33and ‘to love him with all the heart and with all the understanding and with all the strength’ and ‘to love one’s neighbor as oneself’—this is much more important than all whole burnt offerings and sacrifices.”
A certain man, a scribe, heard how well Jesus taught the people. He also wanted to approach Jesus and ask him a question. He asked Jesus:
— We have many different commandments. And which commandment is the most important?
Jesus answered:
— We have many different commandments, and the most important of them is this: People of Israel, listen to God! Our God is only one! You must love God completely with all your thoughts, feelings and strength. This is the most important first commandment. And there is also a second, equally important: love your neighbor as yourself. These commandments are the most important.
The scribe replied:
— Teacher, you speak correctly! There are no other gods except our God. We must love God with all our heart, all our thoughts, all our strength. And yes, we must love our neighbor as ourselves. These two commandments are above all others and even sacrifices.
Jesus said to him:
— You reason correctly! You are close to the Kingdom of God.
After this event, none of the scribes dared to ask him tricky questions anymore.
Original Russian back-translation (click or tap here):
Один человек, книжник, слышал, как хорошо Иисус учил народ. Он тоже захотел подойти к Иисусу и задать ему вопрос. Он спросил Иисуса:
— У нас есть много разных заповедей. А какая заповедь самая главная?
Иисус ответил:
— У нас есть много разных заповедей, а самая главная из них такая: Народ Израиля, слушай Бога! Наш Бог только один! Вы должны всеми вашими мыслями, чувствами и силами полностью любить Бога. Это самая главная первая заповедь. А есть еще вторая, такая же важная: своего ближнего так же, как самого себя, люби его. Эти заповеди самые важные.
Книжник ответил:
— Учитель, ты говоришь правильно! Нет иных богов, кроме нашего Бога. Нужно всем сердцем, всеми мыслями, силами полностью любить Бога. И да, нужно любить ближнего своего так же, как самого себя. Эти две заповеди выше всех остальных и даже жертвоприношений.
Иисус сказал ему:
— Ты рассуждаешь правильно! Ты близок к Царству Бога.
После этого события никто из книжников больше не решался задавать ему каверзные вопросы.
The Hebrew and Greek that is translated as “neighbor” or “relative” in English is translated in the Contemporary Chichewa translation (2002/2016) and the Buku Lopatulika translation (1922/2018) with just one word: nansi. This word can also be translated as neighbors whom you share a blood relation with because in Chewa context a community is mostly comprised of people of blood relations. (Source: Mawu a Mulungu mu Chichewa Chalero Back Translation)
Following are a number of back-translations of Mark 12:33:
Uma: “And we must love him with our real heart, to the full extent of our thinking and the full extent of our ability. And we must love our companions like ourselves. That is better than all livestock and other stuff that we sacrifice to God.'” (Source: Uma Back Translation)
Yakan: “And a person should love God with his entire liver and mind and strength. And he also should love his companion as he loves himself. If he follows/obeys this, this is still better than if he sacrifices burned animal or gives anything to God.'” (Source: Yakan Back Translation)
Western Bukidnon Manobo: “and our holding God the Lord dear in our breath, in our mind, in our understanding, and in all of our actions, and holding dear our companion as if he were our very own breath, these are greater than all the burnt sacrifices and offerings.'” (Source: Western Bukidnon Manobo Back Translation)
Kankanaey: “It is also correct that we must concentrate all our mind/thoughts, skill/intelligence and strength in loving him, and we must also love our fellows like our manner-of-loving ourselves. It is more-important that we obey these two commands than our offering animals and other offerings to God.'” (Source: Kankanaey Back Translation)
Tagbanwa: “And as for our (incl.) holding him dear without not-meaning-it, but on the contrary with our mind/inner-being and mind/thinking being concentrated, and with all our strength, and our valuing too of our fellowman just like our valuing of our own body, (these are) really greater/more-important than all which is sacrificed by being burned and other things-being-sacrificed with which forgiveness is asked for.'” (Source: Tagbanwa Back Translation)
God transcends gender, but most languages are limited to grammatical gender expressed in pronouns. In the case of English, this is traditionally confined to “he” (or in the forms “his,” “him,” and “himself”), “she” (and “her,” “hers,” and “herself”), and “it” (and “its” and “itself”).
