Goes (so also An American Translation) is translated “goes out” by Good News Translation, intimating that the spirit had entered the house before returning to the dry places to look for other evil spirits. Other translations use an idiom indicating departure from the house rather than from within it; for example, “off it goes” (Moffatt, New English Bible, New American Bible) and “it … goes off” (New Jerusalem Bible). Since the verb in itself is neutral, the specific rendering will need to be determined by the way the receptor language talks about movement from one space to another. One may even translate “it leaves the house.” Some readers may feel that he goes and brings with him is too abbreviated. It may be necessary, for example, to indicate that the one evil spirit first looked for and found other evil spirits before bringing them along with him. Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch translates “Then he goes and finds seven other evil spirits, who are worse than he himself, and they come and live there.”

Just as languages use “come” and “go” differently, so with “bring” and “take.” Here brings may have to be “takes” or “leads back.”

Revised Standard Version has him and himself throughout this section, but in modern English “it” and “itself” are more natural. Translators should do whatever the receptor language demands for referring to an evil spirit.

Enter and dwell there is represented in Good News Translation by “come and live there.” Although “live there” implies entering the house, some languages will require specific mention of this event, as with enter of Revised Standard Version and “come in” of New English Bible.

The last state of that man becomes worse than the first is rendered more idiomatically by Good News Translation: “So when it is all over, that person is in worse shape than at the beginning.” The function of the Greek is merely to contrast the previous situation of the man possessed by one evil spirit with what finally happens to him when he is possessed by eight evil spirits. Jerusalem Bible translates “so that the man ends up by being worse than he was before,” and Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch “so the man is worse off at the end than he was at the beginning.”

As can be seen in the above examples, the man’s state refers to the situation he finds himself in. “Things are worse for the man” and “the situation that man is in is worse” are two other possible renderings.

Discourse structure in some languages requires that that man be very clearly described, as in “that man with the spirit” or “the man whom the spirit left once.”

So shall it be also with this evil generation is an application which Matthew alone makes of this parable. As noted in the introduction to the parable, Luke makes individual application of it, whereas Matthew has Jesus addressing the people collectively as an evil group. This may be a difficult concept to convey clearly, and a second-person construction may be preferable: “This is how it is with all of you evil people. You are worse off now than you were before.” For Matthew the meaning is that the entire generation of people had refused Jesus and his message. Their refusal had in turn left a vacancy which was then filled by a whole flock of evil spirits, leaving the people in a worse condition than they were before encountering Jesus.

The translation should not make readers think that seven or eight evil spirits will come into the people of that day. Rather, it means that those people, too, are going to be worse off than ever. It is possible to say, however, “you will be filled with even more evil than before.”

For a discussion of this evil generation, translators should see verses 39 and 41. “The evil people of this time” or “you evil people of today” are just two possibilities.

Quoted with permission from Newman, Barclay M. and Stine, Philip C. A Handbook on the Gospel of Matthew. (UBS Handbook Series). New York: UBS, 1988. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .