This is number 7 of a series of posts investigating Brian Simmons’ claims to be translating from the Aramaic in certain verses of his so-called ‘Passion Translation’. My current intention is to look at the first ten such claims in Letters from Heaven, and then take stock. For more on my purpose and methodology see here and here.
Galatians 4.3
οὕτως καὶ ἡμεῖς, ὅτε ἦμεν νήπιοι, ὑπὸ τὰ στοιχεῖα τοῦ κόσμου ἤμεθα δεδουλωμένοι· [NA 28]
Even so we, when we were children, were in bondage under the elements of the world. [NKJV]
Simmons:
Instead of ‘under the elements of the world’, Simmons has ‘under the regulations and rituals of religion’, which is a different thing entirely. Has this been translated from the Aramaic as he claims?
Here is the Western UBS Peshitta text from dukrhana.com with transliteration and three English translations by Etheridge (green), Murdock (navy), and Lamsa (purple):
We notice immediately that there is no indication of any divergence from the Greek text and normal English translations of it. It would appear that ܐܶܣܛܽܘܟ݁ܣܰܘܗ݈ܝ (ᵓesṭūkkəsaw), lexeme ܐܣܛܘܟܣܐ , comes directly as a transliteration or loan word from the Greek στοιχεῖον, meaning ‘elements’, ‘fundamental principles’ or ‘elemental spirits’. Both Jennings:
and Payne Smith:
define the word first of all by means of its Greek equivalent. There is clearly no divergence at all between the Greek and the Aramaic at this point.
The lexeme of ܕ݁ܥܳܠܡܳܐ is ܥܠܡܐ , which means either ‘age’ or ‘world’, as shown in both Jennings:
and Payne Smith:
The dalath (ܕ) before ܥܠܡܐ is here a marker of the genitive: ‘of the age’, ‘of the world’.
I conclude that there is no divergence between the Greek and the Aramaic Peshitta in this verse, and that Simmons cannot have derived his ‘the regulations and rituals of religion’ from the latter.
Andrew
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