Modern Mandarin Chinese, however, offers another possibility. Here, the third-person singular pronoun is always pronounced the same (tā), but it is written differently according to its gender (他 is “he,” 她 is “she,” and 它/牠 is “it” and their respective derivative forms). In each of these characters, the first (or upper) part defines the gender (man, woman, or thing/animal), while the second element gives the clue to its pronunciation.
In 1930, after a full century with dozens of Chinese translations, Bible translator Wang Yuande (王元德) coined a new “godly” pronoun: 祂. Chinese readers immediately knew how to pronounce it: tā. But they also recognized that the first part of that character, signifying something spiritual, clarified that each person of the Trinity has no gender aside from being God.
While the most important Protestant and Catholic Chinese versions respectively have opted not to use 祂, some Bible translations do and it is widely used in hymnals and other Christian materials. Among the translations that use 祂 to refer to “God” were early versions of Lü Zhenzhong’s (呂振中) version (New Testament: 1946, complete Bible: 1970). R.P. Kramers (in The Bible Translator 1956, p. 152ff. ) explains why later versions of Lü’s translation did not continue with this practice: “This new way of writing ‘He,’ however, has created a minor problem of its own: must this polite form be used whenever Jesus is referred to? Lü follows the rule that, wherever Jesus is referred to as a human being, the normal tā (他) is written; where he is referred to as divine, especially after the ascension, the reverential tā (祂) is used.”
In that system one kind of pronoun is used for humans (male and female alike) and one for natural elements, non-liquid masses, and some spiritual entities (one other is used for large animals and another one for miscellaneous items). While in these languages the pronoun for spiritual entities used to be employed when referring to God, this has changed into the use of the human pronoun.
Lynell Zogbo (in The Bible Translator 1989, p. 401ff. ) explains in the following way: “From informal discussions with young Christians especially, it would appear that, at least for some people, the experience and/or concepts of Christianity are affecting the choice of pronoun for God. Some people explain that God is no longer ‘far away,’ but is somehow tangible and personal. For these speakers God has shifted over into the human category.”
In Kouya, God (the Father) and Jesus are referred to with the human pronoun ɔ, whereas the Holy Spirit is referred to with a non-human pronoun. (Northern Grebo and Western Krahn make a similar distinction.)
Eddie Arthur, a former Kouya Bible translation consultant, says the following: “We tried to insist that this shouldn’t happen, but the Kouya team members were insistent that the human pronoun for the Spirit would not work.”
In Burmese, the pronoun ko taw (ကိုယ်တော်) is used either as 2nd person (you) or 3rd person (he, him, his) reference. “This term clearly has its root in the religious language in Burmese. No ordinary persons are addressed or known by this pronoun because it is reserved for Buddhist monks, famous religious teachers, and in the case of Christianity, the Trinity.” (Source: Gam Seng Shae in The Bible Translator 2002, p. 202ff. )
In Thai, the pronoun phra`ong (พระองค์) is used, a gender-neutral pronoun which must refer to a previously introduced royal or divine being. Similarly, in Northern Khmer, which is spoken in Thailand, “an honorific divine pronoun” is used for the pronoun referring to the persons of the Trinity (source: David Thomas in The Bible Translator 1993, p. 445 ). In Urak Lawoi’, another language spoken in Thailand, the translation often uses tuhat (ตูฮัด) — “God” — ”as a divine pronoun where Thai has phra’ong even though it’s actually a noun.” (Source for Thai and Urak Lawoi’: Stephen Pattemore)
The English “Contemporary Torah” addresses the question of God and gendered pronouns by mostly avoiding pronouns in the first five books of the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament (unless God is referred to as “lord,” “father,” “king,” or “warrior”). It does that by either using passive constructs (“He gave us” vs. “we were given”), by using the adjective “divine” or by using “God” rather than a pronoun.
