This day in history: David Bentley Hart's "The New Testament - A Translation", was released on this day in 2017.
Bing gave me this description of his New Testament: "David Bentley Hart is a theologian who has translated the New Testament into English. His translation is 'pitilessly literal' and 'not shaped by later theological and doctrinal history.'"
That's not entirely true. He capitalizes the I AM in John 8 is if it has some mystical value and relationship to the words at Exodus 3:14. This is a notion that is "shaped by later theological and doctrinal history" and any relationship between John 8 and Exodus 3 falls apart after closer examination.*
However, Hart's translation is still better than most. I personally have always had a singular fascination with John 1:1.
David Bentley Hart's New Testament 2017 reads at John 1:1 "In the origin there was the Logos, and the Logos was present with GOD, and the Logos was god." (Notice the word "god" in small letters in the last clause.)
However, I discovered in his earlier work, "Atheist Delusions: The Christian Revolution and Its Fashionable Enemies" he actually writes:
"As a general rule, the 'articular' form ho Theos—literally, 'the God'—was a title reserved for God Most High or God the Father, while only the 'inarticular' form theos was used to designate this secondary divinity. This distinction, in fact, was preserved in the prologue to John, whose first verse could justly be translated as: 'In the beginning was the Logos, and the Logos was with God, and the Logos was a god.'"
It's unfortunate that DBH felt the need to tone it down for his New Testament translation.
However, Hart's second edition to his New Testament has some surprising updates when it comes to the anarthrous theos (god).
His John 10:33 now reads: "We stone not on account of a good work, but rather on account of blasphemy, and you who are a man make yourself out to be a god."
The first edition had "make yourself out to be God." Few other modern Bibles are brave enough for this rendering (The New English Bible comes immediately to mind).
He made a similar change at Philippians 2:6 where he has: “who, subsisting in a god’s form, did not deem existing in the manner of a god a thing to be grasped.” QEOUtheou should be taken as indefinite here, such as in “form of a god.” This would highlight a parallel that is overlooked by most, the parallel between "the form of a god" and "the form of a slave." (Verse 7)
Let me know in the comments section of any other verses you may want to share from this New Testament translation.
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