The Greek that is typically translated in English as “Jesus, filled with the Holy Spirit, went away (or: returned)” is translated by the Italian La Sua Parola è Vita translation as Dopo essere stato battezzato, Gesù, pieno di Spirito Santo, si allontanò or “After being baptized, Jesus, filled with the Holy Spirit, went away.” Cotrozzi (2019) explains: “After the interposition of the long genealogy between the baptism of Jesus (3:21-22) and the temptations in the desert (4:1-13) there is need for a clear connection between these two events, all the more so because the episode about the temptations is placed at the beginning of a new chapter. When tempted by the devil, Jesus is full of the Holy Spirit because the latter descended upon him at baptism. Without a clear reference to the verses of the previous chapter, the reader can easily miss this important connection in 4:1.”
Language-specific Insights
in the fifteenth year of the reign of Emperor Tiberius
The Greek in Luke 3:1 that is typically translated in English as “in the fifteenth year of the reign of Emperor Tiberius” is translated by the Italian La Sua Parola è Vita translation as Passarono circa due decenni. Era adesso il quindicesimo anno del regno dell’imperatore Tiberio Cesare or “About two decades passed. It was now the fifteenth year of the reign of Emperor Tiberius Caesar.” Cotrozzi (2019) explains: “There is a time gap between the last events recounted in 2:52 and those in 3:1. Jesus was 12 at the end of chapter 2 but about 30 years old when he began his work (3:23). As a result, some 18 years must have elapsed since 2:51-52. However, this is not readily apparent to most modern readers. All the more so since the gap coincides with a break at chapter level and is followed by the same name (Herod) as in 1:5 which seems to indicate continuity. What most readers are not aware of is that the same name refers in Luke to two different historical figures, Herod the Great (1:5) and his son Herod Antipas (3:1). Only a few Bibles — Danish Bibelen på Hverdagsdansk and Den Nye Aftale, English New Living Translation, French La Parole de Vie, German Die Gute Nachricht and Neues Leben Übersetzung, and Spanish Traducción en lenguaje actual — make this clear in the text.”
at that time, in those days
The Greek in Luke 2:1 that is typically translated in English as “in those days” or “at that time” is translated by the Italian La Sua Parola è Vita translation as Qualche tempo dopo la nascita di Giovanni or “Some time after the birth of John.” Cotrozzi (2019) explains: “After a short summary of John’s youth (1:80) the story goes back in time. The shift, however, is not marked clearly in the original, and formal translations suggest that the events introduced in 2:1 followed those narrated in 1:80. The Greek phrase ἐν ταῖς ἡμέραις ἐκείναις (2:1) is best understood as referring back to the time of Herod the Great and more specifically the time after the birth of John the Baptist.”
burnt-offering
The Hebrew olah (עֹלָה) originally means “that which goes up (in smoke).” English Bibles often translates it as “burnt-offering” or “whole burnt-offering,” focusing on the aspect of the complete burning of the offering.
The Greek Septuagint and the Latin Vulgate Bibles translate it as holokautōma / holocautōsis (ὁλοκαύτωμα / ὁλοκαύτωσις) and holocaustum, respectively, meaning “wholly burnt.” While a form of this term is widely used in many Romance languages (Spanish: holocaustos, French: holocaustes, Italian: olocausti, Portuguese: holocaustos) and originally also in the Catholic tradition of English Bible translations, it is largely not used in English anymore today (the preface of the revised edition of the Catholic New American Bible of 2011: “There have been changes in vocabulary; for example, the term ‘holocaust’ is now normally reserved for the sacrilegious attempt to destroy the Jewish people by the Third Reich.”)
Since translation into Georgian was traditionally done on the basis of the Greek Septuagint, a transliteration of holokautōma was used as well, which was changed to a translation with the meaning of “burnt offering” when the Old Testament was retranslated in the 1980’s on the basis of the Hebrew text.
In the Koongo (Ki-manianga) translation by the Alliance Biblique de la R.D. Congo (publ. in 2015) olah is translated as “kill and offer sacrifice” (source: Anicet Bassilua) and in Elhomwe as “fire offering.” (Source: project-specific translation notes in Paratext)
The English translation of Everett Fox uses offering-up (similarly, the German translation by Buber-Rosenzweig has Darhöhung and the French translation by Chouraqui montée).