Some Protestant and Orthodox English Bibles use a referential capitalized spelling when referring to the persons of the Trinity with “He,” “His,” “Him,” or “Himself.” This includes for instance the New American Standard Bible or The Orthodox New Testament, but most translations do not. Two other languages where this is also done (in most Bible translations) are the closely related Indonesian and Malay. In both languages this follows the language usage according to the Qur’an, which in turn predicts that usage (see Soesilo in The Bible Translator 1991, p. 442ff. and The Bible Translator 1997, p. 433ff. ).
Barclay Newman, a translator on the teams for both the Good News Bible and the Contemporary English Version, translated passages of the New Testament into English and published them in 2014, “in a publication brief enough to be non-threatening, yet long enough to be taken seriously, and interesting enough to appeal to believers and un-believers alike.” The following is the translation of Mark 12:28-34:
Jesus had just frustrated a group of theologians,
when a noted biblical scholar asked him,
“What’s the most important teaching in the Bible?”
Jesus answered, “The Bible itself says,
Love God with all your heart!
And the Bible also says,
Love others as much as you love yourself!
No teachings are more important than these.”
“Teacher,” answered the man, “you’re certainly right.
We must love the one and only God with all our heart,
and love others as much as we love ourselves.
To obey these two commands is more important
than offering all kinds of gifts to God.”
Jesus realized the depth of the man’s answer and said,
“You already have one foot in the Ultimate Kingdom.”
Living Water is produced for the Bible translation movement in association with Lutheran Bible Translators. Lyrics derived from the ESV® Bible (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®).
After suneseōs ‘understanding,’ Textus Receptus includes kai ex holēs tēs psuchēs ‘and with all the soul,’ which is omitted by all modern editions of the Greek text.
Exegesis:
to agapan literally ‘the to love’: the infinitival phrase is used as a noun, and is the subject of the sentence. The infinitive is timeless, indicating simply the action involved in the verb without any reference to the time aspect.
It is to be noticed that the three clauses ‘heart,’ ‘understanding,’ and ‘strength’ do not follow literally either v. 30 or Septuagint Deut. 6.5.
ex holēs tēs kardias ‘with all the heart,’ following v. 30 and the Septuagint of Deut. 6.5.
ex holēs tēs suneseōs ‘with all the understanding,’ which follows neither v. 30 nor the LXX of Deut. 6.5. It is the equivalent of ex holēs tēs dianoias sou ‘with all your mind’ of v. 30, which, as noticed, is added to the three clauses of Deut. 6.5.
sunesis (only here in Mark; cf. suniēmi 4.12) ‘comprehension,’ ‘understanding.’
ex holēs tēs ischuos ‘with all the strength,’ following v. 30 (but not the Septuagint of Deut. 6.5, which has dunamis).
perissoteron (cf. 7.36) ‘much more (than),’ ‘more abundant (than)’: in the neuter, agreeing with the subject to agapan ‘the to love,’ which is also neuter.
holokautōmatōn (only here in Mark) ‘whole burnt offerings’: these were the offerings in which the animal was entirely consumed by fire.
thusiōn (only here in Mark) ‘sacrifices,’ ‘offerings’: refers to all offerings and sacrifices of the Jewish religion, whether animal or vegetable. (Carefully to be avoided is any rendering which might convey the idea of ‘sacrifice’ as the personal element of cost and hardship with which one may accomplish certain tasks or perform certain duties.)
Translation:
For problems involved in translating love with … the heart see 12.30.
Understanding may be translated in the same way as ‘mind’ in 12.30.
The basic problem of translation in this verse is the use of the infinitive constructions which in many languages cannot be used, especially not when the infinitive constructions are so involved and include two different expressions for ‘love.’ In this passage there are often two alternative ways of treating the construction: (1) by means of a conditional clause, e.g. ‘if you love him … and if you love your neighbor…, that is much more than…’ or (2) through the use of paratactic constructions, in which the first is a statement of obligation, e.g. ‘you should love him … and you should love your neighbors…; that is much more than….’
General obligations or a truth of universal import may be stated in terms of second person ‘you’ or of first person ‘we,’ usually in the inclusive form, if the inclusive-exclusive contrast exists. The use of these persons is seemingly more widespread than an indefinite third person singular, as in the Greek and English.
