Second Timothy
4:1 Let us Translate Correctly
Koot van Wyk
(Dlitt et Phil; Thd)
Text: Διαμαρτύρομαι ἐνώπιον
τοῦ θεοῦ καὶ Χριστοῦ Ἰησοῦ τοῦ μέλλοντος κρίνειν ζῶντας καὶ νεκρούς, καὶ τὴν ἐπιφάνειαν
αὐτοῦ καὶ τὴν βασιλείαν αὐτοῦ· (http://www.nestle-aland.com/en/read-na28-online/text/bibeltext/lesen/stelle/65/40001/49999/)
Translation I warn/charge
before God and of the Lord Jesus Christ, of the One Being about to Judge the
living and the dead and His appearance and His kingdom.
Text: Διαμαρτύρομαι ἐνώπιον
τοῦ θεοῦ καὶ Χριστοῦ Ἰησοῦ τοῦ μέλλοντος κρίνειν ζῶντας καὶ νεκρούς, καta τὴν ἐπιφάνειαν αὐτοῦ καὶ τὴν βασιλείαν αὐτοῦ·
Translation I warn/charge
before God and of the Lord Jesus Christ, of the One Being about to Judge the living
and the dead according to His appearance and His kingdom.
Text: Διαμαρτύρομαι ἐνώπιον
τοῦ θεοῦ καὶ Χριστοῦ Ἰησοῦ τοῦ μέλλοντος κρίνειν ζῶντας καὶ νεκρούς, καὶ καta τὴν ἐπιφάνειαν αὐτοῦ καὶ τὴν βασιλείαν αὐτοῦ·
Translation I warn/charge
before God and of the Lord Jesus Christ, of the One Being about to Judge the
living and the dead and according to His appearance and His kingdom.
Voca: 2 Timothy 4:1 διαμαρτύρομαι I testify [warn/adjure/charge*] ούν then ενώπιον in the
presence of του θεού God και and του of the κυρίου Lord Ιησού Jesus χριστού Christ, του of the one μέλλοντος being about [think of doing/intend**] κρίνειν to judge ζώντας [the] living και and νεκρούς [the] dead, κατά according to την επιφάνειαν αυτού His appearance και and την βασιλείαν αυτού His kingdom
*Sakae Kubo, A
Reader’s Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament page 214. **Liddell and
Scott, Greek-English Lexicon page 496.
Logical
Considerations influencing the semantics If the dead
will be judged at the Second Coming and the living as well, and the
Resurrection takes place at the Second Coming with the living and raised dead
arriving at Christ at the same time, as Paul also said, then this Judgment
cannot be at the Second Coming. No faithful one is dead any longer. Yet the word Judge
is used at the Second Coming = His appearance (4:8) but that “Righteous” Judge
is “verdict bringing”. It is bringing reward or bad news. Paul said in 4:8 that
the crown is “laid aside” until the Second Coming when the Judge, Who must have
finished His Investigative Judgment with the House of God to establish who will
be saved, will receive their crowns then as reward. Therefore, at
the Second Coming of Christ there will no longer be a Judgment Hall that all
will have to appear before a jury and judges for entry into heaven. The
Investigative Judgment is from 1844 [calculating a year-day principle for the
2300 days in Daniel 8:14 starting it the same year as the 490 year prophecy of
Daniel 9:24-27, namely in 457 BCE]. The surprise
element here is that Thomas Aquinas [Catholic], Martin Luther, John Calvin,
George Ioye, Hugo Grotius, Henry Hammond et al. all accepted the year-day
principle in Daniel 9:24-27 starting in 457 BCE (Ezra) to date Christ’s
crucifixion but they then “dumped” the year-day principle inconsistently with
their exegetical method and said that 2300 days are literal. It is this
inconsistency in method that led to the origin of Seventh-day Adventist
interpretation.
KJV with
corrections I charge
Korean
Translation It appears that
the Korean translation is saying “by His appearance”. The preposition “by”
could have been there only if the Dative form was used but it is the
Accusative. F. Delitzsch in his Hebrew translation of the New Testament also
made an error by translating the Hebrew here with his preposition be- meaning “in/through/by”.
It is the waw copulative that he was supposed to have used not the preposition
be-. The Korean is thus also not correct.
B. Weiss
translation 1906 page 109 [fuse his notes to his translation to modify] “I
testify/charge in the sight of God, and of Christ Jesus, who shall judge the
living and the dead, both of his appearance and of his kingdom.” Weiss
translated very well here. Old Latin
translation according to Sabbatier page 890. Testificor
coram Deo et Christo Iesu, qui judicaturus est vivos et mortuos et adventum
ejus et regnum ejus. Old Latin
translation I testify in
the presence of God and Christ Jesus who is to judge the living, and the dead
and His Advent and His reign. Vulgate of
Jerome Testificor
coram Deo et Jesu Christo, qui judicaturus est vivos et mortuos et per adventum
ipsius et regnum ejus Vulgate
translation
I testify in
the presence of God and Jesus Christ who is to judge the living, and the dead
also
Exegesis: Paul had three
phases in mind here for Christ functioning (1) as a Judge; (2) Appearing at the
Second Coming; (3) King of His kingdom. These are in chronological order. This
means that judgment is done when Christ comes at the Second Coming and Paul
understood that as well. In 4:8 one
cannot lay aside a crown in keeping for Paul’s reward if judgment did not start
yet or the crown is not allocated to Paul until the Second Coming. If the crown is
laid aside with Paul completing his process of sanctification (4:7), it is
still not given him but only at the Second Coming. If souls go to
heaven at death, why would Paul sit crownless in heaven to receive his crown at
the Second Coming! H. Meyer’s
translation (1884) page 260. The words “then
I” were used by some authorities but others left it out. “Of the Lord” were also
left out by some manuscripts. Most
manuscripts used “to judge” but there is a minority reading of the aorist of “judge”
to mean “judged” which is a one event past action. This was found in
Manuscripts F and G, several cursives and Theodoret and Theophilus. “But there
is not sufficient authority for it here”. Some
manuscripts read “according to” and others read “and”. The famous manuscripts
read “and” instead of “according to”. The dative
translation “[by] His appearance” as one finds with the Korean and with F.
Delitzsch in his Hebrew New Testament, is also found in one case, with John
Chrysostom. Reiche and others
all admitted the difficulty of the reading καὶ τὴν ἐπιφάνειαν especially the
use of the copulative καὶ = “and”. That is the
reason that they wanted to “emend” or “correct” the text with extra words
inserted. As Seventh-day
Adventists we object against changing the original reading just because it
looks for us in the 21st century difficult to understand.
Ellen White on
this verse SDABC vol. 7-A “No one is to
put truth to the torture by cheap imaginings, by putting a forced, mystical
construction upon the Word.” “There is among
young men a burning desire to get hold of something new, even though it be of
the cheapest quality”. thee
therefore before God, and the Lord Jesus Christ, Who shall judge [is
about to judge/ think to judge] the quick and the dead at [and/according
to/and according to] His appearing and His kingdomthrough the same Advent and His reign.