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[Note: This is one of a series listed under the heading: Wordie Post." It was originally posted on the Word Press blog entitled "Our Daily Bread," found at rtippett97@wordpress.com. The changes at Word Press are similar to those on Twitter and Facebook, where I was posting to an empty space. That was because I began and maintained that blog as one of their free offerings. When their force to change to a paid blog website did not move me, they cancelled their "Reader," so posting on Word Press has become like a caged animal at the zoo, where only workers occasionally toss the animals a bite to eat. Word Press [et al] is like what I imagine life was like in the satellite countries of the Soviet Union: meager, bleak, spiritless. So, I am transferring those forty articles here.]
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On June 4, 2017 – Pentecost Sunday – I attended a lectionary class before the main service at an Episcopal church. The reading being discussed was Acts 2, which tells of the Spirit of Yahweh filling the apostles of Jesus, in an upper room of a building in Jerusalem. After the priest read the scheduled reading, the floor was opened for discussion: “What does that mean to you?
After nobody offered any insights or thoughts, I pointed out one thing that made me read those same words differently. I said, “Where it says Peter “raised his voice,” the word “raised” should be seen not so much as him speaking loudly, but that his voice was raised spiritually. It says to me that Peter spoke with an uplifted voice.”
One woman – an influential member of that church, who was highly educated, an advanced degreed professional, who was wealthy and comfortably retired by the age of fifty-five – burst out saying to me (almost with spittle flying off her lips), “Then why doesn’t it just say that?”
That woman spoke what I believe most American Christians believe, which is this: Everything in the New Testament occurred exactly like a Hollywood movie, with all scripts written in English. Because the English says “raised,” then it can only mean “loudly.”
To be sure of this, I looked up the English definition of “raised,” which is relative to “raise.” It is not as simple a translation as the woman thought.
According to Merriam-Webster, the word “raise” has multiple definitions, as a transitive verb. They are:
1: to cause or help to rise to a standing position
b: to stir up : INCITE raise a rebellion
c: to flush (game) from cover
d: to recall from or as if from death
3a: to set upright by lifting or building raise a monument
b: to lift upraise your hand raise sunken treasure
c: to place higher in rank or dignity : ELEVATE
d: HEIGHTEN, INVIGORATEraise the spirits
e: to end or suspend the operation or validity of raise a siege
4: to get together for a purpose : COLLECT raise funds
b: to bring to maturity : REAR raise a child
c: to breed and bring (an animal) to maturity
6a: to give rise to : PROVOKE raise a commotion
b: to give voice to raise a cheer
7: to bring up for consideration or debate raise an issue
8a: to increase the strength, intensity, or pitch of don’t raise your voice
b: to increase the degree of
c: to cause to rise in level or amount raise the rent
d (1): to increase the amount of (a poker bet)
(2): to bet more than (a previous bettor)
e (1): to make a higher bridge bid in (a partner’s suit)
(2): to increase the bid of (one’s partner)
9: to make light and porous raise dough
10: to cause to ascend raise the dust
11: to multiply (a quantity) by itself a specified number of times raise two to the fourth
power
12: to bring in sight on the horizon by approaching raise land
13a: to bring up the nap of (cloth)
b: to cause (something, such as a blister) to form on the skin
14: to increase the nominal value of fraudulently raise a check
15: to articulate (a sound) with the tongue in a higher position
16: to establish radio communication with
Of course, Peter was not speaking to Jewish pilgrims in Jerusalem for the Passover in English. Luke (the writer of Acts) was not writing in English; so, one needs to really look at what Greek words he wrote and then discern what the definitions are for the word translated into English as “raised.”.
Acts 2:14b was written in Greek: “ἐπῆρεν τὴν φωνὴν αὐτοῦ”. That transliterates as “epēren tēn phōnēn autou“. Those four words in Greek are commonly translated into English in three ways:
First, as “raised his voice”. This is the most common English translation and the one read aloud in that church class on that Pentecost Sunday. That same translation is found promoted by many English versions of Acts 2, with some of the most prominent being: New International Version (NIV); New American Standard Bible (NASB); New Revised Standard Version (NRSV); and, Christian Standard Bible (CSB). [Again, with many others drawing the same conclusion.]
Still, there are multiple versions that use different terminology. They instead translate the same four Greek words as saying, “lifted up his voice”. This variation can be found in the King James Version (KJV); English Standard Version (ESV); and, American Standard Version (ASV). There might be others.
Still further, I found one translation site that offers this as the translation of the Greek written: “spoke in a loud and clear voice”. That is presented by the Contemporary English Version (CEV).
The Greek word “ἐπῆρεν” (“epēren“) comes from the root verb “epairó” (“ἐπαίρω”) and is said to mean “to lift up.” (Strong’s Definition) It can also mean “I raise, lift up.” (Strong’s Usage) The word appears in the New Testament nineteen times, translated in these ways: “exalts (1), hoisting (1), lift (3), lifted (4), lifting (4), raised (5), turning (1).” (NASB Exhaustive Concordance) Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance adds this as the intent and meaning: exalt self, poise, lift up,” saying it comes “from epi and airo; to raise up (literally or figuratively) — exalt self, poise (lift, take) up.”
My point is this: Everything written in the Holy Bible is either in Hebrew [Old Testament] or Greek [New Testament]. European Christians, those following the Roman Catholic Church, were read texts that were translated into Latin. Because Latin is a similar language to both Hebrew and Greek, in the sense that the written text is less etched in stone (as to the meaning) and more open for multiplicity in meaning, the RCC refused to allow for translations into local languages, which were not so accommodating to divine Scripture. However, Martin Luther broke the rules and translated the Holy Bible into German; and, now English paraphrases have been the rage ever since ole King James was King of England and he followed Brother Martin’s lead.
In the above four Greek words, the scope of meaning for each of those words means it is possible for them to say this: “he lifted up this language same”. In that, following the imagery of “tongues on fire,” to limit “phōnēn” as only “voice,” when it means “a sound, noise, voice, language, dialect” [rooted in “phóné“], leads one to only read “raised voice” in terms of loudness, not as being “raised” in “language” that could be stated. The common pronoun “autou” seems a standard translation as “his,” but the word is the genitive singular of “αὐτός (autós),” meaning “of same,” or “of himself.” When “of same” is seen as an equal level of “raised,” a state that matches the “tongues on fire” from the Spirit of Yahweh, then “autou” becomes a statement that says Peter was then speaking from a divine state “of being.” When a “self” is seen as a “soul,” then a translation as “of himself” means Peter spoke from an elevated state “of soul,” that being the “same” as the Spirit that set his “tongue on fire.”
The problem American Christians have was voiced by that uppity woman, who refused to accept some peon like me could offer anything of value in a lectionary class, when no one else had any opinions of value to offer. They had all been trained to keep their mouths shut. That was why they all said nothing, when asked, “What does that mean to you?” If it means anything more than “Peter yelled out at the top of his lungs,” which is something all American Christians can equally do, then that “more” would mean American Christians would have to do “more” too. No American Christian wants that.
If Peter spoke divinely, then that raises more questions about what changed Peter. The can of worms that opens is it forces all ‘do nothing’ American Christians to do what Peter and the eleven did – stand up and speak divine truth.
That becomes a question for discussion: How does one become divinely “raised”? That is why one should attend Bible Studies. But …
That “more” is too much, it seems.