ONE VERSE AND TWO PROBLEMS
Robert Meyers

Two questions fascinate some Bible students: whether writers of Scripture always compose under the influence of a uniform degree of inspiration, and whether translation is not a much more difficult and complex art than is commonly supposed. There is a single verse in one of Paul’s letters which opens the door for discussion of both questions.

Before we put the verse into print, let us set the stage for Paul’s comment. Writing to the Galatian believers, he is extremely unhappy about the circumcision controversies raging among them. He had already been through the fire with those who rebuked him for failing to preach circumcision. Now the anti-legalists are harassing him because he does not make not being circumcised important enough. Circumcision is nothing, Paul responds. Only faith working through love is good. But some of his friends want to feel that not being circumcised is meritorious. This is simply legalism in reverse, of course, and it upsets Paul.

Goaded by both sides, the apostle lashes out in Galatians 5:12 with one of the most startlingly harsh comments in the entire New Testament. It is so abusive, in fact, that some translators have been unwilling to give his words their natural meaning. The King James version says: “I would they were even cut off which trouble you.” This appears to mean that Paul merely wanted the disturbers separated from the rest of the church, so that the quarrels could end.

Adam Clarke is typical of those who adopt this explanation and Clarke’s, although not a critical commentary, is probably the only scholarly work widely used among many segments of the Restoration movement. When Daniel Curry supplemented a new edition of Clarke with views “from the best modern authorities,” he translated: “O that they who disturb you would mutilate (emasculate) themselves.” He argues that “but for reasons of taste and good morals all would be ready to accept” this rendering, and he wonders whether we have a right to adopt forced interpretations to avoid a more natural one, just because the more natural one seems unrefined.

It seems that the King James translators simply felt that Paul’s remark, naturally translated, was too crude. An apostle of the Lord Jesus Christ ought not to be represented as making so savage a thrust at his enemies. So they found a possible alternative translation and adopted it, a procedure which they followed on several occasions.

The American Standard version, which stays as close to the King James as it can in most places, translates as follows: “I would that they that unsettle you would even go beyond circumcision.” The comment is ambiguous, since no reader could feel quite sure that he knew the meaning of “go beyond circumcision.” Obviously, the expression is a euphemism employed by the American Standard committee to avoid the clear, biting implications of the Greek text. In a footnote they acknowledge that the original means “mutilate themselves:’ The meaning of “go beyond circumcision” then becomes clear. Paul meant that he wished those who were so interested in cutting would go deeper and further and mutilate themselves. This is virulent sarcasm indeed, but the meaning is attested by modern versions.

The Revised Standard version says: “I wish those who unsettle you would mutilate themselves!” Raymond Stamn; in his exegesis of this verse in The Interpreter’s Bible, translates: “I wish that those who are upsetting you would even emasculate themselves!” He says: “This is what Paul said and meant. The KJV gives a very different meaning, but is incorrect. For a similar outburst see Phil. 3:23, where the advocates of circumcision are ‘dogs,’ and by a play on words — perifome, katatomen — circumcision’ becomes ‘mutilation’. Paul may have been thinking of the mad spectacle of the Cybele-Attis cult, whose priests in frenzied devotion used to emasculate themselves as a sacrifice to their deity. The inference would be that if salvation depended on merit for a physical operation, these pagan observers of a more drastic rite would have greater assurance than the adherents to the Jewish custom.”

James Moffatt, as usual, translates bluntly: “O that those who are upsetting you would get themselves castrated!” Goodspeed records: “I wish the people who are upsetting you would go on, and mutilate themselves!” The New English version makes it quite clear: “As for these agitators, they had better go the whole way and make eunuchs of themselves!”

This abbreviated history of the translation of a single verse suggests how boundless are the fields of study for students of the art of translating. For even though there is now general agreement as to the meaning of the apostle’s words, one may still encounter a surprising exception. J. B. Phillips turns his back on the recent versions cited above and translates: “I wish those who are so eager to cut your bodies would cut themselves off from you altogether!”

I was so puzzled by this translation that I wrote to Mr. Phillips several years ago. He made a most kindly response. He doubted that the word in question “necessarily” meant an act of physical mutilation. He said he thought, speaking from memory only, that the word in classical times could be used to mean “to break company with” or “to break off in the middle of a speech.”

This seemed inadequate support for a translation which goes against all the great modern speech versions. I wondered whether Mr. Phillips’ great admiration for Paul, and Mr. Phillips’ own gentle nature, caused him to soften the translation. It seems highly unlikely to me that the New English committee would go so far as to speak of “eunuchs” without being quite sure that Paul’s words were just that harsh.

All this may seem merely curious to most readers, but in addition to provoking thoughts about translations the verse does something else. It permits us to ask the other question: was Paul as deeply under the influence of the Spirit when he wrote this scurrilous pun as when he wrote I Corinthians 13? Paul’s Lord had said that His disciples were to love their enemies, bless those who cursed them, and do good to those who hated them. Yet Paul in this moment utters a wish which would seem reprehensible from the mouth of a pagan. Although Christ spoke sharply to the Pharisees, He did not pass beyond the limits of decency. Paul’s remark, however, seems inexcusable. That is, unless one admits that any cruelty in word or deed is permissible if one is “under the influence of the Spirit.”

Peter was once hypocritical and cowardly in the matter of withdrawing from social activities with the Gentiles. Paul soundly rebuked him. We justify Paul’s rebuke on the grounds that Peter was not “inspired” at the time and was clearly in the wrong. We make this judgment on the basis of Christ’s own acceptance of the Gentiles and Peter’s earlier admission that they were brothers. Can we judge Paul’s savage remarks about the circumcision party on the same grounds? Jesus steadfastly refused to say anything like this, even when hounded to death. And Paul himself must often have stressed the requisites of gentlemanly conduct and fairness. Yet here he falls off from it.

If we should judge that Paul was less inspired when he uttered this crude pun, we would be saying in effect that we judge the level of a writer’s inspiration by his nearness to the spirit of Christ. Granting the risks in such a procedure, have we any other canon? Or must we simply shrug our shoulders and say that no matter how outrageous Paul’s comment seems, he is excusable because he wrote at all times under a uniform measure of the Spirit? — 867 Spaulding, Wichita, Kansas.