Responding to my Stump the Chump challenge, someone emailed me:
When Jesus says that we need to "believe in him" to have life (not a specific reference – but like all the references to belief, vice works), what do we need to believe?
This is a great question and one of those translation problems that has ramifications for how we live out our Christianity. The short answer is that there is problem with using the word “believe” in most passages where the Greek word PISTEOW is used. I’m going to restrict the discussion to the Gospel of John. References below are from the NIV.
JOHN 6:35 Then Jesus declared, “I am the bread of life. He who comes to me will never go hungry, and he who believes in me will never be thirsty. 36 But as I told you, you have seen me and still you do not believe.
JOHN 7:38 Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, streams of living water will flow from within him.”
JOHN 11:25 Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will live, even though he dies; 26 and whoever lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?”
JOHN 12:44 Then Jesus cried out, “When a man believes in me, he does not believe in me only, but in the one who sent me. 45 When he looks at me, he sees the one who sent me. 46 I have come into the world as a light, so that no one who believes in me should stay in darkness.
The first thing to notice is that there is a difference between “believing in” someone and “believing” someone. In current English usage, “believe in” is almost always used to refer a person or idea which is held in doubt. Do you believe in Santa Claus? Do you believe in the theory of evolution? But what about cases in which someone standing right in front of you says, “Do you believe in me?” This is pretty uncommon usage these days (at least in my dialect) but it is meant to convey the idea not of existence but of confidence. In this usage it is a matter of trust. Do you believe in me? Do you still have confidence in me despite what everyone is saying?
There is an easy way to clear up the confusion. In all the passages above, replace believe in with trust. Jesus isn’t calling us to make a mental assent but to trust him.
The accounts of Jesus in the Gospels are from start to finish unbelievable. He does things that bend the laws of nature. He expels demons and confounds religious experts. Here’s a simple test. In John 14, Jesus says this: “I tell you the truth, anyone who has faith in me will do what I have been doing. He will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father.” (Note that the NIV translators are inconsistent. The boldface text is the same word used in the passages above for “believe in”) So the test is this, as a believer in Jesus, go do a miracle. Heal the blind. Raise the dead. Walk on water.
You won’t do it because it’s impossible. It’s unbelievable. But still you persist in believing. What’s going on here? You trust Jesus but you don’t believe him. And I might even be so bold as to say that most followers of Jesus “believe in” him in the sense of mentally acknowledging that he was a real person and did the things the Gospels even while they don’t believe that his miracles and self-identification were possible.
And here is where we find ourselves in the great transition in Christianity from modernism to postmodernism. The theological and biblical studies of the 19th and early-20th century held on to the hope of proving rationally the reliability of the Bible and the person of Jesus. But just as other sciences failed to prove themselves through rationalism, so too theology failed to create a verifiable and internally consistent explanation for the Bible and the God of the Bible. Where did that leave us? Did Christianity crumble? Did the believers throw out their Bibles? No, instead “belief” has been replaced with “trust.” We no longer need “evidence that demands a verdict” because despite the evidence we still trust in the Bible. We still trust in Jesus and his claim to go and prepare a place for us. All our believing is quite independent of rationalism and scientific proof. We trust Jesus even while we don’t believe in him.
Hi David,
Very nice.
However, if I can “believe in” love, I can “believe in” Jesus.
There are also a lot of things that one can see with the naked eye, like the birth of a child, the struggle of a person against all odds, the African night sky, two people making love, that makes one wonder, as in Psalms 8, 19, 104, and 139. Wonder, even doubt, hangs together with belief.
Finally, is it really the case that people who put their trust in Jesus find the nature miracles unbelievable?
I don’t. I’m willing to leave the question open as to whether they happened. In fact, I kind of wonder about people who don’t.
Thanks for the all pics, BTW.
Your comment about wonder is wonderful!
I’m awkwardly trying to grapple with the reason/faith basis of our religion and how that relates to the “irrationality” of postmodern thought. Experiential faith. Ecstatic religious expression. The Emergent conversation. The Celtic resurgence. These all hint at a worldview based on faith rather than sight. I did not see Jesus write in the sand or turn water into wine but I believe he did both those things.
One of the Pentecostal saws that I heard countless times in my youth was, “A man with an experience is never at the mercy of a man with an argument.” Most postmoderns live with a tacit distrust of “a man with an argument” and so experiential mysticism is attractive.
there is problem with using the word “believe” in most passages where the Greek word PISTEOW is used.
