An Aramaic Language Approach to the Greek Gospels for readers

The Red Letter Editions of the New Testament are known to many readers. To explain what they are to those unacquainted with them, these are printed editions of the New Testament in which the words of Jesus are printed in red ink. The effect is spectacular. The spoken words of Jesus seem to almost transcend the printed page. This example is particularly useful to illustrate what some linguistic studies reveal in grammatical constructions in the New Testament. Generally speaking, the spoken words of Jesus have a grammatical construction that reflects a more Aramaic language structure than the usual New Testament Koine Greek.

Read beyond the printed page, and behind the translations, in where the various original manuscripts preserve the spoken words. Those spoken words were carefully translated which unintentionally preserved grammatical elements more inherently characteristic of the Aramaic language than of Koine Greek. These similar spoken words, in parables, and in the Sermon on the Mount, preserved in the Four Gospels & Acts (and perhaps elsewhere) , may reasonably imply an Aramaic Sayings - Tradition which recorded those spoken words. Not only were the words preserved, but so was their source language structure.

It may be helpful here to remember that we now have only a handful of manuscripts of the Gospels, and that they do differ from one another. Each one is unique in it's own right. That asyndeton is found more often in one codex (original scripture) than in another codex may well be due to the "unpolished" manuscript considered.
As noted by Matthew Black, in his respected work, An Aramaic Approach To The Gospels And Acts, "Asyndeton is, on the whole, contrary to the spirit of the Greek language." "Asyndeton is highly characteristic of Aramaic,...". "Except in Mark, the construction is most frequent in the Bezan (D) text." (Codex Bezae Greek Text)

Here is an example to illustrate the difficulty of translating. "And when Jesus was in Bethany at the house of Simon the leper," (Mt. 26:6, Mk. 14:3) But lepers were not allowed to live in the city. The Greek (D) Codex Bezae text reads "Σιμωνος του λεπρωςου" (Simônos tou leprôsou), which is usually translated as "Simon the Leper". "λεπρωςου" (leprôsou) would suggest he somehow, in someway, resembled one, or formerly was once afflicted with a skin condition, or was just known by that name.

Although the Syriac - Aramaic texts we have do use the same language of the original sayings-source, the Old Syriac manuscripts and the Peshitta appear to have, instead, a direct reliance on Tatian's Diatessaron Gospel Harmonies and also on the Greek texts. Yet, they do offer text variations and insight into questions of translation found in the Greek texts.

For example, "...it is easier for a camel to pass through an eye of a needle than for a wealthy man to enter the Kingdom of God." In Greek it reads "καμηλον" (kamélon) which is the accusative form of "καμηλος" (kamélos). The word for "camel" in the Aramaic manuscripts is "gamla" which can mean "camel" but it can also refer to a "thick rope made of camel hair", which is probably the intended meaning here.

One can therefore conclude that the Koine Greek texts were perhaps reliant on various "Q"s, and that perhaps one was a Greek translation of an Aramaic language sayings-source* manuscript. ( *similiar to the Gospel of Thomas ). These original source texts are lost, and gone forever, yet the words they gave us are as real as the day they were spoken for us.

( Click here for The Lord's Prayer in Aramaic)

Syriac - Aramaic Texts of the Gospels & Acts
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Syriac Aramaic MSS