't mean London in Albion? Or did you?

Jerzy
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#15
No London, UK.

Akhay, I'm feel really honored to be nominated for PR manager, but I must confess that I'm really a nobody. I don't have a PhD, I'm not fluent in Biblical Hebrew, Aramaic or Greek. But I love Mari, His Holy Word and His Body (the Church).
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