Translators need to consider restructuring this verse, since languages present information about characters or participants in narratives in different ways. Translators therefore are required to choose the order of presenting this information that would be the most natural in their languages.

Matthew begins this verse with a participle (As he walked) in which the name Jesus is not explicitly mentioned. But since this introduces a new section, it is helpful to mention the subject (Jesus) by name, as translations such as Good News Translation, New English Bible, Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch, and Barclay have done.

By (so New English Bible, New Jerusalem Bible), a preposition in Greek, is rendered “along the shore of” by Good News Translation. It can also be translated “near,” “along,” or “beside.”

Walked may be “was walking” in some translations. Whatever is natural is what the translation should have.

Sea or “Lake” is sometimes difficult in areas that do not have lakes and which are too far inland for the people to know the ocean, either. Translations in these cases use “big water,” “wide river,” or something similar. This lake is about 20 kilometers long by 13 kilometers wide.

In some languages he saw two brothers could mean they were his brothers, that is, the brothers of Jesus himself, certainly an erroneous impression. Secondly, there are only two men whom Jesus sees here. But if translators do not restructure the information as their languages require, it may seem that there are four people: the two brothers, and Simon and Andrew.

Simon was a common Greek name; it is found in Sirach 50.1, in Josephus, and in the New Testament. The Hebrew form of the name is “Shimeon.”

Matthew includes the information called Peter, which is not found in the Marcan parallel (1.16). According to Mark (3.16), this was the name Jesus later gave to Simon, but Matthew probably uses it from the beginning of his Gospel because it was the name by which his readers knew Simon. Translators can say “Simon, who was also called Peter,” or “Simon, whose other name was Peter.”

Andrew is a Greek name and not uncommon. As early as 169 B.C. it appears as the name of a Jew on an inscription in Olympus.

Many languages do not have a word for brother, but have one word for “younger brother” and another for “elder brother.” We can guess that Peter was the elder since he was named first, but this cannot be proved. If a decision must be made, however, then Andrew should be called “his younger brother.”

Casting a net into the sea is represented in Good News Translation by “catching fish in the lake with a net.” The net referred to was probably a circular net with weights and a draw rope around its edge.

It is important in many areas to indicate that they were casting a net in order to catch fish. Translations can have “they were fishing by throwing a net into the lake (or, water)” or “they were throwing a net into the lake to catch fish.”

Note that both of them were fishing, not just Andrew, as some translations have made it appear.

Fishermen here indicates that this was their profession, their regular way of making a living. The word some languages have will indicate this, but others will have to say “for that was what they did for their living (or, as their occupation).”

For they were fishermen is restructured as a relative clause by Good News Translation: (“who were fishermen”) and placed immediately following Peter and Andrew his brother. Other possibilities of restructuring also exist; for example, “… he saw two fishermen catching fish in the lake with a net. They were brothers. The older one was Simon (called Peter) and the younger was Andrew.” Another example is “… he saw two men. One was Simon, whose other name is Peter, and the other was his brother Andrew. They were fishermen, and were throwing their nets into the lake to catch fish.”

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 .