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Biblical Hermeneutics - Lesson 18

Hermeneutics for Poetry (Part 2)

Jesus uses parallelism in the Gospels to illustrate and emphasize who God is and what the kingdom of God is like. In order to understand an idiom, you first need to identify it as an idiom and then determine what the meaning is in the culture.  

Robert Stein
Biblical Hermeneutics
Lesson 18
Watching Now
Hermeneutics for Poetry (Part 2)

HERMENEUTICS FOR POETRY (PART 2)

I. Types of Poetry in the Bible

A. Synonymous Parallelism

1. Matthew 7:7-8

2. Luke 6:27-28

3. The Lord's Prayer

B. Antithetic Parallelism

1. Matthew 7:17-18

2. Luke 16:10

3. Proverbs

C. Step/Climactic Parallelism

1. Matthew 11:40

2. Matthew 5:17

D. Chiasmic Parallelism

1. Matthew 23:12

2. Mark 8:35

II. Why Use Poetic Language?

III. The Genre of Idioms

A. Examples

1. "God bless you."

2. "Break a leg."

3. "How are you?"

B. Biblical Examples

1. Joshua 8:17, Judges 4:16, 2 Kings 10:21 - "No one was left."

2. 1 John 3:17 - "Shutteth up his bowels."

3. Genesis 22:17ff, Genesis 41:43, Joshua 11:4, Judges 7:12 - "Sands of the seashore."

4. Matthew 17:20, 1 Corinthians 13:2 - "Faith to move mountains"

C. How to detect idioms

1. Found frequently

2. Cannot be interpreted literally in context

D. Specific example - "Love and Hate"

1. Malachi 1:2-3, Romans 9:13

2. Explanation from Genesis 29:31

3. Deuteronomy 21:15-17

4. Luke 14:26

5. Proverbs 13:24

E. Meaning is determined by the author

F. Learning a new language


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Transcript
  • Understanding the roots of the English language and knowing the history of the English translations of the Bible gives you a context that can help you understand the meaning of the passage you are reading. 

  • After William Tyndale published the first Bible in English in 1539 that was translated from the Hebrew and Greek texts, King James of England assembled a team of top scholars to create an English translation that was published in 1611. More recent translations are still being made to reflect new manuscript discoveries and changes in the English language. 

  • There is no such thing as an exact word equivalent when going from one language to another. Different languages as well as different cultures pose a challenge for translators. It's important to use the best manuscripts for your translation.

  • A few of the challenges that translators face are for the translation to be accurate but understandable, contemporary but universal, and to avoid a theological bias. Contemporary languages are always changing, and each translator holds theological beliefs based on years of training and experience. 

  • Inerrancy of the Bible is an important foundation for the process of translation. Some translations focus more on "word-for-word" equivalents and some focus more on "thought-for-thought" equivalents. Some translations include footnotes to explain a verse that is ambiguous or controversial. 

  • The three components that determine meaning in written communication are the author, the text and the reader. In determining the meaning of Biblical passages, it's important to know as much as possible about all three components. 

  • The author of a passage made an intentional effort to communicate a message. It is the job of the reader to determine the meaning and implications of the message by studying the text itself, then evaluating the literary form and other contextual factors. 

  • The first step in interpretation is to focus on the pattern of meaning the author consciously willed to convey by the words they used. Then, the implications of the text may also include meanings in the text of which the author was unaware but fall within the author's pattern of meaning.

  • It's important to define your terms when you are determining the interpretation and application of Biblical passages. Your goal is to begin by hearing the message of a passage as the author intended it and the first readers would have understood it. 

  • The written word correctly interpreted is the objective basis of authority. The inward illuminating and persuading work of the Holy Spirit is the subjective dimension. When 1 Cor. 2:14 says that an unspiritual man cannot understand Scritpure, it is referring to his lack of acceptance rather than his mental grasp of the words. 

  • You will gain a comprehensive understanding of the role of the Holy Spirit in relation to believers, the church, and the world. The lesson covers the Holy Spirit's work in the regeneration and sanctification of believers, empowering and guiding them, unifying the church, bestowing spiritual gifts, the conviction of sin, righteousness, and judgment, and drawing people to God. The conclusion summarizes the Holy Spirit's impact on all aspects of life.