Much more than all is a difficult comparative expression since two complex processes, ‘loving God’ and ‘loving one’s neighbors,’ are compared with two other processes ‘providing burnt offerings’ and ‘making sacrifices.’ This is treated in Tzeltal as ‘great the goodness this becomes past the goodness of burned gifts for God and killed gifts.’
Where there is no special designation, burnt offerings are often treated as ‘gifts that are burned,’ sometimes with ‘to God’ added in order to imply their religious significance. Sacrifices are frequently rendered as ‘killed gifts’ or ‘gifts that one kills.’
Quoted with permission from Bratcher, Robert G. and Nida, Eugene A. A Handbook on the Gospel of Mark. (UBS Handbook Series). New York: UBS, 1961. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .
In this verse the scribe repeated the meaning of what Jesus said. He emphasized that it was very important. In Greek he did this in one long sentence. In some languages it may be more natural to use a different way to express the meaning. For example:
And you must love God with all your heart and with all your mind and with all your strength. You must love your neighbor as you love yourself. It is more important to do this than to offer all burnt offerings and other sacrifices to God.
See the General Comment on 12:33a–d at the end of 12:33d for another suggestion.
12:33a
to love Him with all your heart: In Greek this phrase is literally “to love him from the whole of the heart.” It is almost the same expression that was used in 12:30a–b. You could translate in a similar way here.
with all your understanding: In Greek this is literally “from the whole of the intelligence.” The Greek word that the Berean Standard Bible translates as understanding means “the ability to understand something.” It is a different word than the one Jesus used in 12:30c that the Berean Standard Bible translated as “mind.” However, these two words have almost the same meaning in this context.
12:33b
and with all your strength: The Greek word that the Berean Standard Bible translates as strength is the same Greek word that is used in 12:30c. It refers to a person’s ability to do something. It may also include his physical strength or power.
12:33c
and to love your neighbor as yourself: The Greek phrase that the Berean Standard Bible translates as love your neighbor as yourself refers to loving another person in the same way that you love yourself. This has the same meaning as the same expression in 12:31b.
12:33d
This part of the verse implies that the scribe agreed with Jesus’ statement in 12:31c.
which is more important than: Here the scribe indicated that he was comparing two important commands in the law:
(a) It is important for a person to love God and his neighbor very much, and
(b) It is important for a person to offer burnt offerings and sacrifices.
Of these two commands, it is more important for a person to love God and his neighbor. In some languages it may be difficult to express this comparison with a phrase like “more…than.” Use a natural way in your language. See the General Comment on 12:33a–d for a suggestion.
all burnt offerings and sacrifices: In the Old Testament God commanded the Jews to burn whole animals as offerings and to also offer other sacrifices to him. The phrase all burnt offerings and sacrifices contains implied information. The word all implies “all that the law requires” or “all that we have been offering.”
burnt offerings: The Greek word that the Berean Standard Bible translates as burnt offerings is literally “whole burnt offerings.” This refers to animals that the priests sacrificed to God and completely burned up on the altar.
Here are some other ways to translate burnt offerings:
sacrificing animals to God by burning them -or-
to burn animals as a sacrifice to God
and sacrifices: The word that the Berean Standard Bible translates as sacrifices is a general term that refers to different kinds of offerings. Here it includes other kinds of animal sacrifices (besides the burnt offerings). It also includes other things that people offered to God, such as wheat, oil and wine.
If you need a more general way to translate the word sacrifices, you could say something like:
other things that people give/offer to God
Here is one way to translate this whole phrase:
to offer on the altar animals and other sacrifices to God (Good News Bible)
The focus here is not on specific kinds of offerings. If it awkward to describe a “whole burnt offering” in your language, consider using a more general term. For example:
all the animals and sacrifices we offer to God (New Century Version) -or-
all the sacrifices and offerings that we could possibly make (Contemporary English Version)
You may also want to add a footnote containing some of the preceding information about offerings and sacrifices.
General Comment on 12:33a–d
In some languages it may be helpful to change the order of some of the verse parts. It may also be helpful to include implied information. For example:
It is important to offer God all burnt offerings and sacrifices that he has commanded. But it is more important that we love him with all our heart, all our understanding, and all our strength. It is also more important to love our neighbor as ourselves.
Translate this verse in a way that is clear and natural in your language.
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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.
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