5. The Greek Genitive: A Problem of Its Own
Chapter 5: The Greek Genitive:
A Problem of Its Own
Although nouns and verbs are basic to all languages, they are formulated differently from language to language. For example, in English we “conjugate verbs” in the present tense by adding an “s” in the third person singular and, primarily, by adding “-ed” in the past tense. Otherwise we use “modals” such as “will,” “have,” and “had” to express other tenses. For nouns English changes form only in the possessive singular (with ’s) and in the plural. Greek, on the other hand, changes forms much more often, for both nouns and verbs. In contrast to English, Greek is a highly inflected language, meaning that both nouns and verbs have different forms that serve different functions.
One of the greatest challenges in this regard is translating the Greek genitive case, which is the case used not only to express possession (as the English pronouns, “my, her, his, your, our, their”), but also to express a great many other relationships. This makes translation of the genitive into English difficult, because in many cases we have no exact equivalent. That same thing can be said of what is called the construct relationship between two Hebrew nouns.
Historically, the habit has been to use the English preposition “of” for the construct construction in Hebrew or the genitive case in Greek (as in “the word of God”); and many who think of themselves as translating “literally” consider this to be its “literal meaning.” But in fact it is simply one English way of trying to approximate the meaning of the Greek genitive. The problem can be illustrated in the following figure, where the meaning of the Greek genitive overlaps only in part with the English prepositional phrase, “of + NOUN.”
Unfortunately, the traditional use of “of + NOUN” as the default translation for the Greek genitive often creates something ambiguous in English that was not ambiguous in Greek. In other cases, the resulting translation is not only ambiguous, but obscure and misleading.
The purpose of this chapter is to illustrate the challenges of translating the Greek genitive case and in this way to demonstrate, once again, the point that all good translation involves interpretation. Translators must carefully consider the meaning of each genitive in context and must translate using the best English equivalent. In many cases, “of + NOUN” works perfectly well as a translation of the genitive. For example, phrases like “the genealogy of Jesus Christ,” “the son of David,” “the Word of God,” and “the land of Israel” all make good sense in English and accurately reproduce the meaning of the genitive.
In other cases the translation of the genitive with “of” is a good choice since it approximates the ambiguity of the Greek text. For example, in Revelation 1:1 the translation “the revelation of Jesus Christ” could mean a revelation given by Jesus Christ (a subjective genitive), or a revelation about Jesus Christ (an objective genitive). The NLT chooses the for-mer: “the revelation from Jesus Christ.” Yet both subjective and objective genitives fit well the purpose and content of the book, and many scholars suggest that the author is being intentionally ambiguous. Thus, it seems best to render the phrase “the revelation of Jesus Christ” (NIV, NET, HCSB, GW, ESV, etc.).
Similarly, in Romans 1:17 the genitive phrase “righteousness of God” could mean God’s own righteousness (a character trait), or it could mean righteousness from God, which God bestows on believers. While the original NIV chose the latter (“the righteousness from God”), its revision the TNIV returned to the ambiguous “the righteousness of God,” leaving the reader with either or both options (cf. NET, NAB, NASU, NKJV, ESV).
In many other cases, however, translation of a genitive with “of” is misleading. We have already seen several examples of this in chapter 2 (pp. 38 – 39). Here are a few more. In Ephesians 1:17, Paul prays that God, “the Father of glory” (ESV, NRSV, NASB, NKJV), will give wisdom to the Ephesians. But what does “Father of glory” mean? This is probably an attributive genitive, meaning “glorious Father” (NIV, TNIV, HCSB, GW, NLT, TEV, CEV). Similarly, in Romans 6:4 Paul says that Christ was raised so that we can walk in “newness of life” (NRSV, ESV, NASU, NKJV). Again, “newness of life” is almost nonsensical English. This is an attributed genitive, meaning “a new life” (NIV, TNIV, NET, NJB, GW, NLT, TEV, CEV) or “a new way of life” (HCSB).
Life is again the topic in John 5:29, where formal equivalent versions speak of the righ teous dead coming from their graves to “the resurrection of life” (NKJV, NASU, ESV, NRSV). This is a genitive of result or destination, meaning “rise to live” (NIV, TNIV), “rise to eternal life” (NLT), or “resurrection resulting in life” (NET). In Romans 1:7, Paul says that the believers in Rome are “loved by God” (NIV, TNIV, HCSB, NET, ESV) — a subjective genitive. In a misguided attempt to be “literal,” the NASU and NKJV translate with the awkward “beloved of God.” The same thing happens in John 6:45, where the NASU reads that God’s people will be “taught of God.” Almost all other versions, including most formal equivalent ones, recognize this as a subjective genitive and translate it “taught by God.” In these and many other cases, defaulting to “of + NOUN” without carefully interpreting the meaning of the genitive in context results in obscure or inaccurate translation.
