God's Purpose for the Bible's Stylistic Complexity

[Guido]

A long time now, I have known that the original manuscripts of the Bible (I don't know the original languages.) often used nouns to express actions, in places where a verb could have easily been used. Such wording is discouraged by style guides of modern English prose, which offer principles for clear, energetic communication. The Bible also uses very sophisticated sentence structures in the New Testament. Such use also is discouraged by the style guides I just mentioned.

My question is this: Why did the authors of the Bible write this way, requiring much effort from all people in understanding the text? Did God mean to strengthen their intellect, or give them intellectual pleasure? If that is the case, why should modern authors not also use sophisticated language to produce the same effect?

It appears to me that, some people, when told in a writing that it was written for their ease of comprehension, take it as an insult. I wonder then why simple writing is so often promoted as a means to persuade readers of their intellect. Isn't verbal intelligence important, or have we abandoned it these days?

What is God's purpose for the stylistic sophistication of the Bible, with regard to the human intellect. Is a more intelligent mind more capable of understanding, obeying, and pleasing him? This seems wrong because God loves everyone. And those who cannot understand the gospel, lacking the mental capacity, are likely saved.

 

[Van]

Wow, quite a lot to unpack. Did God actually use in the New Testament "very sophisticated sentient structure" to make His word more accessible to those more gifted in language skills? Nope!!

Some people by choice use arcane translations, but the New Testament was written in the language of the day, often initially presented verbally to an audience.

The actual issue is translation into a form of language understandable to the receptor audience. If you read at an 8th grade level (in other words an average reader like me) it takes study to grasp say a translation written at an 11th grade level. And when a translator or translation team renders the Greek at an 8th grade level, the opportunity arises to distort the actual message (or covey it more accurately than the 11th grade version!)

The NLT is a case in point, it does a great job of making the New Testament understandable to those who read at an 8th grade level, but the price is that it misrepresents some of the actual message.

Final point, please provide an example where a noun is used to express action as a verb, rather than describe an action as a concept or idea.
If a person is chosen for salvation, the use of a noun is correct.

 

[Deacon]

Guido: Admitting you are not familiar with the biblical languages simply makes you dependent upon translators that have proficiency in the languages.

Fortunately there are many who have devoted their lives to learning and translating these ancient languages.

In the Opening Post you state, "manuscripts of the Bible ... often used nouns to express actions, in places where a verb could have easily been used."

Perhaps you are eluding to the "verbless clause"? It's a rather technical aspect of the Hebrew language.
The 'verbless clause' relates the syntax of Biblical Hebrew; how BH was spoken and how its sentences were constructed.
Such a sentence doesn't transfer easily to the English language without adding an implied verb.

So the "verbless clause" [link], or nominal clause, refers to instances in Biblical Hebrew where a clause (or sentence) doesn't contain a finite form of the verb and where a connecting word has to be inserted in English.

1 Samuel 16:12 - And he (was) ruddy with beautiful eyes
1 Samuel 24:4b - And there (was) a cave.

Personally, it's an aspect that most of us do not need to be concerned about, we can trust the translators.

~~~~~~~~~

Then you ask: Why did the authors of the Bible write this way, requiring much effort from all people in understanding the text?

The Bible is written for us but not to us.

The biblical authors wrote in a way that their original audience might best understand its message.

John H. Walton writes:
We like to think of the Bible possessively—my Bible, a rare heritage, a holy treasure, a spiritual heirloom. And well we should. The Bible is fresh and speaks to each of us as God’s revelation of himself in a confusing world. It is ours and at times feels quite personal.
.......But we cannot afford to let this idea run away with us. The Old Testament does communicate to us and it was written for us, and for all humankind. But it was not written to us. It was written to Israel. It is God’s revelation of himself to Israel and secondarily through Israel to everyone else. As obvious as this is, we must be aware of the implications of that simple statement. Since it was written to Israel, it is in a language that most of us do not understand, and therefore it requires translation. But the language is not the only aspect that needs to be translated. Language assumes a culture, operates in a culture, serves a culture, and is designed to communicate into the framework of a culture. Consequently, when we read a text written in another language and addressed to another culture, we must translate the culture as well as the language if we hope to understand the text fully. [bolding added]
Walton, John H. 2009. The Lost World of Genesis One: Ancient Cosmology and the Origins Debate. Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic.

Rob

 

[Guido]

In Philipppians in the KJV, which is recognized as a word-for-word" translation, it says,

...even as it is meet for me to think this of you all, because I have you in my heart, inasmuch as both in my bonds, and in the defence and confirmation of the gospel, ye all are partakers of my grace."

There are three nouns here which express actions: defence, confirmation, and partaker. "Bonds" might also be an action but doesn't appear to be a nominalization. I'm not sure if "partaker" is a nominalization.

 

[Deacon]

Hummm, I mentioned "nominal clause"; you mentioned "nominalization."

