Translating 2 Corinthians 5:19

It hit me the other day, out of the blue, while driving: “For God was in Christ, reconciling the world to himself.” I looked it up immediately when I got home. 2 Corinthians 5:19 expresses Saint Paul’s faith in concise and unprecedented simplicity, and yet it is one of the deepest expressions of theology anywhere in the Bible. Here is this verse, in the original Greek and in a few English translations, because I do want to comment on how this verse has been translated.

ὡς ὅτι θεὸς ἦν ἐν χριστῷ κόσμον καταλλάσσων ἑαυτῷ, μὴ λογιζόμενος αὐτοῖς τὰ παραπτώματα αὐτῶν, καὶ θέμενος ἐν ἡμῖν τὸν λόγον τῆς καταλλαγῆς.

KJV, King James Version – To wit, that God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them; and hath committed unto us the word of reconciliation.

NASB, New American Standard Bible – namely, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and He has committed to us the word of reconciliation.

ESV, English Standard Version – that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation.

NIV, New International Version – that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting people’s sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation.

RSV, Revised Standard Version – that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation.

RSVCE, Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition – that is, God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation.

NRSV, New Revised Standard Version – that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting the message of reconciliation to us.

Note how the English translations have shifted from the King James Version to the more recent Protestant/Evangelical translations. Among the major Evangelical translations, only the NASB has stayed close to the King James tradition. Even the RSV and the NRSV which came out of the mainline National Council of Churches opted for the new way of translating this verse. But note how the Catholic Edition of the RSV has gone back to the King James Version! I found that modification of the RSV particularly illuminating. Is it because Catholics have a stronger sense of God being in Christ?

The way the Greek sentence is structured, it can be translated literally and word-for-word “God was in Christ,” the way King James translated it; but it is also grammatically correct, as far as I can tell, to translate it as “in Christ God was.” Then it becomes a translator’s choice. And that’s where many times Bible translations mess up. The advantage of the King James tradition, carried on by the NASB and the RSVCE, is that it is the more literal translation and it is actually word-for-word literal, which doesn’t happen very often when Greek is translated into English. And it can be taken as a strong ontological statement: God was in Christ – as for example, “the fullness of divinity dwelt in Christ bodily” (see Colossians 2:9). The Catholic and Orthodox traditions, with their stronger Christological and Trinitarian adherence would. obviously prefer such a reading. But so would the primary Reformed tradition as we will see below.

Yes, you can say that the Catholic translator is also making a choice. But it is also a choice made by the King James and more recent transactions like the NASB which aim for the most literal translations. Whenever possible the literal translation should be preferred. And the literal translation allows me to look at the context and come to an understanding that fits the context. So let’s look at the context and use the RSVCE as baseline.

ὥστε εἴ τις ἐν χριστῷ, καινὴ κτίσις· τὰ ἀρχαῖα παρῆλθεν, ἰδοὺ γέγονεν καινά. ¹⁸ τὰ δὲ πάντα ἐκ τοῦ θεοῦ τοῦ καταλλάξαντος ἡμᾶς ἑαυτῷ διὰ χριστοῦ καὶ δόντος ἡμῖν τὴν διακονίαν τῆς καταλλαγῆς, ¹⁹ ὡς ὅτι θεὸς ἦν ἐν χριστῷ κόσμον καταλλάσσων ἑαυτῷ, μὴ λογιζόμενος αὐτοῖς τὰ παραπτώματα αὐτῶν, καὶ θέμενος ἐν ἡμῖν τὸν λόγον τῆς καταλλαγῆς. ²⁰ Ὑπὲρ χριστοῦ οὖν πρεσβεύομεν, ὡς τοῦ θεοῦ παρακαλοῦντος δι᾽ ἡμῶν· δεόμεθα ὑπὲρ χριστοῦ· καταλλάγητε τῷ θεῷ. ²¹ τὸν μὴ γνόντα ἁμαρτίαν ὑπὲρ ἡμῶν ἁμαρτίαν ἐποίησεν, ἵνα ἡμεῖς γενώμεθα δικαιοσύνη θεοῦ ἐν αὐτῷ.

Therefore, if any one is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has passed away, behold, the new has come. ¹⁸ All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation; ¹⁹ that is, God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation. ²⁰ So we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We beseech you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. ²¹ For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

In verse 18 Paul clearly say that God reconciled the world through Christ (διὰ χριστοῦ). What would be the point of saying exactly the same thing in verse 19? Verse 19 is not a repetition of verse 18. It is an expansion of verse 18. The ὡς ὅτι at the beginning is a double pointer that Paul is about to expand what he already wrote: God could reconcile the world ‘through Christ’ (verse 18), because God ‘was in Christ’! And if one wants to translate verse 19 as ‘in Christ God was reconciling the world…” it is allowable. But I don’t see the point of simply changing a preposition (διὰ to ἐν) just to reiterate the same point.

Maybe I’m making too much of this, and perhaps Paul did mean exactly the same thing in verses 18 and 19: through/in Christ God reconciled the world. But I still think the translator’s responsibility is to prefer the literal translation as much as possible.

How did church tradition take this verse? John Chrysostom probably represents the standard patristic interpretation, even though we don’t have many patristic commentaries on 2 Corinthians other than Chrysostom’s:

Can you see how great God’s love is for us? Who was the offended party? He was. Who took the first steps toward reconciliation? He did. Some will say that he sent the Son in his place, but this is a misunderstanding. Christ did not come apart from the Father who sent him. They were both involved together in the work of reconciliation.

Chrysostom, Homilies on 2 Corinthians, 11.5

 The preachers of the Protestant Reformation picked up on Chrysostom’s interpretation and spelled out the implications of literal reading. We have several examples of how the Reformers interpreted the literal reading of this verse:

Huldrych Zwingli: This passage shows that Christ was not a mere man, but was also God, no matter how humble and despised he was during the time he lived among mortals. Thus Paul gives emphasis to this when he says that God was in Christ. Now God was not in Christ in the same way that he is in all other things, but deity dwelt corporally in Christ himself, such that Christ was truly God. For unless Christ was God, neither our salvation nor our life was possible. The one who at the same time was both Christ and God died for us. Through his death the Father reconciled the world to himself; that is, on account of Christ, he did not impute our sins to us.

Tilemann Hesshus: God, namely, the eternal Father, was in Christ. Deity itself performed those wondrous works in Christ.

Several other Reformers interpreted the verse similarly, as quoted in the Reformation Commentary on Scripture, New Testament, Vol. IXb, 2 Corinthians, published by InterVarsity Press, which I access in my Logos software.

I’d be interested in any comments that either agree or disagree with what I’ve written here.