16:7a

They discussed this among themselves and concluded: Verse 16:7b contains a description of what the disciples decided about Jesus’ words. In some languages, it may be good to make this more clear in 16:7a, as the Berean Standard Bible has done. Here are some other ways to say this:

began discussing it among themselves and concluded, saying
-or-
were discussing this among themselves and decided

discussed: The Greek word that the Berean Standard Bible translates as discussed means “thought or reasoned carefully.” The tense of the Greek verb indicates that the disciples probably discussed Jesus’ words for a while.

Here are some other ways to translate this verb:

started discussing (Good News Translation)
-or-
were talking about

this: This word refers to what Jesus said in 16:6. Your translation of this word should clearly refer to Jesus’ words of 16:6.

Here are some other ways to translate this word:

his words
-or-
that/that

16:7b

It is because we did not bring any bread: There are two ways to interpret the Greek word that connects 16:7a and 16:7b:

(1) It is a conjunction and means because. For example:

He says this because we didn’t bring any bread. (Good News Translation)

(Berean Standard Bible, New International Version, Good News Translation, New Jerusalem Bible, New Living Translation (2004), New American Standard Bible, Contemporary English Version, NET Bible, King James Version, New Century Version, New Revised Standard Version)

(2) It is a speech introducer and means that. In natural English, this word is not translated when it introduces direct speech. For example:

We brought no bread (Revised Standard Version)
-or-
that they had not taken any bread along (God’s Word)

(Revised Standard Version, God’s Word, Phillips’ New Testament in Modern English, Revised English Bible, English Standard Version)

It is recommended that you follow interpretation (1). The majority of English versions follow this interpretation.

we: The disciples were talking among themselves, and they were not including Jesus when they used the pronoun we. If your language has an inclusive we and an exclusive we, use the inclusive we since they were not talking to Jesus.

bread: You should use the same word for bread here as you did in 16:5b.

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