7:52a
“Aren’t you also from Galilee?” they replied: This is a rhetorical question. The Greek text emphasizes the word you. The Jewish leaders used it as a rebuke to scorn or mock Nicodemus. The other Jewish leaders were saying that Nicodemus was speaking as though he also came from Galilee. They thought that that would explain why he defended Jesus.
There are two ways to translate this rebuke:
• Use a rhetorical question. For example:
Are you from Galilee, too? (New Century Version)
• Use a statement. For example:
Nicodemus, you must be from Galilee! (Contemporary English Version)
Translate this rebuke in the way that is most natural in your language.
7:52b
Look into it, and you will see that no prophet comes out of Galilee: The Pharisees were saying that Jesus could not be a true prophet because he was from Galilee. They were implying that Nicodemus did not know the Scriptures well, or he would know that. This sentence shows the Pharisees’ scorn for Nicodemus. See 7:41b, and the note there, for a similar idea.
Look into it: The Greek word that the Berean Standard Bible translates as Look into it is a command that is second person singular, referring only to Nicodemus. It is a command to examine or study carefully. It implies that Nicodemus should study the prophecies in the Hebrew Scriptures (our Old Testament).
Here are ways to make this explicit:
Study the Scriptures (Good News Translation)
-or-
Read the Scriptures (Contemporary English Version)
you will see that: The pronoun you is second person singular and refers only to Nicodemus. The verb will see refers to learning something. The Pharisees said that Nicodemus would learn something when he read the scriptures.
Here are other ways to translate this phrase:
you will learn that (New Century Version)
-or-
you will find that (New International Version)
no prophet comes out of Galilee: The Pharisees said that Nicodemus would learn that the scriptures never said that a prophet would come from Galilee. However, the Pharisees were wrong. Some prophets, such as Jonah, came from Galilee. See 2 Kings 14:25 (Gath Hepher was a village in Galilee).
Here are other ways to translate this clause:
you cannot expect a prophet to come from Galilee
-or-
prophets do not arise in Galilee (New Jerusalem Bible)
-or-
Galilee does not produce prophets
prophet: A prophet was a man who spoke as God’s representative. He told people what God revealed to him. Here are some ways to translate prophet :
a representative of God
-or-
a man who speaks God’s words
-or-
God’s message-speaker
It is good to use a general term that does not only refer to predicting the future. Although prophets did predict the future, they also gave people other messages from God.
See how you translated this term in 1:21 and 7:40b. See also prophet 1(a) in Key Biblical Terms.
out of Galilee: The word Galilee is referring to the province or region called Galilee. See how you referred to this province in 2:1a.
© 2020 by SIL International®
Made available under the terms of a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License (CC BY-SA) creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0.
All Scripture quotations in this publication, unless otherwise indicated, are from The Holy Bible, Berean Standard Bible.
BSB is produced in cooperation with Bible Hub, Discovery Bible, OpenBible.com, and the Berean Bible Translation Committee.