Why was the New Testament written in Greek when Jesus spoke Aramaic?

[Medicine*Woman]

*************
M*W: This has always puzzled me. If Jesus existed, he would have spoken Aramaic, a dialect of ancient Hebrew. Yet, the NT was written in Greek and not in the language Jesus actually spoke. (I'm not implying here that I believe Jesus existed other than hypothetically for this post). I've always been uncomfortable with this difference in languages, especially if Jesus were god. It seems odd that the story of Jesus (which allegedly includes his own words) would be written in any other language than what he spoke. Any comments on this? Thanks!

[nietzschefan]

Kinda makes you wonder what's "lost in translation" huh? We know "Murder" got translated to "kill"...that one is a dooozy.

Whatever the "original" message was it has been handled and re-handled by men of various ages.

[mapsdnasggeyerg]

If you can rely on wikipedia (look for Aramaic). It seems to suggest that Greek was the most widely used language at that time. So maybe it was a marketing decision...

[tablariddim]

Fishermen couldn't write so they used ghost writers and ghosts could only write in Greek.

[ashpwner]

becuase the bibal is bull, in my opinion but people have there right to think otherwise, i mean what's to say jesus wasent the sun of god!

[Hani]

M*W:

There had been Aramaic Gospels, but they got lost and only the translations remained. There is not any trace left of those Gospels, and not a single proof of their existence, but you have to trust the word of those guys who wrote the Greek ones because they did not write them on their own but they were filled with the Holy Ghost :-P

I wish he fill me sometime, Sandy, if you read this please pray for me to get filled with the Holy Ghost, I want to know what he feels like...

[Medicine*Woman]

becuase the bibal is bull, in my opinion but people have there right to think otherwise, i mean what's to say jesus wasent the sun of god!

*************
M*W: That's what I've been saying. That's the only thing that makes sense to me. Good to hear it from you!

[Pete]

*************
M*W: This has always puzzled me. If Jesus existed, he would have spoken Aramaic, a dialect of ancient Hebrew. Yet, the NT was written in Greek and not in the language Jesus actually spoke. (I'm not implying here that I believe Jesus existed other than hypothetically for this post). I've always been uncomfortable with this difference in languages, especially if Jesus were god. It seems odd that the story of Jesus (which allegedly includes his own words) would be written in any other language than what he spoke. Any comments on this? Thanks!

Perhaps Greek was the language of choice for written works, much like Latin was the language of choice for written academic work a few centuries ago.

[Jeremyhfht]

Actually, the apostles themselves are what wrote it. They wrote in greek, many many years after Jesus died. supposedly anyway, that's when the documents date.

P.S: check wikipedia for similar information. Jesus Myth is the keyword.

[Pete]

A better keyword in this context is Greek primacy (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greek_Primacy).

[Delvo]

Speaking and writing in Aramaic or Hebrew would have limited the audience too much. Go from one village to another, and you run into people speaking too many different languages in a small area... but no matter what language they spoke at home, they would have also spoken Greek back then in order to be able to communicate with the world outside their own village no matter what the other local home languages were.

[EmptyForceOfChi]

god doesent exist niether did jesus, that should be the title of all of yur posts M*W, it would save all of this beating around the bush.


peace.

[Medicine*Woman]

god doesent exist niether did jesus, that should be the title of all of yur posts M*W, it would save all of this beating around the bush. peace.

*************
M*W: Haven't you noticed the little phrase by my avatar?

[EmptyForceOfChi]

yes you advertise it well. :)

peace.

[Jeremyhfht]

A better keyword in this context is Greek primacy (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greek_Primacy).

Yes of course, but that's included in the myth page. Or so it was.

[Fraggle Rocker]

Perhaps Greek was the language of choice for written works, much like Latin was the language of choice for written academic work a few centuries ago.All scholarship and formal education in that region was done in Greek because the Greeks had political and cultural leadership. Anyone who was going to invest the effort to learn to read and write would do it in Greek because there was so much more material available. Even the Romans deferred to Greek scholarship in the early days of their empire. It wasn't until both the Greek and Roman empires collapsed that Aramaic gathered more respect. It was the lingua franca of a huge swath of the Middle East for something like a thousand years and if I'm not mistaken it was still in wide use a couple of hundred years ago during the Ottoman era.

[IceAgeCivilizations]

I think it was Herodotus who said that Arami lived along the northeast coast of the Black Sea, between the Scythians (Crimea) and the Assyrians (Caucasus).

[timlyg]

Dear Med W.

Ever watched the Mask of Zorro?
1000 years later, perhaps people would ask: I can't imagine how Zorro spoke English...isn't Spanish his language?

[Randwolf]

Whatever the "original" message was it has been handled and re-handled by men of various ages.

Nietz, don't you know that each and every subsequent translation has been guided by the hand of God, and is therefore no less dependable than the original? Hmmmm, wonder how dependable the original is / was... Different topic I guess.

(And since you don't know me, let me make it clear that I find all the translations are products of schizophrenic minds and inspired by delusions, just as was the original.)

[PsychoTropicPuppy]

what FR said.

