Zingers in 1 Peter 1:3-4
Zingers in 1 Peter 1:3-4
Good speakers pepper their speeches with sonically pleasing "zingers" - the types of statements that stay in your head long after you hear them. Perhaps no American public speaker has been better at this than Martin Luther King Jr. Consider this except from his famous speech, I Have A Dream (August 23, 1963):
In a sense we've come to our nation's capital to cash a check. When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to fall heir. This note was a promise that all men, yes, black men as well as white men, would be guaranteed the "unalienable Rights" of "Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness." It is obvious today that America has defaulted on this promissory note, insofar as her citizens of color are concerned... But we refuse to believe that the bank of justice is bankrupt"
Did you notice that Dr. King used similar sounding words to underscore his most important points? Did you also notice the extended metaphor? The potent mixture of metaphor and sonically pleasing words holds the human mind spellbound. We can listen to this kind of rhetoric all day, which is why some people do - they listen to music all day.
About 1,900 years before Dr. King's speech, Peter also wrote a rousing message to a downtrodden people. And, just like Dr. King, he emphasized his main points with some zingers. One of my favorites happens right near the beginning, in 1 Peter 1:3-4.
Zingers in 1 Peter 1:3-4
Peter, with the help of Silvanus (5:12), wrote his first letter to Christians who were facing persecution within their families. Romans considered failing to worship their gods a threat—to family material success and to national security—while Christians insisted on worshipping God alone.
Peter's letter starts with a great zinger right off the bat:
1 Peter 1:3–4 (UBS5): Εὐλογητὸς ὁ θεὸς καὶ πατὴρ τοῦ κυρίου ἡμῶν Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ ὁ κατὰ τὸ πολὺ αὐτοῦ ἔλεος ἀναγεννήσας ἡμᾶς εἰς ἐλπίδα ζῶσαν διʼ ἀναστάσεως Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ ἐκ νεκρῶν 4 εἰς κληρονομίαν ἄφθαρτον καὶ ἀμίαντον καὶ ἀμάραντον τετηρημένην ἐν οὐρανοῖς εἰς ὑμᾶς
You don't need to read Greek to be able to see that the highlighted words look (i.e. sound) VERY similar. For those of us who can read Greek, the bold ones are pretty similar as well. Peter wanted to assure these downtrodden Christians that, even if they lost their earthly family's inheritance for their faith, their heavenly inheritance would be secure forever.
In my translation of 1 Peter for the Spoken English Bible, I've tried to capture the liveliness of this verse by (1) repeating "inheritance" so the audience catches the connection and (2) repeating the same phrase before the verbs in verse 4 so the audience feels how these ideas are connected.
4 and into an inheritance that will not be destroyed, will not be defiled, and will not fade. This inheritance is reserved for you in heaven…
1 Peter has some even more powerful zingers which I'm excited to share with you next week.
TL;DR
If the email was too long to read, here are the main points:
- Good speakers often underscore their main points with statements that sound good.
- MLK Jr. did this wonderfully in his speech, I have a Dream.
- Peter made his statement about the believer's inheritance sound really catchy.
- My translation of 1 Peter reproduces this catchiness.
Challenge for You
Compare my translation of 1 Peter 1:4 with other translations. Be honest with yourself. Which do you think sounds better, and why?
If you think another version sounds better, let me know!
References
- Transcript of MLK's Speech, I Have a Dream