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The Contours of the Land in Israel's History
The Land of Palestine
The land of Palestine took its name from the Philistines (the Pelishtim in Hebrew) who settled along the Mediterranean coast from Joppa to Gaza about 1300–12...
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Nobody Talks Like That! (Ps 102:12) - Mondays with Mounce 291
You know you have been talking too much about translation when your spouse throws your own words back in your face. Robin was reading Ps 102...
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The Case of the Missing Object (Matt 5:25) - Mondays with Mounce 290
I have been enjoying reading the CSB, the new version of the former HCSB. Tom Schreiner and his group of translators have done an excellent ...
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How You Can Translate Mark 1–4 On Your Own
A few weeks ago we introduced you to an approach to reading biblical Greek that Mark Strauss calls “interesting and innovative.”
Reading Bib...
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Doesn’t ἀντί Always Mean “Instead of”? (Heb 12:2) - Mondays with Mounce 289
I came across a really strange use of ἀντί the other day. It serves as a good example of semantic range.
Speaking of Jesus, Heb 12:2 says, “...
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Ambiguous and Meaningless (John 3:21) - Mondays with Mounce 288
Sometimes Greek can really be frustrating, especially when it is succinct. Here is a good example: John 3:21 reads, “But the one who does th...
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An Interesting, Innovative Approach to Reading Biblical Greek
The English idiom “It’s all Greek to me” isn’t merely an expression that something isn’t understandable. It also embodies the frustrations a...
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Is the ESV Literal and the NIV Gender Neutral? - Mondays with Mounce 286
This blog is purely on translation and not directly on Greek, but I have been thinking about this a lot lately so thought I would share it.
...
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When οὔν Doesn’t Mean “Therefore” (John 11:6) - Mondays with Mounce 285
One of the better known conundrums in NT exegesis is Jesus’ response to hearing about Lazarus. “Now Jesus loved (ἠγάπα) Martha and her siste...
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Translating Every Word (Matt 10:4) - Mondays with Mounce 284
When it comes to particles and conjunctions especially, it can be difficult to translate every single one. Sometimes the best translation is...
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Aktionsart and Ask, Seek, Knock (Matt 7:7-8) - Mondays with Mounce 283
In first year Greek, we teachers need to make a bigger deal of Aktionsart. Meaning isn’t conveyed just by the meaning of the word, or its te...
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When Not to Say “Hello” (2 John 10) - Mondays with Mounce 282
How do you treat people who disagree with you theologically?
There has been a lot of dissension in the church over this question. My compute...
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What Is a “Just” Man? (Matt 1:19) - Mondays with Mounce 281
I came across another example of how word-for-word translations aren’t always translations, assuming that a translation is meant to convey m...
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That Pesky γάρ (Rom 5:6) - Mondays with Mounce 280
By now we should all recognize that γάρ means much more than “for,” and yet so often I hear people complaining that translators don’t always...
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When Word-for-Word Is Ambiguous (John 9:7) - Mondays with Mounce 279
I have been sensitive lately to finding passages in which a word-for-word translation is not clear but is ambiguous and perhaps even mislead...
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Clarity or Ambiguity? (John 1:13) - Mondays with Mounce 278
This is another way of asking the age old question, do you err on the side of word-for-word translation or on the side of meaning? Do you wa...
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What Is Worse? Removing from Scripture or Adding to Scripture? (Matt 18:11) - Mondays with Mounce 277
I was asked why all modern translations “omit” Matt 18:11. “For the Son of man is come to save that which was lost” (KJV). The form of the q...
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