The New English Bible, like other modern translations, can be helpful if used with discretion. The translators have sought to express clearly in modern English the ideas that they think the original writers wished to express in Greek. In a number of cases their theological beliefs have misled them in deciding what those ideas were, and so they express an error in clear English. In a much greater number of passages, however, the meaning of the Greek is plain to the experts, and present-day readers can understand that meaning more readily in the words of the new translation than in the 400year-old language of the Authorised Version. Renderings from the N.E.B. and other modern translations will be included in these notes from time to time, when they give the meaning more clearly or more vividly than King James’s Version.
1 Thess. 2. 18. Satan—the adversary—could mean the opposition of Jews and Pagans requiring Paul’s attention at Corinth, or the more personal scheming of wicked men, or even his own physical infirmities. Acts 17 and 18 cover the period.
1 Thess. 2. 19 (Phillips). “Yet who could take your place as our hope and joy and pride when Christ comes? Who but you, as you will stand before him at his coming—Yes, you are indeed our pride and our joy.”
1 Thess. 3. 11. “God Himself and our Father.” This old form of expression, occurring also in Eph. 5. 20, Phil. 4. 20, Col. 1. 3, Rev. 1. 6, and other places, is replaced in modern translations by “our God and Father Himself”, or “his God and Father”, as the case requires. The Greek word KAI, while usually meaning simply “and”, sometimes has the sense of “even” as rendered in 1 Thess. 3. 13, Matt. 12. 8, Luke 19. 42, etc. Parkhurst, in his Greek Lexicon, lists over 20 senses in which the word is used.
1 Thess. 4. 15, “prevent”. R.S.V. reads “precede”, N.E.B. “forestall”.
1 Thess. 4. 17. Better rendered “caught away in clouds”. N.E.B. omits “the”. The verb is the same as in Acts 8. 39, “the Spirit of the Lord caught away Phillip”. Dr. Thomas comments, ‘Clouds of saints, by almighty power, will be removed from east, west, north and south, where they have been resurrected, ‘for a meeting of the Lord’ in the territory of his kingdom, the Holy Land”. (Eureka, Vol. 1, pp. 139-145.)
1 Thess. 5. 14, “comfort the feeble-minded”. N.E.B. and others read “encourage the fainthearted”.
1 Thess. 5. 23. Body, life, and mind are all necessary to a full intellectual life. Compare 2 Cor. 13. 9.
2 Thess. 2. 1, “by the coming”. R.S.V. reads “concerning the coming”. In the days of King James, the word “by” was often used with meanings differing from present usage, such as “with reference to” in this passage, and “against” in 1 Cor. 4. 4, where N.E.B. reads “I have nothing on my conscience”.
2 Thess. 2. 2. “Spirit” is used in the sense of a teacher claiming to be guided by the Holy Spirit. Compare 1 John 4. 1, Rev. 2. 2.
2 Thess. 2. 7, “letteth”. Used in its old meaning, “to hinder”. The same Greek. word is translated “withholdeth” in verse 6. Modern translations read “that which restrains” in both verses. State Paganism had to be taken out of the way before the Papal “man of sin” could develop.
2 Thess. 2. 10. N.E.B. “With all the deception that sinfulness can impose on those doomed to destruction.”
1 Tim. 1. 20. “Delivered to Satan” (Compare 1 Cor. 5. 5). Some brethren think this means simply expulsion from the ecclesia into the ungodly world; others consider it may also have involved infliction (for ultimate spiritual good) of some physical malady, like the temporary blindness of Elymas the sorcerer.
1 Tim. 1. 15, “a faithful saying”. This phrase, occurring again in 1 Tim 3. 1, 1 Tim. 4. 9,2 Tim. 2. 11, and Titus 3. 8, has been taken by many students to indicate that Paul, in these passages, is quoting from some statements of recognized authority. Ellicott’s Commentary suggests that they were “formulas expressing weighty and memorable truths, well known and often repeated by the brotherhood”. The reference is sometimes to what precedes, and sometimes to what follows. The idea is developed at some length by Bro. H. A. Whittaker in “The Christadelphian”, Dec. 1952, p. 369. He finds support in the frequent use in these epistles of the phrase “sound doctrine”, or more correctly, “the healthful teaching”. (The same Greek adjective is translated “whole” in Luke 7. 10, to describe the state of the centurion’s servant who had been healed by Jesus). Bro. Whittaker says,
“There is reason for believing that the ‘teaching’ Paul had in mind was the method employed amongst the Jews, and there is reason to believe that this feature of Jewish religious life was, like a number of others that could be cited, carried over into the practice of the early church”.
When Paul exhorts Timothy (2 Tim. 1. 13) to “hold fast the form (pattern or outline) of sound words which thou hast heard of me” he may have referred to some me”,catechism or early Statement of Faith. The various “faithful sayings” are studied in detail by Bro. Whittaker.
2 Tim. 1. 14. “That good thing which was committed unto thee. Literally “the good deposit”. The Greek word paratheke, meaning something entrusted to a person for safe keeping, or a deposit in a bank. This word and the related verb occur several times in the epistles to Timothy (1 Tim. 1. 18, 6. 20, 2 Tim. 1. 12, 1. 14, 2. 2). In 1 Tim. 1. 11 a different Greek word is used, though of similar meaning. The Truth is a treasure, a pearl of great price, to be guarded, pure and intact, by those to whom it is entrusted.
In 2 Tim. 1. 12, however, Paul speaks of a deposit which he had lodged with Christ. He perhaps thinks of all the things which he had given up for the service of Christ, as deposits lodged in the Bank of Heaven, which would be returned to him with generous interest in the day of account. The word is used in a similar sense in 1 Pet. 4. 19, “Let them that suffer according to the will of God commit the keeping of their souls to him in well doing, as unto a faithful Creator”. The same Greek word appears in Luke 23. 46, in the _last words of Jesus on the cross, “Father, into Thy hands I commend my spirit”.
The Origin of the Organic World – Part One