As is typical for me in church, I read along in my Bible as the pastor reads scripture, which is projected on the screen for everybody. I happened to have with me the NASB translation. My church tends to use ESV. Last Sunday John 20 was being read. All is good until we got to verse 16. This is what I heard: Jesus said to her, "Mary." She turned and said to him in Aramaic, "Rabboni!" (which means Teacher). This is what I read: Jesus said to her, "Mary!" She turned and said to Him in Hebrew, "Rabboni!" (which means, Teacher). I had to look up at the screen to see if my ears were decieving me. They weren't. The translations are agreed: Mary said, "Rabboni!" and it means "teacher." But is "Rabboni" an Aramaic or Hebrew word? What does the original written account say? In Greek, this verse is: λέγει αὐτῇ ὁ ᾿Ιησοῦς· Μαρία. στραφεῖσα ἐκείνη λέγει αὐτῷ· ῥαββουνί, ὃ λέγεται, διδάσκαλε. Transliterated into English letters, it is: Lesous lego autos Maria ekeinos strepho lego autos rhabboni hos lego didaskalos. John 20:16 Greek transliteration Here's a breakdown of some of the above Greek: rhabboni = Strong #4462 = "rabbi"
hos = Strong #3739 = "which"
lego = Strong #3004 = "is to say"
didaskalos = Strong #1320 = "master" Here is Google Translate's translation, which is much better at translating ancient Greek than any other translator online: It is said that Jesus; Maria. στραφεῖσα she tells them; rabboni, it is said, teacher. John 20:16 word-for-word translation (Google-assisted) What's interesting is that the clause "in Hebrew" or "in Aramaic" is missing in the original Greek! Google couldn't translate στραφεῖσα, which translates into "turned," and ῥαββουνί which is the (apparently) non-Greek word in question, most probably a transliterated foreign word into Greek letters. So, is "rabboni" really an Aramaic word? Certainly it's Hebrew, for that's where we get today's Jewish word "rabbi". I watched the "Passion of Christ" a few days ago and noticed the difference between Aramaic and Hebrew -- Aramaic is much smoother-sounding; the guttural sounds found in Hebrew are absent. But "rabboni" could be gutteral (roll the "r" like the Spanish word "perro") or not (like the English word "rural"). Why did the translators of ESV and NASB feel compelled to add what language the word comes from when it's not in the original? Why do they disagree?
After this brief study, I'm left with the same number of questions as when I started :( At the least, I've documented it here for future reference. It's nice to get the actual Greek on the same page. All links above direct you to useful places (even inside the blue boxes). |
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