  • Your presuppositions about whether or not the miracles in the Bible took place as they are recorded will affect the way you look at the Bible and at specific events. Three approaches to this question are the supernatural approach, rationalist approach and the mythical approach. 

  • Kinds of meaning and types of meaning are two of the main ideas in the book, "The Language and Imagery of the Bible," by G. B. Caird. Proverbs are short, pithy sayings that express a general truth. Exceptions are allowed. A good example of an exception to a proverb is the book of Job.

  • Judgment prophecy assumes that, even if not stated, if the people repent, judgment will not come. Prophets also tend to speak in figurative language, using cosmic terminology. 

  • The prophets use figurative and metaphorical language to describe future events and spiritual reality. They also use cosmic language to describe God acting in history. 

  • Dr. Stein discusses the possibility of a sensus plenior in some passages. In Mark 13, Jesus talks about coming events that are also prophesied in the Old Testament. 

  • Judges chapters 4 and 5 describe the same events. Chapter 4 uses prose, chapter 5 uses poetry. The book of Psalms is a collection of songs, prayers and reflections about human emotions, and God, his character and his work in the world. 

  • Jesus uses parallelism in the Gospels to illustrate and emphasize who God is and what the kingdom of God is like. In order to understand an idiom, you first need to identify it as an idiom and then determine what the meaning is in the culture.  

  • Exaggeration is overstatement. Hyperbole is literally impossible. When using exaggeration, both parties must agree that the expression is an exaggeration. Jesus uses exaggeration to emphasize and illustrate important teachings. 

  • Jesus uses exaggeration to make his point clear, especially on matters of morality, but doesn't take the time to discuss possible exceptions. Jesus also uses all-inclusive and universal language, as well as idiomatic language that no longer bears its original meaning. 

  • Some of the early church writers and the reformers interpreted parables, like the parable of the Good Samaritan, as allegories. 

  • Adolf Jülicher taught that parables tend to have one basic point of comparison, and the details are just there to make the story interesting. So you should try to understand what’s the main point of the parable. To begin with, seek to understand the parable as the first century audience would have. Consider what the Gospel writers were trying to teach. Ask how it applies to you in your current situation. 

  • In the parable of the hidden treasure and the parable of the pearl of great price, the message of the value of the kingdom of God is more important than the character of the man. In the parable of the ten virgins and the parable of the dishonest manager, it's important to focus on the main point of the parable and not to get distracted by the details. The parable of the lost sheep teaches us to pursue the lost. 

  • When interpreting the parable of the workers, determine the main characters, consider the rule of end stress and pay attention to what gets the most press. 

  • Some parables are best interpreted as an allegory. It's important to ask if Jesus with his audience would have attributed meaning to these details and if the audience of the Gospel writers would have understood the details as being allegorical. 

  • When you are determining how you should apply the parable of the final judgment in Matthew 25: 31-46, who Jesus is referring to when he says, "...just as you did it to one of the least of these, my brethren, you did it to me." In the parable of the rich man and Lazarus, Jesus makes a point about what causes people to believe in him or to not believe in him. 

  • You read and interpret a passage that is historical narrative differently than a passage that is prophecy, poetry or a parable. Much of the historical information in the Bible is confirmed by archaeological discoveries including literature from other contemporary cultures. In the 1700's there was a group of scholars that began questioning whether the miraculous events in the Bible were supernatural. They tried to find meaning in the stories without saying that a miracle happened assumed that the real meaning is not the same as the author's literal intention. They did this by finding the meaning of the words, then conducting a historical assessment of what really happened. 

  • Supernaturalists believe that the miracles the Gospel writers recorded were supernatural events. The rationalists believe that either the Gospel writers knew that miracles did not take place, but they were accommodating their readers who did believe in miracles, or that they really believed them but they were just myths. This would require the Gospel writers to be liars or not very smart, neither of which seem consistent with the care and precision with which the Gospels were written. When you are preaching a narrative passage, it's important to include the whole context when you are interpreting the meaning of the events.

  • When interpreting the epistles, it's important to identify which words are used frequently, what the meaning of the words are and how the author uses them. It can be helpful to study the etymology of words and the meaning of words in their historical context. The process of moving from norms of language to norms of utterance is important. 

  • We can get information about the meaning of words from studying ancient Greek literature, the writings of early church fathers and the translators of the Hebrew Old Testament. We can also compare letters written by the same author, and also how the word is used within the same letter or passage. It can be helpful to look at the way different authors use the same word. 