The Greek word is very crucial to the Greeks. The judge in a Hellene court was to determine whether the witnesses were mouthing mere rhetoric or were telling the truth. It was the trustworthiness of the witness, yes; but it was the believability of the testimony too, no? There’s ambiguity in the word in sentences such as this -
Οὐ γὰρ δὴ μάρτυρά γε πιστότερον οὐδὲ κριτὴν ἱκανώτερον ἕξομεν ἐπαγαγέσθαι περὶ τῶν Ἑλένῃ προσόντων ἀγαθῶν τῆς Θησέως διανοίας.
“For we shall never be able to produce a more believable/trustworthy witness or a more convincing authority upon the good qualities of Helen than the judgment of Theseus.” — Isocrates, “Praise of Helen” 38
οὐκέτι πιστὰ γυναιξίν
“women are no longer believable/trustworthy” — Homer, “Odyssey” 456
And, in the NT, this ambiguity carries over, no? “Trust” is actually a more difficult English translation than “belief” in some sentences. Here’s from the ESV (but does any good translation use “trust” here?):
“But when they heard that he was alive and had been seen by her, they would not believe it.” — Mark 16:11
“Afterward he appeared to the eleven themselves as they were reclining at table, and he rebuked them for their unbelief and hardness of heart, because they had not believed those who saw him after he had risen.” — Mark 16:14
“but these words seemed to them an idle tale, and they did not believe them.” — Luke 24:11
“And while they still disbelieved for joy and were marveling, he said to them, ‘Have you anything here to eat?’” — Luke 24:41
“So the other disciples told him, ‘We have seen the Lord.’ But he said to them, ‘Unless I see in his hands the mark of the nails, and place my finger into the mark of the nails, and place my hand into his side, I will never believe.’” –John 20:25
Just for clarification I’m only suggesting that “trust” is a better translation for those places where “believe in” has been used. The examples you cite from the ESV are all places where “believe” is the proper rendering.
I’m only suggesting that “trust” is a better translation for those places where “believe in” has been used.
Sorry about that and thanks for the clarification.
What do you think about how to best translate into English the Greek translation of the Hebrew Psalm 78:22?
ὅτι οὐκ ἐπίστευσαν ἐν τῷ θεῷ, οὐδὲ ἤλπισαν ἐπὶ τὸ σωτήριον αὐτοῦ.
Translating the Greek to English, Lancelot Brenton has exactly what the KJV has translating the Hebrew to English:
“Because they believed not in God, and trusted not in his salvation.”
(Of course, the Hebrew to English NIV is “for they did not believe in God or trust in his deliverance” and CEV is “because they did not believe in God and did not trust his saving power” by CEV).
Albert Pietersma changes the Greek to English just a bit, as so:
“because they had no faith in God nor did they hope in his saving power.”
Does the preposition in the source language(s) determine that “believe in” is okay in English? Or is “trust (in)” actually better English for PISTEOW (EN) here? And how do you like Pietersma’s “have faith in”?
Funny you should mention that. I’m planning a post on Paul’s Greek translation of Habakkuk’s Hebrew in Rom 1:17.
You can definitely see from your example how PISTEOW and ELPIZO are overlapping concepts. I’ll look at it more and get back to you but I’m not really qualified comment on Greek translations of Hebrew let alone give a definitive opinion.
Thanks for this post. An interesting point about trust being more important than intellectual belief now that we are in a postmodern era. Sadly many Christians won’t accept this change and act as if convincing people of the facts about Jesus’ life, death and resurrection is going to make them good Christians.
But let’s not throw out the baby with the bathwater: I still believe the facts (pisteuo without a preposition) as well as trust in the One behind them (pisteuo eis). And because I trust that One I believe that we can still do miracles like raising the dead, and continue to believe that even if the first time I don’t succeed I should continue trying, as God gives me the faith to do so.
[...] must lose our faith 2009 April 18 by David Ker Continuing from my post Jesus is unbelievable, I want to look at how different translations have handled Paul’s citation of Habakkuk 2:4 in [...]
David, excellent observations!
Let me join you!
I am Greek so I think I can clarify some words for you…
Pistevo (πιστεύω) comes from pistis (πίστις) which is a noun.
Pisti has many meanings
It may mean belief, trust or even credibility!
Elpizo (ελπίζω) is just to hope. It comes from elpis (ελπίς) (or elpida in new greek).
It can also mean to wait, to persevere.
Very nice article! Have a nice day…
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