In the rest of this chapter, we offer a variety of examples of the challenges translators face in rendering the Greek genitive. Our primary purpose is to show that translators must first of all be good interpreters of the biblical text. Simply replacing the genitive construction with an “of + NOUN” phrase risks mistranslating God’s Word.
Whose “Co-worker”?
Our first illustration is one of the (rare) places where the Greek genitive is possessive but does not work well when translated as a possessive in English. This is especially true in some cases where Paul refers to his companions as “co-workers.” We have no difficulty when Paul refers to one of them as “my co-worker,” since in English this means what Paul intended, that he and his companion share ministry in common. But that changes when the possessive is “God,” and it is thus rendered “God’s co-worker.” In English this means that a human being is a co-worker with God regarding the gospel. However, in the two instances where Paul says this (1 Cor. 3:9; 1 Thess. 3:2), he intended a true possessive — that two or more human beings are co-workers and both belong to God.
The first of these occurs in 1 Corinthians 3:9, where Paul writes, “We are God’s co-workers; you are God’s field, God’s building” (TNIV). All three of these phrases are true possessives: Paul and his co-workers belong to God, and so do the Corinthians. But in English the phrase “we are God’s co-workers” can only mean that God is working together with these co-workers (Paul and Apollos). This mistaken notion appears in most formal equivalent versions (ESV, NASU, NKJV: “we are God’s fellow workers.”) and some of the mediating ones (TNIV, HCSB: “we are God’s co-workers”). The NET gets the meaning right: “We are coworkers belonging to God.” The NLT similarly reads, “For we are both God’s workers,” and the CEV, “Apollos and I work together for God.” Here, then, is a place where translating literally leads the English reader to a mistaken idea about what Paul said.
A similar problem appears in 1 Thes salonians 3:2, where Paul identifies Timothy as “our brother and God’s fellow worker” (NIV). Again, the meaning of the phrase is that Timothy is Paul’s co-worker who belongs to God. Some versions carry on the mistaken idea that Timothy is a coworker with God (ESV, NASU, NIV, NJB, REB). Others capture Paul’s intended meaning with translations ranging from “co-worker for God” (NRSV, NAB), to “who works with us for God” (GNT; cf. CEV), to “co-worker in God’s ser vice” (TNIV). In these and many other cases, an idiomatic translation is necessary to capture the meaning of the genitive.
Patience of Hope?
Another place where translators have shown reluctance to abandon a nearly meaningless rendition of the genitive occurs in 1 Thes salonians 1:3, where Paul commends these believers for their “faith, love, and hope.” In doing so, he puts these three words in the genitive as modifiers of “work, labor, and patience.” The problem with translating the Greek genitive with an “of” phrase emerges in this case with the word “hope.” That is, both “work of faith” and “labor of love” are basically understandable, and the latter has become a common idiom in English. In both cases the mind quickly “translates” these phrases into subjective genitives, where “faith” and “love” find expression in the Thessalonians’ labor on behalf of the gospel and for others.
But no native English-speaking person would ever say “patience of hope” (KJV, NKJV), which is only partly eased when “patience” is changed to either “endurance” (HCSB) or “steadfastness” (NASU, ESV, NRSV). No one would say to a friend, “I really appreciate your endurance of hope.” For this reason the idiomatic versions turn all three phrases into more recognizable English — “your work produced by faith, your labor prompted by love, your endurance inspired by hope” (NIV, TNIV).
The Word of . . .
In English one may speak of “my word” or “the word of life” and be understood in the first instance to be referring to something I said, and in the second to refer to a message that brings, or offers, life. But the same clarity is not true of “the word of the Lord,” which may refer either to Scripture (as in “Hear the word of the Lord”), to a message Christ has spoken, or to the message about Christ. And since a biblical author probably did not intend all three of these at any given point, translators must make a contextual decision regarding the meaning of the phrase and render it accordingly: either “the Lord’s word” (= a message the Lord has spoken), or “the message about the Lord.” A third option is to leave the phrase ambiguous (“the word of the Lord”) and let the reader decide which meaning is intended.
When Paul tells the Colossians to “let the word of Christ dwell richly among you” (3:16), this cannot refer to Scripture, since the New Testament did not exist yet. So at issue for translators is whether this is a subjective genitive (the message from Christ) or an objective genitive (the message about Christ). Here is a case where translators must decide whether to choose one interpretation over another or to leave the passage intentionally ambiguous. The GNT (“Christ’s message”), GW (“Christ’s word”) and the first edition (1996) of the NLT (“the words of Christ”) interpret the phrase as a subjective genitive — the message from Christ. The NLT (2004), CEV (“the message about Christ”), and HCSB (“the message about the Messiah”) favor an objective genitive — the message about Christ. Other versions retain the ambiguous “word of Christ” (NIV, NET, NAB, NJB, NASU, ESV) or “the message of Christ” (TNIV), which could be understood as either objective or subjective.
