Understanding the Difficult Words of Jesus (REV)

by David Bivin, Roy B. Blizzard, Roy B.(Joint Author) Bivin, David(Author) ; Blizzard, Roy B.(Author); Blizzard

Book Overview

This book clearly describes ways of understanding some original Hebrew and Greek techniques and discovering the true meanings of many of the words of Jesus. This book will be an important addition to... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 156043550X
• ISBN13: 9781560435501
• Release Date: October 1994
• Publisher: Destiny Image Incorporated
• Length: 156 Pages
• Weight: 0.40 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.4" x 5.1" x 8.0"

Customer Reviews

Excellent, easy read!

This is a well-written, easy-to-understand book that clarifies a LOT of what has always been muddy to believers. I do not really agree with the main premise--that the Gospel was WRITTEN in Hebrew before being translated into Greek--but it is a fact that it was composed in Hebrew-thinking minds before it was written down; so from that standpoint the result is the same: you must read the Gospels (and honestly, the whole New Testament!) with an awareness that you are reading HEBREW literature, NOT Greek. The appendix contains several specific instances where the English and Greek translations are confusing, but the Hebrew "original" makes a lot of good sense! I would recommend this book to anyone who really wants to understand God's Word.

A Fine and Concise Study of Biblical Language

This is just what I've been searching for: a book about Hebrew and how it works, and the idioms that might explain some of the often confusing phrases used in the New Testament. This book is easy to read and very convincing. You don't have to agree with everything the authors say to benefit from the text. But it helps enormously. And it does indeed open up the more difficult words of Christ with possible interpretations that make very good sense. For a person who can not tackle Greek or Hebrew from the ground up, this is marvelous. I wish there were more books like this one -- and books that would delve into how language must affect thinking. I refer to word order here, to preferences for certain proverbs and expressions. Surely a language has a personality. This book helped me to understand something of the personality of Hebrew.

A Personal Watershed

"It is indeed unfortunate that of all the New Testament writings, the words and sayings of Jesus himself are the most difficult to understand." So begins this remarkable little book.The minor premise is undisputed: Jesus was Jewish. The major premise is: the "Hebraic mindset" (-language, thought, culture, idioms) is far removed from the Greek. To understand Jesus, therefore, one must appreciate the Hebraic/Jewish background of the Greek gospels. (A growing minority of Scripture scholars consider that our present Greek gospels are translations of Hebrew or Aramaic originals and that they are best understood when read that way. Though serious scholarship underlies the work, it aims to teach the general public what it means to think of Jesus as an observant Jew versed in and devoted to the Torah. Running just over 130 pages, it leaves the reader hungry for more examples and more detailed analysis. Yet it may come as a watershed to readers who--like me--have thought too little about how the Jewish background of Jesus influenced the way he thought and taught. Since the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls, no one disputes that Hebrew was still used during the time of Jesus. The book provides a good primer on this point and its importance.The next main section concerns the implications of misunderstanding Jesus. Such misunderstandings fall into two categories. First, there are the times we think we understand Jesus perfectly but do not. For example, Bivin and Blizzard argue that by "kingdom of heaven" Jesus was not referring to a futuristic place but rather to a present reality. (The reign of God means God reigns in one's life.) Further, Jesus was not a pacifist, despite "turn the other cheek", and he did not advocate indiscriminate charity, despite "give to him who asks of you." Then there are the things Jesus says that we know we don't understand. Such as "blessed are the poor in spirit." Shouldn't one be rich in spirit? Yes, and Jesus was cautioning against self-righteousness. Christians tend to 'get' that despite the curious wording. But what about "to bind" and "to loosen" from Matthew 16? What was Jesus giving Peter the authority to do? And over whom? During the Sermon on the Mount what did Jesus mean by 'I came not to abolish the Law but to fulfill it?' Christians aren't required to follw the Law, are they? If that doesn't 'abolish' it, then what would? My favorite example concerns a puzzling verse from Luke's account of the Passion. Jesus tells the women of Jerusalem, "For if they do these things IN a green tree, what shall be done IN the dry?" Odd as this idiom may sound, I grew up with the sense that it meant, "Listen, ladies, don't weep for me but for yourselves. If this is how they treat me, how do you think they'll treat you?" Something like that is part of what Jesus is saying here, but there's more. The use of "green tree" (rooted in Ezekiel 20:47) is a MESSIANIC claim. Many scholars nowadays argue that Jesus never thought of himself as the

A New Look at the Hebrew Roots of the New Testament

Imagine what popular American sayings such as "killing time" or "He put his foot in his mouth" would sound like if translated literally into another language. The authors of Understanding the Difficult Words of Jesus argue that that is why so many New Testament phrases and especially the words of Jesus sound so strange or awkward or just plain confusing. The authors make a very good case that the Gospels were originally written in Hebrew and then translated into Greek and too often the translator gave a literal translation to what was a Hebrew saying or idiom which means it doesn't make sense in English. The authors do an excellent job of placing Jesus in his proper historical context, as highly educated in both the study of the Torah and in the culture of his day. We cannot grasp His meaning without keeping in mind the Jewish roots to all His teachings. The book is too short, only 169 pages. While this makes it a quick and easy read, it also leaves the reader wishing for more and deeper exploration. This is a good book for a beginner who wishes a good tool for understanding the New Testament. The last 50 pages are an Appendix which gives examples of what the authors see as the true meaning and proper translation of some of the most obscure Biblical passages. One could wish the Appendix were twice as long, but it makes a good, sound introduction to the subject. Highly recommended.

Yeshua (Jesus) was a Torah-observant Jew who spoke Hebrew.

This is one of the best written books about the words and sayings of Yeshua the Messiah. It presents a crisp, complete, concise understanding about Yeshua's teachings. Are the words of Yeshua really difficult to understand? Yes, very much so if you do not know that He was born into a Jewish, Torah-observant home, kept the commandments of G-d and taught others to do so, and most importantly, spoke Hebrew. This is the key to understanding the difficult words of Yeshua....that He spoke Hebrew. Only if we discipline ourselves and learn to read the Scriptures through eastern eyes rather than western eyes can we really appreciate the teachings of our Messiah. His words explode with deeper meaning for us as we begin to view them through the eyes and culture of the Jewish Messiah. Every time we read His words, we need to ask the question, "Where did He get that from in the Torah?" After all, He is the living Torah. This book should be in the library of every serious talmid (student) of the Bible.