  • Once you determine the meaning of the words, it's important to recognize how they are used in the sentence and how the clauses in the sentence are related. Understanding the different ways clauses can be used will help you determine the meaning of each sentence. The distinction between "means" and "cause" is significant. 

  • Romans 13:1-7 is a good example of the development of a logical argument. Most of the epistles follow the form of an ancient letter, which is greeting or salutation, thanksgiving or prayer, body of the letter and conclusion. 

  • Two types of covenants are the parity covenant and suzerain covenant. Covenant language is used in both the Old Testament and New Testament. The parts of a covenant, illustrated in the Mosaic covenant in Exodus 20, are the preamble, prologue, stipulations, provision for continual reading and witnesses.

  • God renews his covenant with Israel in Joshua 24. The three types of laws in the Old Testament are civil laws, cultic laws and moral laws. 

  • The book of Psalms is divided into five sections. The Psalms were written by different people at different times for different purposes. Some were for public worship and some were the result of personal reflection in times of joy, distress or repentance. 

  • In Jesus's day, the Scripture was the books of the Old Testament. Many of the books of the New Testament were written before 70 a.d. The Gospel writers produced a written record of the life of Jesus. Paul and other apostles wrote to churches to encourage and teach them. Eusebius, a church historian in 325a.d., recorded a list of the books that are currently in the New Testament.

  • Factors in recognizing the books that make up the New Testament were apostolic authorship, use in the church over time, unity and agreement and the superintendence of the Holy Spirit. The writing of the books of the Bible was inspired by God and it is inerrant. 

Dr. Robert Stein covers the history of the English Bible and then moves into the rules for interpreting the biblical text, including the role of the Holy Spirit in the hermeneutical process. He then spends considerable time moving through the different genres of literature (e.g., proverbs, poetry, parables, narrative). Dr. Stein did not provide us the notes he refers to in the class, but we did place links for the books he used as a basis for the class on the class page under the Recommended Reading heading.

Recommended Books

Biblical Hermeneutics - Student Guide

Biblical Hermeneutics - Student Guide

How do you even start to study your Bible? What are the guiding principles? Are the rules for interpreting narrative any different from parables and apocalyptic literature?...

Biblical Hermeneutics - Student Guide

Now I am going to talk about four specific kinds of poetry.  One is synonymous parallelism. In synonymous parallelism, you have the same thought being repeated. You have it being repeated however in poetic form.  The poetry would of course be in the Greek in the New Testament.  But the poetry before it was in Greek was in Aramaic Jesus spoke.  It is still in the Greek and it is still in the translation. 

Listen. 

“Ask and it shall be given you.
Seek and you shall find.
Knock and it shall be opened to you.
For everyone who asks receives
And he who seeks finds.
To him who knocks, it shall be opened.”

Now I remember hearing a sermon one day from somebody who was saying, “There are really three kinds of prayer.  The problem with some of us is that we are only at the asking level of prayer. We need to go to this deeper seeking level of prayer. And then if we have gone to that place we should strive further to get to the knocking kind of prayer.”

Three points. You can’t beat that can you?

The only problem is that its poetry.  And the same thought is essentially being repeated because to ask means to seek and to seek means to knock and to knock means to ask.  To find means to have it opened to you and so forth and so on.

The same thought is being repeated much like in a particular kind of song we have, of course:

“Lord. You are more precious than silver.
Lord, You are more costly than gold.
Lord, You are more beautiful than diamonds.
And nothing I desire compares to you.”

Is this to be understood as one person saying, “Lord, You are more precious than silver” and someone says, “For me You are more precious than gold.” “Well. He is more precious than diamonds to me.” 

Or are we repeating the same thought?  It is the same thought being repeated.  But let me say, it sure is a lot nicer to say this than to say, “Lord, You are more precious than silver. “Lord, You are more precious than silver. Lord, You are more precious than silver.” Alright?

So there is a variety where the same thought where the same thought is being repeated in rhythmic form. This can become helpful at times because if you did not know one of these lines, the other lines knowing it is in rhythmic parallelism, helps you to understand it.

For instance in Luke 6:27 and 28, we have an example of this kind of parallelism.

“But I say to you then – listen 4 lines – Love your enemies.
Do good to those who hate you.
Bless those who curse you.
Pray for those who abuse you.”

