Bible beginner's questions

^{I’m back just briefly. Blame it on Madame Guyon’s advice, to us beginners, to meet with Jesus Christ by “praying the scripture.”}

^{The text I met this morning is Mark’s (chapter 13, 28-29; which sends me over to Matthew’s 24:32-33 and to Luke’s 21:29-31). Now, please remember I’m a beginner here. But how can we readers and we translators miss the word play?}

^{I’ve copied/pasted the texts (from playful Mark and Matthew) below. Now I want to ask us readers and translators a few questions:}

^{How can we readers and translators miss the word play?}

^{Isn’t Jesus Christ having fun with his learners, telling them then and us now to “learn” from what a tree throws across at us (aka from a feminine-“she” tree’s “parable”)?}

^{And aren’t Mark and Matthew having fun with translating the words of Jesus into Greek?}

^{Isn’t there “room for discussion” that Peter Kirk calls for in his comment on my comment (on Suzanne McCarthy’s blog post)? Is the Greek we read from the disciples more authoritative than the Aramaic they heard from Jesus? (And I’m not suggesting we play the games of the “Jesus” Seminar, who doubt at all Jesus really said what Mark, Matthew, and Luke say he said. N.T. Wright responds to that silliness.)}

^{Do we see their rhymes, the alliterations? And hear the differences in plays on words, in the responses to one another, of Mark and Matthew? (Could we have a word-play-to-word-play translation into English?)}

^(i.e., ὅταν ἤδη and ὅταν ἴδητε

γένηται and γινόμενα and γινώσκετε – for this is a feminine tree with feminine branches giving birth

the turn of punchlines in τὸ θέρος [ἐστίν] and ἐστιν ἐπὶ θύραις⁾

^Mark

²⁸ ἀπὸ δὲ τῆς συκῆς μάθετε τὴν παραβολήν

ὅταν ἤδη ὁ κλάδος αὐτῆς ἁπαλὸς γένηται

καὶ ἐκφύῃ τὰ φύλλα

γινώσκετε ὅτι ἐγγὺς τὸ θέρος ἐστίν

²⁹ οὕτως καὶ ὑμεῖς

ὅταν ἴδητε ταῦτα γινόμενα

γινώσκετε ὅτι ἐγγύς ἐστιν ἐπὶ θύραις

^Matthew

³² ἀπὸ δὲ τῆς συκῆς μάθετε τὴν παραβολήν

ὅταν ἤδη ὁ κλάδος αὐτῆς γένηται ἁπαλὸς

καὶ τὰ φύλλα ἐκφύῃ

γινώσκετε ὅτι ἐγγὺς τὸ θέρος

³³ οὕτως καὶ ὑμεῖς

ὅταν ἴδητε πάντα ταῦτα

γινώσκετε ὅτι ἐγγύς ἐστιν ἐπὶ θύραις