The other day I was scrolling through Facebook as I normally do after I get off work to unwind and got worked up instead when I saw this:
Really?!?! Do I really need to write a post about this? (Well, no but I am!) Folks are really asking this question? With a big sigh, I recognize deep down in my heart that people are or their wouldn't be memes and discussion wars about this. So, here comes the blog post. First, to get down to answering the question at hand, we must first review the Bible:
Matthew 10:2 - 4 (NIV) says,"These are the names of the twelve apostles: first, Simon (who is called Peter) and his brother Andrew; James son of Zebedee, and his brother John; Philip and Bartholomew; Thomas and Matthew the tax collector; James son of Alphaeus, and Thaddaeus, Simon the Zealot and Judas Iscariot, who betrayed him."
Most individuals are familiar with a few of the disciples, especially Peter, Matthew, and Judas however, just like EVERY OTHER WORD in the Bible, names were also translated from Hebrew and/ or Aramaic. Translation of the Bible was not a singular event in which it was translated from Hebrew/ Aramaic to English. The Bible or the many books we now know to be the Bible took many travels down translation lane. However many trips to translation from Hebrew to Greek to Latin to English and other languages, one thing remains the same, the names of the disciples were not originally Matthew, James son of Zebedee, Judas, Peter, Simon, Andrew, Thomas, James son of Alphaeus, Thaddaeus, Philip, John, or Bartholomew.
The original names of the disciples were:
Simon was Shimon.
James was Yakov
John was Yochanan
Bartholomew was Bar-Talmai (son of Ptolemy)
Matthew was Mattityahu meaning, “gift from God.”
Thomas was Tau’ma
Thaddaeus was a variant of Theudas
Judas was Yehuda.
Andrew was Andreas
Philip was Filippos
So please, for the love of all of the information that is available to us at a swipe of our fingertips, the next time someone asks the question, "How did Jesus find guys named Matthew, James son of Zebedee, Judas, Peter, Simon, Andrew, Thomas, James son of Alphaeus, Thaddaeus, Philip, John, or Bartholmew in the Middle East?" Please tell them that those names were TRANSLATED from the original text!
References:
Shafiroff, I. (2011) Hebrew Names for Jewish Apostles.
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ReplyDeleteWith that being said how accurately do you think KJV which is a widely used version depicted the Word of God and the stories in them? Because how many men and women have twisted God's Word to fit their own needs and ways. Such as during slavery in the US where the masters only read the portion of the Bible that they felt would benefit them to keep their slaves fearful and in check
ReplyDeleteDo I believe that the KJV version of the Bible is the most accurate? No, it has been proven time and time again that people will take the text in holy books be it the Bible, Koran, etc., and use it for their personal gain or ideologies. That reason alone should compel believers to search, read, AND research the text of their religious beliefs thoroughly. Even then, we may not come to the same conclusions but we must work out our own soul salvation and walk in love as we have been instructed.
DeleteRead a red-letter edition of the bible. The red letters are pretty much what Jesus said. These were all real people whose names were translated into Greek and Latin many times. The point is that we know pretty much what Jesus said. Any reasonable scholar will agree.
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