Do you want to know what it means to love your enemies? Well, it means to pray for those who abuse you. To bless those who curse you. To do good to those who hate you.

Notice these are all about actions. There is nothing about “emote”  [Hard to Hear]  towards them. It has to do with good actions. You want to know what love of enemies means.  It means to do good things for them.  To bless, to pray for and to do good to.

Another example of that is in the Lord’s Prayer. There are three lines in the Lord’s Prayer in Matthew which are synonymous parallelism. 

“Hallowed be thy name.
Thy Kingdom come
Thy will be done.”

Then you have the expression, “On earth as it is in Heaven” which probably goes with all three of them.

What does it mean to have God’s name hallowed on earth as it is in Heaven? To have His will done on earth as it is in Heaven? I know what the one line in between these three lines of synonymous parallelism means. 

“Your kingdom come,
On earth as it is in Heaven.

I know what that means. Asking for history to come to an end. For Jesus to return.  It is the same kind of prayer that the early church prayed when they said, “Even so come quickly Lord Jesus” or “Maranatha” as it is in 2nd Corinthians.

Well. If that’s what it means, “Hallowed be your name on earth as it is in Heaven” looks for the day where we pray “Lord, we pray for that time when just as it is in Heaven, your name will be hallowed on this earth.” Your will be done, we are praying Lord that just as your will is done and perfection in Heaven, we are praying for that day when it will be done on earth as it is in Heaven.”

So if you know one of these lines, it helps you to understand these other lines when you have this rhythmic synonymous parallelism.  The opposite of that – we looked at one example, this last one in which you had four lines, the previous one had three lines, in which you had synonymous parallelism. 

Now the opposite of synonymous parallelism would be antithetical parallelism.  And here you have in all the examples however only two lines. One line and then the opposite line.

“Every good tree bears good fruit, but the bad tree bears bad fruit.
A good tree cannot bear evil fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit.”

Opposite being repeated.

Luke 16:10 – another example of this kind of this parallelism.

“Whoever is faithful in very little, is faithful also in much.
And whoever is dishonest in very little, is dishonest also in much.”

Now a lot of the Proverbs use antithetical parallelism. You say “Well, what are they? Are they Proverbs or are they poetry?” Well, there is no sharp distinction. Some you could label both.  You can have a proverb that is in poetic form. But almost all of Proverbs 10, 11, 12, 13, 14 and half of 15 are all examples of antithetical parallelism.

“The wise son is a joy to his father but a bad son…” so forth.

Antithetical parallelism, the opposite thought is being repeated.  Another kind of parallelism, is called step or climatic parallelism. In this, the 1st and the 2nd lines are not identical. They are not synonymous. But the 2nd line is not the opposite of the 1st.  What happens is that the 2nd line advances the 1st line a step further and are called therefore step parallelism.

Matthew 11:40, “Whoever welcomes you, welcomes Me. And whoever welcomes me welcomes the one who sent me.” If they welcome the disciples, they welcome Jesus and if they welcome Jesus, they welcome His heavenly Father Who sent Him.

Matthew 5:17, “Think not that I have come to destroy the Law and the Prophets. I have come not to destroy them, but to fulfill them.”

It rises a level up. Step Parallelism.

Now another kind of parallelism is called chiasmic parallelism. Here you have in the 1st statement, a A-B part.  There is an A part and a B part.  Now when you get to the 2nd part, remember, the key to all of these is parallelism or rhythm. The 2nd part reverses the order and goes from B to A.

Matthew 23:12, “Anyone who exalts Himself will be humbled. Anyone who (A) exalts Himself will be (B) humbled. Anyone who (B) humbles himself, will be (A) exalted.” A-B-B-A

Mark 8:35, “He who (A) saves his life will (B) lose it. He who (B) loses his life for my sake and the Gospels will (A) save it. Save-lose-lose-Save. Chiasmic parallelism

Now the key of all this is that poetry is here not so much rhyme, but rhythm. Well, you say, “But I thought poetry was rhyme.  I mean Mary had a little lamb, whose fleece was white as snow. Everywhere that Mary went the lamb was sure to go. Snow, go, Rhyme. That’s poetry.

But think a minute.

Maary had aaa little lamb, whose fleece was white as snowwww… and everywhere that Mary went, the lamb was sure to follow ? No. One syllable …go.

