Scatology

mark_in_manchester

I wonder if anyone knowledgeable in ancient languages, would like to comment on today's lectionary reading - Mark 7 14-23, and specifically vs 19?

I might explain - I really like the KJV take on Phil 3 vs 8 - Paul's 'I do count them but dung!' - because it's a short hop from there to 'what a load of shit!' and that's something I can imagine an exasperated bloke saying. Peterson doesn't quite go there, but perhaps I can pencil it into my copy of 'The Message'

And for today's reading - I can imagine an exasperated Jesus - 'Are you being willfully stupid?' as Peterson has it - continuing something like 'it doesn't go into your heart, but your stomach - and then straight out your arsehole!'

I guess I'd like to know if modern translations skate around something in early versions, or if they too are a bit more decorous. It's probably a bit sad that this kind of thing moves (sorry) me

jay_emm

My interlinear has belly to drain, followed by purged.

The kgv as ever follows the general pattern (it uses draught for where interlinear has drain)

The esv has stomach and expelled. Which definitely seems like deliberate euphemism

Gramps49

The Message seems pretty explicit to me, though I do not think the Biblical writer would be that well versed in human anatomy at the time.

jay_emm

I was definitely expecting something I couldn't post from that lead in.

Message
18-19 Jesus said, “Are you being willfully stupid? Don’t you see that what you swallow can’t contaminate you? It doesn’t enter your heart but your stomach, works its way through the intestines, and is finally flushed.” (That took care of dietary quibbling; Jesus was saying that all foods are fit to eat.)

Good news
19 because it does not go into your heart but into your stomach and then goes on out of the body.” (In saying this, Jesus declared that all foods are fit to be eaten.)

Geneva
19 Because it entered not into his heart, but into the belly, and goeth out into the draught which is the [a]purging of all meats?

etc...

Nick Tamen

Gramps49 wrote: »

The Message seems pretty explicit to me, though I do not think the Biblical writer would be that well versed in human anatomy at the time.

I’d assume the Biblical writer, who lived in a culture that involved regular animal slaughter and sacrifice that in turn involved disembowelment, understood quite well how food moves through the body.

BroJames

The Greek word seems to be a fairly neutral word for privy, latrine or toilet. I don’t think it has the same ‘roughness’ that arsehole does - at least in UK English.

Hedgehog

BroJames wrote: »

The Greek word seems to be a fairly neutral word for privy, latrine or toilet. I don’t think it has the same ‘roughness’ that arsehole does - at least in UK English.

Indeed. Particularly as the Greek is referring to an external object (toilet, sewer, latrine, whatever) rather than a body part.

Honestly, what puzzles me more about this selection is v.17, which seems to uniformly be translated that the disciples asked him "about this parable." Parable? What parable? There is no allegory, no story, no parable. It is one of those times that Jesus stated bluntly what he meant. Is that why he questioned the disciples' intelligence? "That wasn't a parable, you idiots. I meant exactly what I said!"

Lamb Chopped

Not super exciting--it goes ’ εἰς τὴν κοιλίαν, καὶ εἰς τὸν ἀφεδρῶνα ἐκπορεύεται--that is, "into the guts/belly, and goes out into the latrine." And I agree with Hedgehog. It makes me laugh.

jay_emm

So in summery, as recorded by Mark, its direct and many modern translations are more delicate, but it's also not played up or crude (your measure may vary)

Of course that leaves open the possibility that the Aramaic was saltier and it got tidied up at stage one

If concessus is reached ( @mark_in_manchester ?)
There are other passages, that might be of interest in a similar vein? (Ezekial and the dung?)
Or perhaps a further consideration on how much jesus tone matters and implications
Or discuss translation agenders and discretion
Or....

Doublethink

There is quite a lot about him that pisseth against the wall.

mark_in_manchester

jay_emm wrote: »

So in summery, as recorded by Mark, its direct and many modern translations are more delicate, but it's also not played up or crude (your measure may vary)

Of course that leaves open the possibility that the Aramaic was saltier and it got tidied up at stage one

If concessus is reached ( @mark_in_manchester ?)
There are other passages, that might be of interest in a similar vein? (Ezekial and the dung?)
Or perhaps a further consideration on how much jesus tone matters and implications
Or discuss translation agenders and discretion
Or....

Very happy for it to broaden in scope, jay_emm. I know it's a bit immature, but the punch of it moves me, and I don't have any language skills to do this work myself. Thanks all!

Gamma Gamaliel

It "moves' you?

What kind of motions would that involve?

Now who's being immature?

I'll get me Beavis and Butthead coat.

Alan Cresswell

Hedgehog wrote: »

Honestly, what puzzles me more about this selection is v.17, which seems to uniformly be translated that the disciples asked him "about this parable." Parable? What parable? There is no allegory, no story, no parable. It is one of those times that Jesus stated bluntly what he meant. Is that why he questioned the disciples' intelligence? "That wasn't a parable, you idiots. I meant exactly what I said!"

It could be that our use of the word "parable" is simply much more narrow than would have been the case at the time. It certainly seems that Jesus' public teaching style (at least as recorded in the Synoptics, John has Jesus teaching in a very different style though more often in private) was significantly different from other teachers of the law at the time. In contrast to what we seem to know of contemporary religious teaching, the normal practice was for teachers to speak for significant periods of time leaving no detail untouched, whereas Jesus is making a series of short pithy statements which are usually (but not always) in the form of a story.

Here we have the Pharisees and Lawyers complaining that the disciples are not following the strict rules they've laid out, those rules have been developed by endless and ongoing discussions about how the laws in the Torah about food and washign are to be applied - reaching conclusions that are evidently impossible for most people to adhere to if they don't have the time to do all that washing and checking where their food comes from, which effectively makes maintaining these rules a priviledge for the rich who aren't coming in from manual labour for a bite to eat before returning to work and simply don't have the time to ritually wash their hands and dishes. You can imagine a scene where someone has received a shipment of grain from Greek traders and, given that those traders wouldn't have followed Jewish ritual laws, asks the Lawyers whether they could sell it ... followed by an afternoon of discussion while they try to fit this situation into their framework of ritual practice. Jesus just comes along with a "Nothing outside a person can defile them by going into them. Rather, it is what comes out of a person that defiles them" statement, which will pull everyone up short and have them question the entire basis of their ritual practices.

I think the main purpose of parables is to do that, to pull people up short and have them ask questions of themselves. In that sense this statement is a form of parable, albeit not within the narrow definition of it not being a story. We are told that Jesus didn't speak to the crowds without using parables, if we accept that then we're going to need to accept that there's a lot of Jesus' public teaching which isn't in the form of stories, and maybe that means "parable" is a broader term than just story.