[B-Greek] question
Iver Larsen
iver_larsen at sil.org
Fri Dec 26 10:51:39 EST 2003
> Why is a transliteration used for the greek word "poimen" to pastor in
> Ephesians 4:11? I've noticed that odf the 18 times poimen is used in the
> New Testament, it's only translated pastor once.
This is a translation question, and you are quite right that almost all
English versions are inconsistent and somewhat inaccurate here. They are
simply carrying forward a tradition that goes back at least to the King
James version. In the English language of that time, the word "pastor" was
an alternative (from Latin) for "shepherd", and it appears that "shepherd"
was used always in the literal sense and when God is the shepherd, but
sometimes "pastors" was used in the extended sense of leaders caring for
their "sheep". In this extended sense, the words seem to have been
synonymous at that time, but this is no longer the case.
The inconsistency (or stylistic variation?) is found also in the KJV of
Jeremiah:
Jer 23:1 Woe be unto the pastors that destroy and scatter the sheep of my
pasture! saith the LORD.
Jer 23:4: And I will set up shepherds over them which shall feed them: and
they shall fear no more,
The Hebrew text has the same word, and LXX uses POIMHN in both cases.
I assume many pastors would object to removing the word from the only place
where it occurs in the NT. It is feature of Bible translation tradition in
English, but not in other languages.
Iver Larsen
More information about the B-Greek
mailing list