There has to be a rhythm to it. So rhythm is far more basic to poetry than rhyme, and Hebrew poetry especially is much more rhythm than rhyme in that regard.  Even in English poetry is much more dominated by rhythm than rhyme. Though sometimes we have both present. Yeah. I have for instance in the Gospels, I have 48 examples that I know of synonymous parallelism. 48 times where Jesus used this form of poetry of synonymous parallelism. 

I have a 138 examples of antithetical parallelism. 20+ of step or climactic parallelism and 16 of chiasmic parallelism.

So all together, when you put it together, let us see uh … you have over 200 examples of that kind of poetry.

Dr. Stein: Yes.

Student:  [Hard to Hear]

Dr. Stein: Just in the Gospels, right. From Jesus lips. Why would Jesus want to teach them poetry? Our missionary talked about a non-cultural society, and not literal.

Student:  [Hard to Hear]

Dr. Stein: Sure. If you have a non-literal society, how do you teach them? You might say, “Well. Teach them to read and write.” That takes a while. But you can teach them in poetic forms, things easily memorizable. And the community can possess those and have them before they learn how to read.  So you have this rhythmic teaching, it is very to do so.

I could probably ask most of you, right out for me the first verse of “The Church’s One Foundation.”

Church’s One Foundation
Is Jesus Christ Our Lord
She is His new creation

And you would sing it right? And the rhythm would come to you. And the rhythm would help you to remember it. And so by placing things in poetic form, Jesus helped His readers to retain His teachings. Other forms that we looked at are exaggeration. We haven’t looked at that very carefully. We will look at that more in precision later on. We will look at Parables.

If you hear the Parable of the Prodigal Son, how often do you have to hear it to be able to say it almost exactly? Twice? Parables of story helps you with that. Poetry.  So these are very memorizable forms and we are dealing with a culture that essentially is illiterate, so they are useful and powerful forms as well.

Questions? Comments?

Student:  [Hard to Hear]

Dr. Stein: Alright I’ll tell you once again.

Synonymous parallelism: 48 examples.
Antithetical parallelism: 138 examples.
Step or climactic parallelism: 20+ roughly
Chiasmic parallelism: 16

That is just Jesus’ teachings in the Gospels. Of course if you just went to the book of Proverbs, and you see all the rhythm there, which makes Proverbs easy to memorize is the rhythm, you would have hundreds of them literally. Hundreds and hundreds.

Anything else? Yeah.

Student: I was wondering if I could ask a question that goes back a couple of classes.

Dr. Stein: Sure if I could still remember that far. The older you get, you have short-term memory loss.

Student:  [Hard to Hear]

Dr. Stein: The Parables could be interpreted as saying Jesus taught so that the non-predestined would not understand. You have a real Calvinistic interpretation. The problem with that is that verse He quotes from Isaiah, the strongest possible portion of that verse that would really lead to that kind of an interpretation, He omits.

You look at the part of Isaiah that is not quoted, and that’s really a strong Calvinistic kind of thought you might have, but He doesn’t say it that way. Furthermore those who were not predestined understood the Parables pretty well.  I mean after one of the Parables, they wanted to go out and crucify Him. Do they say, “I’m tired of not being able to understand the Parables. Lets crucify a guy like that.”

{Laughter}

So they understood the Parables pretty well. And I think we have to wrestle with sometimes, the Parables are used because when you talk about the Kingdom of God and Pontius Pilate is only interested in the Kingdom of Rome and any other kingdom you talk about it pretty dangerous. How do you talk about sensitive subjects? Well. You talk about it in parabolic form.

And the spies of Pontius Pilate come back to the Pilate and say, “We heard Him talking about the Kingdom of God.” And He says, “Well. What did He say?” “Well. He said it was like leaven which a woman put in a batch of dough.” “And then what did He say?” “It is about all He said.” Oh. He said, it doesn’t make sense in many ways.

So in some ways the Parables are not as obscure as you might think but they are in a form that would be very hard to find fault with in some of the areas like the Kingdom of God, very touchy subject. Same as what He does in the teaching about the Kingdom of God in parables, He does by talking of Himself not as the Messiah, but as the Son of Man. He can talk about who He is without evoking revolutionary kinds of things that would require Rome to interfere immediately to try to crush the movement.

