The Gospels: The Synoptic Issue
THE GOSPELS: THE SYNOPTIC ISSUE
The first three gospels—Matthew, Mark, and Luke—are often known as the “synoptic gospels,” as they present summary accounts of the life and teachings of Jesus. The synoptic gospels include a significant amount of common material, which is sometimes presented in one setting in Mark, another in Matthew, and perhaps even a third in Luke. The same story may be told from different perspectives in different gospels. Sometimes a story is told at greater length in one gospel than in another. This is widely believed to be due to the fact that all three draw on several common sources, such as collections of the sayings of Jesus, which were committed to memory at a very early stage.
Some of this material is common to all three gospels; some is common to Matthew and Luke (which are much longer than Mark); and some is found only in Matthew or Luke. In each case, the evangelist (as the gospel writers are known) has drawn on his own set of historical sources to allow his readers access to the details of the central figure of the Christian faith.
So what relevance does this have for our study of the problems facing the King James translators? The answer is this: At many points, Matthew, Mark, and Luke present passages which, in the original Greek, are virtually identical to each other. It is precisely this observation which gives rise to the exploration of how the synoptic gospels were put together. It would therefore seem to be a matter of some importance to ensure that, where identical Greek passages are encountered across two or three gospels, that the English translations of those passages should be the same in each case. After all, it is the same passage that is being translated in each case.
The evidence, however, suggests that the Second Oxford Company of translators, who were responsible for translating the gospels, did not see things in quite this light. We regularly find identical Greek passages in two or three gospels which are translated in quite different manners in the King James Bible. Two reasons may be given for this. First, as the preface “The Translators to the Reader” makes clear, the translators did not see themselves as being under an obligation to use precisely the same English translation in each and every case; they allowed themselves a flexible creativity in rendering the text which did not bind them absolutely to a fixed convention of rendering words and phrases. Second, the observations which led scholars to reflect on the nature of the synoptic gospels had not been fully coordinated in the seventeenth century; indeed, it could be argued that two more centuries would pass before the matter was given proper attention. The translators were therefore not alerted to the issues which are taken for granted in biblical translation circles today.
The difficulty in translating what are usually referred to as “gospel parallels” can be seen by comparing the following, bearing in mind that exactly the same Greek words are being translated in each case.
Watch and pray, that ye enter not into temptation: the spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak (Matthew 26:41).
Watch ye and pray, lest ye enter into temptation. The spirit truly is ready, but the flesh is weak (Mark 14:38).
The casual reader might gain the impression that quite different Greek words were being translated in each passage; in fact, the Greek text is identical in each case. As will be clear from what has just been said, the simplest explanation of this puzzling phenomenon is that the King James translators were simply not aware of the parallelism between the texts, and hence did not realize the inconsistencies which might arise.