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

M

Medicine*Woman

Jesus: Mythstory--Not History!
Valued Senior Member
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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!
 
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.
 
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...
 
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:

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...
 
ashpwner said:
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!
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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!
 
Medicine*Woman said:
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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!
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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.
 
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.
 
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.
 
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.
 
Pete said:
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.
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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.
 
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).
 
You have No Idea Greek was the common Language

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?
 
nietzschefan said:
Whatever the "original" message was it has been handled and re-handled by men of various ages.
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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.)
 
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