See also offering (qorban).
shake the dust off your feet
The Greek that is typically translated in English as “shake the dust off your feet as a testimony against them” (Luke 9:5) is translated by the Italian La Sua Parola è Vita translation more explicitly as lasciandola scuotete la polvere dai vostri piedi per mostrare che non avete più niente a che fare con loro e li lasciate al loro destino or “shake the dust off your feet to show that you do not have anything more to do with them and that you leave them to their fate.”
Luke 10:11, translated in English as “Even the dust of your town that clings to our feet, we wipe off in protest against you” or similar is translated as Non abbiamo più niente a che fare con voi e vi lasciamo al vostro destino. Ecco, riprendetevi anche la polvere della vostra città or “We do not have anything more to do with you and leave you to your fate. Here, take back also the dust of your city.”
Source: Cotrozzi 2019
See also shake off the dust from your feet.
angel of the Lord
The Greek in Luke 1:11 that is typically translated in English as “angel of the Lord” is translated by the Italian La Sua Parola è Vita translation as angelo or “angel.” Cotrozzi (2019) explains: “Apart from a handful of verses where the context makes clear that fallen angels are in view (e. g. Matt 25:41; 2 Cor 12:17; Rev 9:11) the term ‘angel’ refers to a supernatural, spiritual being sent by God. This is the default sense that this term has in Italian, the meaning people think of when they hear this word in isolation. Since the occurrence in Luke 1:11 corresponds to the default case, there is no reason to state explicitly that the angel in question belongs to the Lord. On the contrary, the phrase ‘angel of the Lord’ may be confusing to readers not accustomed to church jargon.”
See also angel.
Greetings favored one! The Lord is with you.
The Greek in Luke 1:28 that is translated as “Greetings, favored one! The Lord is with you” or similar in English is translated in the interconfessional Italian Common Language Version (Traduzione Interconfessionale in Lingua Corrente, publ. 2014) as Ti saluto, Maria! Il Signore è con te: egli ti ha colmata di grazia or “Hail, Mary! The Lord is with you; he has filled you with grace.”
Carlo Buzzetti (in The Bible Translator 1982, p. 243 ) explains: “The most famous Latin translation, of St. Jerome, reads: Ave gratia plena, Dominus tecum (‘Hail, woman full of grace, the Lord is with you’), and a great many later translations have been influenced by it. So nearly all the Italian Roman Catholic editions of the Gospel say: Ti saluto, piena di grazia. il Signore e con te. However the Italian protestant versions have avoided the formula piena di grazia (‘full of grace’). This expression does not seem to be the best translation of the Greek, and it implies an interpretation which can easily be confessional: the words piena di grazia could be understood as a description of Mary almost independent from God, whereas the Greek word kecharitomene is a passive form. For this reason we read Ben ti sia, o favorita; il Signore sia leco (old Diodati version) or Ti saluto, o favorita dalla grazia, il Signore e teco (Riveduta version), in which favorita (‘favored one’) is preferred as the equivalent of kecharitomene.
“Unfortunately, the word favorita doesn’t belong at all to the common language Italian of today; and the reader who knows it probably gets the wrong shade of meaning and wrong connotations from it. The same thing is true of other participles and adjectives: graziata, gratificata, graziosa … so the Italian translators of [the Common Language Version] decided to bring in the subject (God) which is hidden in the passive Greek form: and they produced the formula Dio ti ha colmata di grazia (‘God has filled you with grace’). There was no confessional difficulty with this expression; on the contrary, the agreement was general.”
two-edged sword
The Greek that is translated as “two-edged sword” in English is translated in Alekano as “like a knife that is sharp at its mouth and its back” (source: Larson 1998, p. 170) and in the German New Testament translation by Berger / Nord (publ. 1999) as “the sharpest knife.”
The now commonly-used English idiom “two-edged sword” (meaning something that offers both a good and bad consequence) was first coined in 1560 in the Geneva Bible. (Source: Crystal 2010, p. 279)
Other languages that use this phrase idiomatically, include:
- Spanish: espada de doble filo
- French: épée à double tranchant
- German: zweischneidiges Schwert
- Italian: spada a doppio taglio
- Portuguese: espada de dois gumes
- Russian: обоюдоострый меч (oboyudoostryy mech) or двуострый меч (dvuostryy mech)
- Czech: dvojsečná zbraň
- Polish: miecz obosieczny
See also sword.