9:30

The Berean Standard Bible changes the Greek order of the phrases in 9:30. Some other versions, such as the New International Version and the New Living Translation (2004), include some part of 9:31 in 9:30 for clarity. See the General Comment on 9:30–31b at the end of the notes on 9:31b-c for suggestions about how to order all of these phrases.

9:30a

Suddenly two men: The Greek phrase that the Berean Standard Bible translates as Suddenly two men is literally “And behold, two men.” Several English versions translate the phrase this way. The Greek word that the Berean Standard Bible translates as Suddenly here, literally “behold,” calls the readers to notice something surprising and sudden. Your language may have an expression of its own that indicates this. For example:

All at once two men

9:30b

Moses and Elijah: Moses and Elijah were both Old Testament prophets who lived many years before Jesus. But God brought them to the mountain to talk with Jesus.

Some people may not know that Moses and Elijah lived long before Jesus. If that is true in your area, you may want to include some implied information in the text or in a footnote. For example:

Moses and Elijah, ⌊prophets of long ago⌋

9:30c

began talking with Jesus: The Greek verb that the Berean Standard Bible translates as began talking can indicate either an ongoing action or an action that is just starting. Another way to translate this is:

were talking with Jesus (New Century Version)

It may be natural in your language to express the idea of talking with a term such as “conversing” or “speaking.”

© 2009, 2010, 2013 by SIL International®
Made available under the terms of a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License (CC BY-SA) creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0.
All Scripture quotations in this publication, unless otherwise indicated, are from The Holy Bible, Berean Standard Bible.
BSB is produced in cooperation with Bible Hub, Discovery Bible, OpenBible.com, and the Berean Bible Translation Committee.