Good News Bible adds “Now” to show that Paul is changing his theme.
Actually is the first word in the Greek text. It is not used elsewhere in the New Testament at the beginning of a sentence. In other places it has the meaning “(not) at all”; see Matt 5.34; 1 Cor 15.29; and perhaps 6.7. Outside the New Testament this word usually means “everywhere,” and several translations take this to be the meaning here, for instance Bible en français courant, Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch, Parola Del Signore: La Bibbia in Lingua Corrente. Actually fits the context better (so New International Version, Revised English Bible). However, no matter which meaning is taken, the translator should use an emphatic word or expression here. Actually may also be translated as “it is a fact that,” or “it’s the truth that.”
It is … reported is literally “It is heard.” We do not find this expression again in Paul’s writings, but the same passive verb, in the past tense, is translated by Good News Bible as “the news spread” in Mark 2.1. Translators may feel that it is more natural in their languages to replace “it is heard” by “people are saying” or “people have actually told me.” Paul uses a passive verb in the Greek and thus avoids naming the person or persons who have given him this information. His reticence in naming his informants may indicate that he wanted to approach the matter of immorality gently. The phrase It is actually reported may be translated as “They have told me,” “They have actually told me,” or “It’s a fact that they have told me.”
The second part of the verse in the Greek adds emphasis by repeating some of the words and information that are found in the first part. Good News Bible, though, combines the two parts, and adds the word “terrible” to convey the emphasis.
The word that Revised Standard Version translates as immorality originally referred to dealings with prostitutes. But it could be used in the wider sense as in this verse. The last part of the sentence and the following verses show that Paul is talking about the immorality of only one person or couple in the church. So Barclay translates this as “a case of sexual immorality.” It is important that the translator carefully considers the range of words for “sexual immorality” that are available in his language. This is not referring to ordinary adultery, which will be expressed in many languages as “sleeping with someone who is not one’s own spouse.” Here it is a more heinous variety that in many languages will need to be referred to as “incest.” Paul makes this clear in the next sentence, where he states that it is a form of immorality that even the pagans do not commit. So in certain languages one may have to say something like the following: “Now, people are actually telling me that there is a type of sexual immorality among you that even the heathen would not commit,” or “… that someone in your group is committing incest, a type that even the heathen would condemn.” “Sexual immorality” is the main theme both in this verse and in verses 9-11.
The clause there is immorality among you may also be translated as “someone in your group has committed sexual immorality.”
There is nothing in the Greek that corresponds literally to the Good News Bible phrase “would be guilty of it.” In fact, the Greek text is rather awkward. It says literally “and such sexual-immorality which not-even among the pagans, so-that a man have his father’s wife.” Many translations give the impression that pagans or heathen would not commit such sin. But the text probably means that the law and customs even of pagans would not allow it. Phillips translates this as “immorality of a kind that even pagans condemn.”
Pagans is a negative reference to non-Jews. One should avoid rendering this as, for example, “other peoples,” since there were almost certainly non-Jews as well as Jews among the Christians in Corinth. However, in a wider sense one may translate this phrase as “people who do not worship the true God.”
The last part of the verse contains two features in the Greek that a literal translation tends to miss. First, the tense of the verb living with (“have” in Greek) shows that this man was committing sexual immorality continually, not just once. This word can be rendered as “is sleeping with” (Good News Bible) or “is living with.” These are common English euphemisms or roundabout ways of referring to sexual intercourse. Translators may need to find appropriate euphemisms for sexual intercourse in their own languages. Second, the Greek expression father’s wife almost certainly means the man’s stepmother, not his own mother. Good News Bible has translated it in this way (also New Jerusalem Bible, Revised English Bible).
An alternative translation model for this verse is:
• Now, it’s a fact (or, it’s true) that people are telling me that someone in your group is sinning by sleeping with his stepmother. Even people who do not worship the true God don’t allow (or, condemn) sin like that.
Quoted with permission from Ellingworth, Paul and Hatton, Howard A. A Handbook on Paul’s First Letter to the Corinthians, 2nd edition. (UBS Handbook Series). New York: UBS, 1985/1994. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .