Finding the Humor

I've been continuing on with the KJV update. Quite a bit of it's tedious. They used the word unto the way we use to. Having to change 99% or more of those gets old after a while. But it's been pretty educational. I've been going verse by verse checking most of them against the Greek. It's been interesting to see the choices the KJV translators made and what they considered translation versus paraphrasing and such. Amid all that I found a verse that made me laugh, once I saw what it literally says. I'm up to John now. This is from back in Luke 24. The situation is after the crucifixion. The disciples are devastated. Mary is devastated. All of Jesus's followers and supporters are at the bottom. A group of mourners goes to the tomb to take the spices for when the body starts to decay and stink and all those death things. They're all completely devastated. They get there, and the stone over the entrance has been rolled back. They go inside. There's no body. What? And then in Greek it says this: 4 And it came to pass, as they were at quite a loss about this one indeed, behold, two men stood by them in shining garments:

That Luke cracks me up. The chapter had a couple of more things like that. 18 And the one of them, whose name was Cleopas, answering said to him, Are you only a stranger in Jerusalem, and has not known the things that are come to pass there in these days? I'm not a Greek expert, but it looks like what he was really saying was, Are you the only one in Jerusalem who doesn't know what's going on? I think it depends on whether Cleopas said it sarcastically or not.

And, course, the KJV translated one of the funny lines. It's the reply to Cleopas's question. The he in this verse is Jesus. 19 And he said to them, What things? So, he was just beaten to a pulp, crucified, died and resurrected. Cleopas asks if he's the only person in town who doesn't know the things that have been going on, and he says tongue in cheek, What things? And the KJV guys had to leave it in, because it's literal. hehe I can't help but wonder if those three things are in there on purpose to show us how silly we can be sometimes, when we're not trusting like we should be.

What a long, strange week it's been outside of the update, which is taking massive amounts of time. I'm still trying to figure out how to balance it all regarding the next book. Changing all the older language to modern English will take to September or so, if I can keep pace. Not counting rechecking everything. It's really a huge project.

Have a great weekend.