Strange Religious Words
GOSPEL: Greek “euangelion” means “good news” or “glad tidings”. It should never be translated in any other way other than this in modern English bibles. Paul is correctly translated as saying “my good news”, not “my gospel”, as is also Jesus himself correctly translated in Luke as “to proclaim the good news to the poor” The word “gospel” is an old Saxon word that doesn’t belong in modern English Bibles.
This is important because “good news” demonstrates the sinners and average people secular focus of the New Testament message, rather than being about establishing a new religion. It may be true that “good news” sometimes refers to the larger message and other times maybe not, but why not translate it into English properly as “good news”? The word “gospel” sounds religious while “good news” is secular and easily relatable by anyone.
Why do translators feel such a need to leave certain orthodox religious sounding words untranslated in Greek in modern bibles, rather than correctly rendering them into common English so the average reader can more easily grasp the intent? Why do religious leaders continue to feel a need to mislead and otherwise confuse regular average people who Jesus claims to dearly love?
DISCIPLE: Greek “mathetai”; meaning “student”, “follower”. It has no special religious connotation or significance, other than one might contend that to follow Jesus is both a significant and important choice. Disciple is an old English word for student.
The word in Greek can be used in reference to a follower of anybody, from Karl Marx and Charles Darwin, to Ayn Rand and Donald Trump to any Tom, Dick or Jane on Twitter. When the New Testament uses the word ‘disciple”, it is simply referring to the followers of Jesus and thus, the word should be correctly translated into English as “follower” rather than the religious sounding disciple.
DOCTRINE: Greek “didaskalias”; simply means “teaching” or “instruction” in Greek. The Greek translated as “doctrine” has no special religious connotation or significance. For example, “sound doctrine” is correctly translated as “sound teaching” or “sound instruction”.
Again, the insistence of continuing to use “doctrine” in most modern bibles and sermons implies an orthodox religious context where none is likely intended. As noted below, there is no such thing as “doctrines” of the church found in the New Testament.
EPISTLE: means “letter” or “formal letter” in Koine Greek. While today one can look up the word “epistle” in a modern dictionary and find that it refers to a formal letter of special importance, in the First Century world of Paul and other authors of the New Testament, the Greek “epistole” apparently referred to any and every kind of letter.
Some of Paul’s letters were intended to be read to one or more groups of people, some of them like First and Second Timothy, Titus and Philemon, are personal letters written to a specific individual. It is the highly counter-productive and misleading habit of modern translators to leave certain words in modern bibles in or close to their original Greek (and sometimes Latin or Saxon) form, rather than translating them correctly into English and other modern languages.
Thus, words like “epistle”, “disciple”, “gospel”, “doctrine” and far too many others give modern Bibles an orthodox religious ‘tone’ where none is likely intended. The message of Jesus in every way is a highly secular message intended for sinners and common average people, as well as for the rest of humanity.
There is nothing in the New Testament that is remotely similar to modern Catholic and Protestant theology-laden Christian religions. One should never confuse simple basic English words like “teaching” and “instruction, with the religious sounding “doctrine”, as if it means something different than simply teaching or instruction.
Paul always refers to God’s “law” in the singular and, never as “laws” in the plural. If we break any part of God’s law, we have broken God’s law. Unlike what is frequently heard in pulpits, there are no such thing as “doctrines” of the church.
Rather, “doctrine” is singular; “sound doctrine”, as found in in the New Testament, simply means proper teaching or instruction. Likewise, disciple simply means follower, gospel means good news and church ALWAYS refers to people; the word “church” as found in the New Testament, does not ever refer to a religion, a religious building or a religious organization.
Don’t you hate it when lying-ass nefarious conservative religious leaders turn the greatest liberal who ever lived into a foolish follower of the modern Republican agenda? These are the same type of charlatans and thieves that Jesus called all kinds of vile names right to their face, as well as going after them with a whip.
For more correct meanings of strange religious words found in the Bible, click here: https://freedomtracks.com/revolutionb.html
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