14:68a

But: The Greek word that the Berean Standard Bible translates as But here indicates that Peter’s response to the servant girl will not agree with what she said. He denied that what she had said was true. Some English versions do not use a conjunction here. Connect Peter’s response to 14:67 in a natural way in your language.

he denied it: The phrase he denied it here means that Peter said that what the servant girl had said was not true. Of course, Peter had been with Jesus, but he was afraid to admit it.

In some languages it may be more natural to express the words denied it as a direct quote. For example:

He replied to the servant girl, “What you are saying is not true!”

denied it: The Greek words that the Berean Standard Bible translates as denied it is literally, “denied, saying.” Some languages may also need to include a word like “saying” or “said.” For example:

But he denied it and said
-or-
But he said

If you do not use a word like denied to introduce the quote, then you should clearly communicate the idea of denial in 14:68b.

it: The Berean Standard Bible has supplied the word it to make the sentence sound natural in English. This word is not in the Greek text, but English requires that there be a direct object with the verb “deny.” Follow the pattern of your own language in this matter.

14:68b

I do not know or even understand what you are talking about: In this context the verbs know and understand have almost the same meaning. Peter repeated the same idea in order to emphasize what he was saying. He wanted to make it clear to the servant girl that she was mistaken.

In some languages it may not be natural in this context to use two verbs with almost the same meaning, like know and understand. If this is true in your language, you may be able to translate Peter’s reply with a different type of emphatic phrase. For example:

I do not have any idea what you are talking about!

he said: The Greek word that the Berean Standard Bible translates as he said occurs at the beginning of 14:68b, along with the phrase “he denied it.” Place it where it is natural in your language. One way to do this in English is:

He denied what she said and replied, “I do not know or understand what you are talking about!”

14:68c

Then he went out to the gateway: The phrase Then he went out to the gateway indicates that Peter left the fire in the courtyard and went out into the covered passageway that led toward the outer gate. (Louw & Nida (page 87) define proaulion as “the area in front of an entrance to a building,” but this may be misleading if it is understood as the entrance “into” the building rather than the entrance “from” the street into the courtyard of the building.) When you translate this, indicate clearly that Peter went toward the place where he could go out into the street, not toward the entry into the house.

Here are some other ways to translate this phrase:

went toward the entrance of the courtyard (New Century Version)
-or-
went out to the gate (Contemporary English Version)
-or-
went to the edge of the yard near the gate

and the rooster crowed: There is a textual issue here:

(1) Some Greek manuscripts include words that are often translated as, “and a rooster crowed.” This text is followed by most English versions.

(Berean Standard Bible, Contemporary English Version, English Standard Version, God’s Word, King James Version, New American Bible, New American Standard Bible, New Century Version, NET Bible, New Jerusalem Bible, New Living Translation, New Revised Standard Version, Good News Bible)

(2) Other Greek manuscripts do not include the words “and a rooster crowed.” This is followed by a few English versions.

(New International Version, Revised Standard Version, Revised English Bible)

It is recommended that you follow option (1). It has very good manuscript support and most English versions follow this option.

However, if the major language version in your area does not include these words, you may want to use brackets around them or include them only in a footnote. An example of a possible footnote is:

Some manuscripts include “and the rooster crowed.”

If you follow option (1), you could include the following footnote:

Some Greek manuscripts do not have “and the rooster crowed.”

the rooster crowed: The phrase the rooster crowed indicates that a male fowl made the noise that it normally makes sometime before dawn. Use the natural way in your language to describe this noise. For example:

a rooster called/cried

See how you translated the similar phrase in 14:30b.

© 2008 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.