So that’s one of the reasons He talked about. But we are going to spend time on the Parables and go into it more at length that way.

Now Faith, in the sense in which I am here using the word, is the art of holding on to things your reason ’has once accepted, in spite of your changing moods. For moods will change, whatever view your reason takes. I know that by experience. Now that I am a Christian I do have moods in which the whole thing looks very improbable: but when I was an atheist I had moods in which Christianity looked terribly probable. This rebellion of your moods against your real self is going to come anyway. That is why Faith is such a necessary virtue: unless you teach your moods “where they get off,” you can never be either a sound Christian or even a sound atheist, but just a creature dithering to and fro, with its beliefs really dependent on the weather and the state of its digestion. Consequently one must train the habit of Faith.

The first step is to recognize the fact that your moods change. The next is to make sure that, if you have once accepted Christianity, then some of its main doctrines shall be deliberately held before your mind for some time every day. That is why daily prayers and religious reading and church-going are necessary parts of the Christian life. We have to be continually reminded of what we believe. Neither this belief nor any other will automatically remain alive in the mind. It must be fed. And as a matter of fact, if you examined a hundred people who had lost their faith in Christianity, I wonder how many of them would turn out to have been reasoned out of it by honest argument? Do not most people simply drift away?

~ C.S. Lewis, On the Importance of Faith

Now we are going to look at two Idioms today. The first is the … excuse me … the first genre, we are going to look at two genres and the first one is Idioms.  Alright, I had idioms in mind so I misspoke here. We want to look at Idioms and how to interpret idioms. The genre of Idioms being taught here by an idiot.

{Laughter}

Sorry.  One of the problems with idioms is that they are difficult to interpret. You hear idioms lots of times and we don’t realize that what is taking place is someone is saying something that makes absolutely no sense unless it is an idiom. 

We have people saying things like, you sneeze, “God bless you!” Now think for a minute. That is an imperative. You are ordering God to bless me because I sneezed? Now come on Stein, that’s an idiom.  You don’t take it that way. It means hope you don’t sneeze again or something like that.

{Laughter}

Have any of you been in theatre of any sort or studied in the theatre? There is an expression when someone starts a new play. What is it? “Break a leg.”  What in the world? Here is something that has to be an idiom. Minors in Germany, when they go down to the mine, miners are told, “Goot Alf”,  Good up. Makes little sense and yet it is also idiomatic.  Someone sees me in the hallway and they say, “How are you Dr. Stein?” What happens if I say, “Well. You know I am having some trouble with my hands right now. I am getting some carpal tunnel problems.”I mean you look at me.

What in the world is the matter with that professor? They didn’t mean, “How are you Dr. Stein?” They mean, “Hi!” It is an idiom. And the one thing about it is that you can interpret idioms literally.

It is a good example by the way and I will emphasize it later that meaning is found in not the text, but what the author means by the text.  Idioms are perfect examples of that. Idioms taken literally as words mean nothing.  The author’s use of them as an idiom can make a lot of sense. We have all sorts of other kinds of idioms that are expressions in the Bible we have an expression, “Not a man was left” which is exaggerated terminology meaning that there is a great victory over the enemies or something like that.

1st John 3:17 talks about finding a brother in need – a person in need – and shutting up your bowels to them. So you have a fellow Christian who is in need and you become constipated. The RSV has “close your heart to them.” Really it says bowels, but its an expression. New RSV, “refuses help,” New NIV, “has no pity.”  They are all translating for us what this idiom is.

We have, “as numerous as the sand of the sea” found lots and lots of times.  One idiom that is found in the Bible is “faith to remove mountains.” It is found both in Matthew 17:20, Paul quotes it in 1st Corinthians 13:2.  Matthew 17:20 if you put down 1st Corinthians 13:2.  And its in the Rabbinic literature, quoted by the Rabbis in [Hard to Hear]  3b

How do you detect if something is an idiom or not? Well here is an expression that is found frequently? I remember one experience after being on Sabbatical, I came back and my friend John [Hard to Hear]  said that there was a new restaurant that had opened and You ought to go there and take Joan with you, he said “Its really bad.”  I looked at him, I thought, “What in the world?” and I didn’t say anything and later on TV, I saw on a talk-show somebody said “Yeah. It was great. Its really bad.”  And it began to dawn on me. Here was an expression that had become some sort of idiomatic phrase during the time my wife and I had been in Europe.