[PieAreSquared]

a better question Why was the New Testament written at all :)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=okd3hLlvvLw

[FelixC]

Fishermen couldn't write so they used ghost writers and ghosts could only write in Greek.that is very derogatory against fishermen, carpenters, they may have a rustic lifestyle, but that hasn't stopped any through the ages of learning to read & write

both Hebrews & Greeks had schools
you may want to ask your Jewish friends how they prepare for their Bar/Bat Mitzvah
amazingly they have to read Torah passages
Jesus is noted as astounding elders at Jerusalem & reading a Bible passage at Nazareth's synagogue

The Aramaic-speaking churches use the Peshitta Aramaic version
a few links;
http://www.peshitta.org/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peshitta

[joepistole]

Prior to Caesar Flavius Valerius Aurelius Constantinus Augustus there were individual scripts books that were used by local churches...some consistent with what we know as the New Testament and some not. But it was not until Contantine I that the religion began codifying the religion and establishing the Christian principals that we are familar with today and Greek was the language used by the early church founders.

The books of the New Testament were not written by first hand observers. The were written many years after the death of Christ.

[Betrayer0fHope]

M*W:

There had been Aramaic Gospels, but they got lost and only the translations remained. There is not any trace left of those Gospels, and not a single proof of their existence, but you have to trust the word of those guys who wrote the Greek ones because they did not write them on their own but they were filled with the Holy Ghost :-P

I wish he fill me sometime, Sandy, if you read this please pray for me to get filled with the Holy Ghost, I want to know what he feels like...

Where have I heard the bold before..? :\

[eddie23]

easy question to answer.
Jesus never wrote anything.
there is no proof he actualy even existed.
All the stuff in the bible was written LOOOOONG after he was suposedly gone.

[River Ape]

Pete and others are absolutely right. Greek was the language of educated discourse at the time. Whatever you think about the Gospel stories, etc, the fact that they were originally in Greek rather than Aramaic does not tell against them.

“Why was the New Testament written at all?” Of course, it was “compiled” rather than “written” – and is a selection from among the multiple contradictory tracts that were around at the time. It was part of the competition that they had to be in Greek to be submitted to the editor for consideration! :)

[StrangerInAStrangeLa]

that is very derogatory against fishermen, carpenters, they may have a rustic lifestyle, but that hasn't stopped any through the ages of learning to read & write

both Hebrews & Greeks had schools
you may want to ask your Jewish friends how they prepare for their Bar/Bat Mitzvah
amazingly they have to read Torah passages
Jesus is noted as astounding elders at Jerusalem & reading a Bible passage at Nazareth's synagogue


It is not unfairly derogatory. A lower class lifestyle certainly has stopped many thru the ages from learning to read & write. More so in that time & place than presently in advanced countries.
In Greece, schools were mainly for the upper class. I strongly suspect it was the same with the Jews.
Asking present day Jews in advanced countries how they do it has little relation to 2000 years ago in the Middle East.

[Fraggle Rocker]

that is very derogatory against fishermen, carpenters, they may have a rustic lifestyle, but that hasn't stopped any through the ages of learning to read & write.Literacy was extremely uncommon prior to the invention of the technology of printing, for the simple reason that there wasn't very much to read. Chinese, with its logograms, allows literacy to be an incremental process: to this day in remote regions tradesmen can learn to recognize (and even write) the words they need for their business, without being able to read a newspaper.

The Jews were one of very few peoples prior to the modern era who promoted universal literacy (at least for boys) because they wanted everyone (at least boys) to be able to read the Torah and Talmud for themselves rather than taking someone else's word for their contents. This was one of several cultural attitudes that made them so suspiciously different from the Europeans among whom they lived.

[nirakar]

*************
M*W: This has always puzzled me. If Jesus existed, he would have spoken Aramaic, a dialect of ancient Hebrew. Yet, the NT was written in Greek and not in the language Jesus actually spoke. (I'm not implying here that I believe Jesus existed other than hypothetically for this post). I've always been uncomfortable with this difference in languages, especially if Jesus were god. It seems odd that the story of Jesus (which allegedly includes his own words) would be written in any other language than what he spoke. Any comments on this? Thanks!

Aramaic was not a dialect of Hebrew. Aramaic was the language of Aram which was the people from near present Damascus Syria. The Assyrians based in northern Iraq adopted Aramaic as their language and Aramaic became the language of commerce and government throughout much of the Middle East as the Assyrian empire grew.

Aramaic became just plain the language because languages spoken by large groups of people tend to replace languages spoken by small groups of people.

Greek became the language of the Mediterranean region for much the same reasons why Aramaic became the language of the interior Middle East.

Jesus was from the interior but Europe got it's Christianity from the Greek dominated cultures of the Mediterranean coasts. Note that there are people in Iraq and California who call themselves Assyrians, speak Aramaic at home and are Christians.

[joepistole]

Let us not forget that Paul ushered in the hellenization of the religion and making the religion less Jewish and more seperate and distinct from the version originally practiced by Jesus (sabath, circumcision, etc).