Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Yigal Levin" <leviny1 AT mail.biu.ac.il>]

RE: [b-hebrew] Aramaic - AbbaOf course, you read the words of Jesus, as 
recorded by the evangelists. Assuming that your Greek is good enough to get 
"behind" the translations and to get a "feel" for the text in Greek, the 
question of whether Mark intended for Jesus' cry to be formal or not is still 
more a literary question than a historical one.

Yigal
  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: Read, James C 
  To: Yigal Levin 
  Cc: b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org 
  Sent: Friday, July 22, 2005 4:26 PM
  Subject: RE: [b-hebrew] Aramaic - Abba


  I can't comment much on the translation of abba but I
  have felt for a long time that modern translations of many
  scriptures have been overly formalised and not well
  reflected the informal nature with which such words were
  originally penned.
  I think this has arose from various sentiments of
  piousness and a feeling for the need to transmit the
  thoughts and feelings of the original composer/s in a
  respectful and formal manner.
  I have no linguistic evidence in favour of a translation
  of 'dad' for abba other than it just seems to sound good.
  The reason I say this is an emotional one and nothing more.
  Because when I read the words of Jesus it makes me feel that
  his personality was rather informal and that his method of
  teaching was very simplistic and heart-reaching in its nature.
  For this reason, I like the translation of 'dad' becomes (to me)
  it seems to better reflect the close and warm relationship he
  had with his heavenly father.
  In most modern languages I have had contact with, the term
  'Father' would only serve to distance the relationship, whereas
  the term 'Dad' is an endearment that calls to mind a close and
  intimate relationship.

  All of this is of course just my opinion and the way I like to
  think things and has little to no scholastic basis to it.



  This email has been scanned for all viruses by the MessageLabs Email
  Security System.