And really bad had come to mean, really good.  It was an idiom.  I knew it was an idiom, figured it out, because it didn’t mean what the words literally meant and it was constantly said in that same kind of expression, so its repetition and the fact that didn’t mean literally what it seems to be.  That all indicated that it was an idiom.

Now, there are a number of idioms in the Bible and one that I deal in the text at length is Malachi 1:2 and 3. The Word of the Lord to Israel by Malachi,

“2 I have loved you, says the Lord. But you say, ‘How have you loved us?’ Is not Esau Jacob’s brother? says the Lord. Yet I have loved Jacob 3but I have hated Esau…”

Right away when I see something like that I say, “God so loved the world, except of course for Esau, that He gave His only begotten…”  You know there are other teachings in the Bible that make you start wondering about things like this. 
I began to look and this is repeated by the way in Romans 9:13, “Jacob have I loved, Esau have I hated.” The clue for me came, I don’t know if somebody pointed me to this or whether I read it by accident, in Genesis 29:30 and 31.  In the RSV and King James it still uses the literal language of the text.  It says,

“So Jacob loved Rachel more than Leah. He served Laban for another seven years. When the Lord saw that Leah was hated, he opened her womb, but Rachel was barren.” 

“He loved Rachel more than Leah,” the next verse, “When the Lord saw that Leah was hated.”

Well, the very fact that they are next to each other means that they are referring to the same thing.  He loved Rachel more than Leah. Leah is seen as being hated.  Now you know the word hated can’t mean literally hated.  I don’t know what their relationship exactly was, but they had some six children or so didn’t they? Something is going on there that we don’t usually refer to as plain hatred. Right?

Jacob loved Rachel more than Leah, and in the Hebrew understanding, if you love one more than the other, you love the one and you hate the other.  Now what hate means is an idiom for being loved less. You have that in Deuteronomy 21:15-17.  Here all of the new translations, translate the idiom according to its meaning, not according to its words, but let me …I am reading from the New RSV, but I’ll put in the words, the literal words, and tell you how they translate it there.

In Deuteronomy 21, verse 15,

“15 If a man has two wives, one of them loved and the other...”

Dr. Stein:  the Hebrew is hated - the New RSV has "disliked."

"and if both the loved and the disliked ..."

Dr. Stein: or hated one literally,

"have borne him sons, the firstborn being the son of the one who is disliked..."

Dr. Stein: hated

"16then on the day when he wills his possessions to his sons, he is not permitted to treat the son of the loved as the firstborn in preference to the son of the ..."

Dr. Stein: hated.  Hated, loved, hated, loved.  It really doesn't mean hated. In fact, it doesn't even mean disliked. It means you prefer one over the other. You love one more than the other. But in that kind of an understanding, you love the one and you hate the other.

“No man can serve two masters for either he will love the one and hate the other.” It is an idiom for you prefer one over the... You love the one more than you love the other. And you have that later on in an idiom when Jesus says, “If any man would come after Me, he must hate his father and mother” Luke 14:26.  The parallel in Matthew, same saying but translated thought for thought is, “If any man loves his mother and father more than me he is not worthy of me.” So here is an idiomatic expression. Proverbs – same thing. You love the one more than you love the other and so forth.

Idioms are a good example of the fact that the meaning of words is determined by the author. The fact that we have idioms destroys the idea that a text can in and of itself bear meaning, because it is just a collection of words. The words taken literally are quite different than the actual meaning.

If you learn a different language, then of course idioms become really a problem.  My wife on our first sabbatical was studying German at the U.S. Army base at Heidelberg. There was a class there for learning German and she took it.  And the teacher was a German woman and the first day of class all she did was speak in German; no English was spoken. And she always said at the end, “Now, try talking some German to some people.”

It was a great experience and … my wife, I remember, after about 3 weeks or maybe even only 2 had bought a garment at a German store and it didn’t fit right. She wanted to return it and she asked me to go with her. And I said, “No. You go. You go alone.” She was real mad. But she went, spoke some German. She came back very very happy. Proud that she was able to communicate and so forth and so on.