~~~~~~~~
Compare Versions

even as it is meet for me to think this of you all, because I have you in my heart; inasmuch as both in my bonds, and in the defence and confirmation of the gospel, ye all are partakers of my grace. (Philippians 1:7, AV 1873)

It is right for me to feel this way about you all, because I hold you in my heart, for you are all partakers with me of grace, both in my imprisonment and in the defense and confirmation of the gospel. (Philippians 1:7, ESV)

It is right for me to feel this way about all of you, since I have you in my heart and, whether I am in chains or defending and confirming the gospel, all of you share in God’s grace with me. (Philippians 1:7 NIV 2011)


~~~~~~~~~
Parse Sentence (English)

I'll only take the portion of the passage that you mentioned in the post above, since I really don't like parsing sentences and only rarely find it to be of any benefit.


AV/ESV "you are all partakers",
Pronoun = you
Verb = are
Adjective = all
Noun = partakers

NIV "all of you share"
Noun (subject) = all of you
Verb = share


Parse Sentence (Greek) [Source - BibleHub link]

Philippians 1:7 (NA28)
Καθώς ἐστιν δίκαιον ἐμοὶ τοῦτο φρονεῖν ὑπὲρ πάντων ὑμῶν διὰ τὸ ἔχειν με ἐν τῇ καρδίᾳ ὑμᾶς, ἔν τε τοῖς δεσμοῖς μου καὶ ἐν τῇ ἀπολογίᾳ καὶ βεβαιώσει τοῦ εὐαγγελίου συγκοινωνούς μου τῆς χάριτος πάντας ὑμᾶς ὄντας.

Noun = συγκοινωνούς (partners/partakers)
Personal Pronoun = ὑμᾶς (you)
Verb = ὄντας (are)
Adjective = πάντας (all)

~~~~~~~~~~

IMO, there are differences but there is nothing in the parsing of the sentence that matters.

Rob

 

[John of Japan]

A long time now, I have known that the original manuscripts of the Bible (I don't know the original languages.) often used nouns to express actions, in places where a verb could have easily bee; n used. Such wording is discouraged by style guides of modern English prose, which offer principles for clear, energetic communication. The Bible also uses very sophisticated sentence structures in the New Testament. Such use also is discouraged by the style guides I just mentioned.

My question is this: Why did the authors of the Bible write this way, requiring much effort from all people in understanding the text? Did God mean to strengthen their intellect, or give them intellectual pleasure? If that is the case, why should modern authors not also use sophisticated language to produce the same effect?

It appears to me that, some people, when told in a writing that it was written for their ease of comprehension, take it as an insult. I wonder then why simple writing is so often promoted as a means to persuade readers of their intellect. Isn't verbal intelligence important, or have we abandoned it these days?

What is God's purpose for the stylistic sophistication of the Bible, with regard to the human intellect. Is a more intelligent mind more capable of understanding, obeying, and pleasing him? This seems wrong because God loves everyone. And those who cannot understand the gospel, lacking the mental capacity, are likely saved.

My explanation is that you are just describing the peculiarities of ancient Hebrew and koine Greek. Every language has its peculiarities, as missionary Bible translators know perhaps better than most. Deacon's giving you some great stuff about the Hebrew. The Greek has its own peculiarities: uses participles much more than English; does not have an indefinite article; has a more complicated verb system than English with lots of prefixes, infixes and suffixes; puts a definite article before proper names, etc. The point is that being different does not make a language better or worse than another language, though Greek can be more precise about some things than other languages (for example, Aktionsart, which is kinds of action).

Contrast Greek and English with Japanese, which has no participles or infinitives; has no articles; can turn an adjective into a verb and back again; has a large number of particles to give nuance to words; has about five levels of respect language (honorifics); uses a complicated system of almost 1000s of kanji (Chinese characters) with two alphabets, etc.

Chinese, on the other hand, uses complicated hanxi (Chinese characters) and no alphabet; has no verb tenses (adds words to show time); has no articles; has a word order similar to English (subject-verb-object), etc.

So, God created various unique languages at the Tower of Babel (probably seven originally, since there are seven language families). None are better or worse than others. So, we generally approach the Hebrew and Greek from our English perspective, which is fine, but they are very different from English.

 

[Guido]

Thank you all for answering my question.

Also, I was not declaring it wrong to use nominalizations and sophisticated sentence structures, but expressing my desire to emulate these characteristics of the Bible, (I was talking about the original languages, but thinking in particular about emulating the prose styles of the KJV).