It is of interest that when the same idiom occurs with “God” as the genitive modifier (“word of God”), there is not the same ambiguity. “God” in this case is easily understood as the subject of the action. This is something God has said. Indeed, when Paul says in Romans 9:6 that “God’s word” has not failed, he immediately turns to the Old Testament as the “word” to which he is referring. This is probably true also of its occurrences in 1 Corinthians 14:36; 2 Corinthians 2:17; and Colossians 1:25, which are almost universally translated “the word of God” or “God’s word.”
But when Paul uses this phrase twice in 1 Thessalonians 2:13 (“the word of God, which you heard from us . . .”), he is referring to the message about Christ that he had preached among them. So while it is still a “subjective genitive,” it now refers to the gospel rather than the Old Testament. To avoid any confusion here, translators would do well to render it “God’s message” (cf. NJB, REB, GNT, NLT, NET).
The Fellowship of . . .
Paul’s use of the word 
with the genitive presents a special difficulty, since has a wide range of meanings: fellowship, participation, association, sharing. It becomes all the more difficult when the genitive is rendered with an “of,” as in 1 Co rin thians 1:9 (“of his Son”); 10:16 (“of the body and blood of the Lord”); 2 Corinthians 13:14 and Philippians 2:1 (“of the Spirit”); Philippians 3:10 (“of Christ’s sufferings”); and Philemon 6 (“of Philemon’s faith”). Only the extreme, nearly unintelligible, literalism of Young’s Literal Translation renders each of these as we have in parentheses above, and always as “fellowship of.” The KJV tended to do the same, except that the translators switched to “communion of” in 1 Corinthians 10:16 and 2 Corinthians 13:14 (but not in Phil. 2:1), and to “communication of” in Philemon 6 (an archaism that cannot be found in most dictionaries).
Recognizing the obscurity of such “literalism,” most contemporary formal equivalent versions offer a variety of idioms, depending on their understanding of the word 
. This is especially so for 1 Corinthians 1:9, where it is not clear who is in with whom. The formal equivalent tradition tends to avoid making a choice by rendering it ambiguously, “the fellowship of his Son” (KJV, RSV, ESV). The NASB broke ranks here by joining the NIV, TNIV, and NAB in rendering it “into fellowship with his Son.” Most likely the phrase here means something like “communal participation in the sonship of Christ,” which the REB seems to come closest to with its “to share in the life of his Son.”
Equally difficult for translators is Paul’s usage in Philippians 3:10. The traditional but ambiguous “fellowship of his suffering” (KJV, NASB) was changed to “share his sufferings” in the RSV, which was kept in the ESV but changed in the NRSV to “the sharing of his sufferings.” The NIV’s “fellowship of sharing in his sufferings” was not one of its better moments, so it was changed in the TNIV to what seems most likely to be Paul’s intent, “participation in his sufferings.”
The passage in Philemon 6 has been especially difficult for most interpreters, including translators, whose renderings range from the literal, but almost meaningless, “the fellowship of your faith” (NASB), to “the sharing of your faith” (RSV, ESV), to “your partnership with us in the faith” (TNIV; cf. NAB), and “the faith you hold in common with us” (REB). These last two seem to be closest to the meaning of the phrase.
Some Conclusions
This chapter has surveyed some of the challenges of translating the Greek genitive case. There is an unfortunate tendency among formal equivalent versions to default to the “of + NOUN” construction without considering carefully the meaning of the genitive in context. Only when this construction clearly misrepresents the sense of the Greek do these versions introduce a different idiom. In other words, they start with form and then move to function.
There are two problems with this approach. First, this is an artificial “equivalence,” since the Greek genitive is a case form, while “of + NOUN” is an English prepositional phrase. In other words, the two are not formally equivalent. Second, defaulting to an of-phrase often produces a translation that, at best, is ambiguous, and, at worst, is obscure and inaccurate. While some translators consider obscurity to be a virtue in Bible translation since it forces readers to make interpretive decisions on their own, obscurity can also lead to misunderstanding and misinterpretation. If the sense of the Greek genitive is clear from the context, why should translators withhold this meaning from readers?
Since the goal of all good translation is to reproduce the meaning of the text, translators should carefully consider the function of genitives in context and then find an English translation that adequately captures that sense. In many cases, this will be an “of + NOUN” construction; in others it will not. Sometimes “of” works well because it retains the same measure of ambiguity in English that the genitive has in the Greek (e.g., “the revelation of Jesus Christ”). Yet even here, this is not because the translation is “literal,” but because it happens to capture well the meaning of the genitive in context. As always, meaning trumps form in Bible translation and translators must first of all be good interpreters of the Word.
For Further Reading
Beekman, J., and J. Callow, Translating the Word of God (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1974), 249 – 77.
Wallace, Daniel B. Greek Grammar beyond the Basics: An Exegetical Syntax of the Greek New Testament. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1996 (esp. 72 – 136).