Well on one of the days, it was a very hot day – at the end of class, she said, “I know you always like to talk German but when you talk German today, don’t talk to any people out there about the weather. Don’t say something like “Ich bin heib[Hard to Hear] ” Is there anything like that. Just don’t say it. And everybody in class said, “Now. Wait a minute. You just can’t say something. Why can’t we say it?” She said, “Well. You don’t need to know. Just don’t say it.” And so finally they kept on saying, “You have to tell us why can’t we say to somebody in this hot weather “Ich bin heib” – “I am hot.”

She said “Well. You should say, “Mich ist es heib,” “To me it is hot.”

So they said, “Whats the difference?”

“Well. “Ich bin heib” is an idiom that describes not you physical temperature but you sexual temperature. You can just imagine all the Americans trying to learn German on a hot day in August and trying to strike up a conversation with people and saying something to somebody and the Germans just shocked and you realize they are Americans and then they say, “Oh. Yeah. Mich ist es auch heib,” – “To me it is also warm” and walking away, turning the corner and then just rolling over and laughing.

It is always a problem. Someone told me, I had another thing happen to me in German which was idiomatic. We had some company in German. We had been there for some time and one of the person said, “Jetzt habe ich mir die nase voll.”  Jetzt habe ich mir die nase voll. Literally, “Now, I have my nose full.” Jetzt habe ich mir die - my nose full.

So she went into the kitchen and got a box of Kleenex and came back and gave it to the person.  He looked at her and then he just started to smile, because “Jetzt habe ich mir die nase voll” is an idiom.  It means, “I have had it up to here with this stuff.”  Does not interest me any more. I have … have it up to here “Jetzt habe ich mir die nase voll” with this political situation or something like that.

There are lots of languages that have idioms and one of the things in learning another language is make sure you learn the idioms, because you can embarrass yourself rather seriously, if you are not careful.  The Bible has those kinds of idioms, many times we see them, so that we have to understand, for instance, I have heard people say they have faith to remove mountains and to understand it very literally. It was never intended to be understood literally.  Mean to have great faith. Faith that accomplish many things.  It is not a challenge to sit next to the … to Mount Everest and practice faith of mountain removal or something like that.  It is not understood that way.  It was never meant to be understood literally in that respect.  So idioms – it goes pretty straightforward.  I think you can read the chapter on that.  I am not going to deal with it much more.  You have any questions or anything like that? Yes?

Student: [Hard to Hear] Why do you think they chose [Hard to Hear]  literal.

Dr. Stein: If you are committed to a particular philosophy of word for word translation, then like the King James you translate it word for word.  Now, I don’t know if the King James knew some of these were idioms.  By the time you get to the RSV, they begin to know they are idiomatic and they begin to hedge on that. Now the question is, should you translate this word for word, when you come to, “the man has two wives, the one loved, the other hated.” Will that cause confusion to the reader, when you put a footnote this is idiomatic for the expression of preferring one wife over the other or you do that already in the translation? And you say, “the one loved, the other – the one loved more and the other less.”  You have to make that decision. It is two different ways of translating, but my understanding would be I think it makes more sense to translate a passage like that, “the one loved more and the other loved less.” That makes sense. People can understand it.

They miss the idiom to be sure, but they don’t get confused about the meaning, so that here you come to a place where a thought for thought translation is more conducive than a word for word, but the problem of course is that when you do that, you lose the idiom and so forth and so on, but I don’t think that for the average person that is a great loss.

Student: Be careful in assuming that the idiom [Hard to Hear]

Dr. Stein: The norms of language possibilities of an expression.  If we have an idiom, they tend to continue that way quite a bit and change in expressions like that in Biblical times would be far far, less frequently than the changes in our language in say 50, 80 years or something like that. So if you knew this was an idiom, I think you could probably assume that, but the context always has to be the final determiner.

Student: [Hard to Hear]

Dr. Stein: A sin to?

Student: [Hard to Hear]

Dr. Stein: No, I don’t think it is. I think what they mean by that is “May the Lord bless you in a general way, probably and …” if you translated it, most people would translate it, “Gesundheit.”

It is no longer so much “God bless you” but “good health” or something like that, “Hope you get over your sneezing” or something like that. Doesn’t really mean that and it might be wise for us to be more careful when we use God’s name, than to be more precise with it. I think we are very very casual in the way we use God’s name much to much so.  If anything, we could learn something from Orthodox Jewish people who have such a reverence for the name of God that they don’t even repeat it. We use such things as that God is going to get you for what you did to me and using it in that lighthearted sense, I am uneasy about that.