καὶ ἐξωμολόγησεν, καὶ ἐζήτει εὐκαιρίαν τοῦ παραδοῦναι αὐτὸν ἄτερ ὄχλου αὐτοῖς.
6So he consented and began to look for an opportunity to betray him to them when no crowd was present.
“This picture indicates that corruption takes place even in temples and even among the religious.”
Drawing by Sawai Chinnawong who employs northern and central Thailand’s popular distinctive artistic style originally used to depict Buddhist moral principles and other religious themes; explanation by Paul DeNeui. From That Man Who Came to Save Us by Sawai Chinnawong and Paul H. DeNeui, William Carey Library, 2010.
For more images by Sawai Chinnawong in TIPs see here.
Following are a number of back-translations of Luke 22:6:
Barclay Newman, a translator on the teams for both the Good News Bible and the Contemporary English Version, translated passages of the New Testament into English and published them in 2014, “in a publication brief enough to be non-threatening, yet long enough to be taken seriously, and interesting enough to appeal to believers and un-believers alike.” The following is the translation of Luke 22:1-6:
Passover was near, and the religious authorities
were looking for a way to get rid of Jesus,
but they were afraid of what the people might do.
About this time, Satan influenced Judas
to approach the religious authorities
with an offer to betray Jesus.
They were very glad and agreed
to pay Judas some money.
Right away he began looking
for a chance to betray Jesus
when the crowds were not around, of course.
Exegesis:
exōmologēsen ‘he consented,’ ‘he agreed.’ exomologeō in 10.21 in a different meaning.
ezētei eukairian ‘he sought an opportunity,’ ‘he looked for a chance.’ The imperfect tense of ezētei is durative.
eukairia ‘favourable opportunity.’
tou paradounai auton … autois ‘to hand him over to them,’ articular infinitive in the genitive, dependent upon eukairian.
ater ochlou lit. ‘without a crowd,’ i.e. ‘without a crowd being present,’ or ‘without tumult,’ preferably the former.
ater (also v. 35) ‘apart from,’ ‘without.’
Translation:
He agreed, preferably, ‘he consented,’ ‘he accepted their proposal’ (Willibrord), ‘he said it was all right.’
In the absence of the multitude, or, ‘without the crowd knowing about it’ (cf. Good News Translation), ‘when the crowd would not be present, or, aware of it.’
Quoted with permission from Reiling, J. and Swellengrebel, J.L. A Handbook on the Gospel of Luke. (UBS Handbook Series). New York: UBS, 1971. For this and other handbooks for translators see here . Make sure to also consult the Handbook on the Gospel of Mark for parallel or similar verses.
22:6a
This verse tells how Judas responded when the Jewish leaders offered him money to betray Jesus. He agreed to their offer. In Greek this verse begins with the common conjunction that is often translated as “and.” Some English versions have “so” here because the verse tells the result of the discussion between Judas and the leaders. Connect this verse to the preceding one in a natural way in your language.
Judas consented: The phrase Judas consented indicates that Judas accepted their offer. He said that he was willing to betray Jesus for the amount of money that the leaders offered him. Some other ways to translate the phrase are:
He agreed… (Revised English Bible)
-or-
So Judas promised to do it. (God’s Word)
and began to look for an opportunity: The phrase and began to look for an opportunity means that Judas began to look for the right time and way to betray Jesus to the leaders, as he promised them. Other ways to translate this are:
and watched for the best time
-or-
and looked for a good/appropriate way
The context implies that Judas left the place where he met with the leaders, and from that time on, he watched for an opportunity. In some languages it may be necessary to include this implied information. For example:
Then ⌊he left, and⌋ began to watch for an opportunity
-or-
and from that time, he searched for a good opportunity
to betray Jesus to them: The Greek verb that the Berean Standard Bible translates as to betray Jesus to them is the same verb that is translated as “betray” in 22:4c. Consider whether in your language it would be more natural to use the same word or a different word with a similar meaning.
22:6b
in the absence of a crowd: The Greek phrase that the Berean Standard Bible translates as in the absence of a crowd refers to a time when Jesus was not surrounded by many people. If Jesus was alone or with only a few disciples, the temple guards could arrest him easily. The people who usually listened to Jesus would not know that the guards had arrested him. Some other ways to translate this are:
when he was away from the crowds/people
-or-
when he was not surrounded by many people
-or-
when only a few people were with him
© 2009, 2010, 2013 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.
No comments yet.
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.