When Dad first learned Portuguese, he made some hilarious mistakes. One was when he wanted to buy a kilo of nails for a project. Not knowing the word for "nails," he looked it up in the dictionary and chose the first word he came to.

Armed with this knowledge, he went to the store and asked, in very broken Portuguese, for a kilo of "unhas." With a somewhat alarmed expression, the proprietor denied they had such an item. Figuring he had put the accent on the wrong syllable, Dad tried variations of that word to no avail.

Finally, in frustration, Dad pointed to what he wanted. "Ah!!!" Beamed the store owner. "Prego!"

Dad had been trying to buy a kilo of fingernails!

While a funny story to tell, it points out the problems in translation. Those who do that work, often have to pick the word they think most closely resembles the meaning in the original language.

Of course, when English has only one word to describe something while other languages have many words that capture the meanings, it can be up to the interpreters' understanding to use a particular word.

Ideally, Bible translators work really hard to be faithful to the text. But as we will see, far too often that is not the case. Add in a large dose of misogyny and patriarchy and the result can be disastrous.

When translators ADD words

What started me on this path was a male reader who was convinced that there were so many references to male headship, filling passages with male pronouns, that even those who wanted to be gender inclusive, would have found it difficult to remove them all.

To bolster his claim that leadership was a males-only club, he pointed to the many male pronouns within 1 Timothy 3:1–13 and that the office of "elder," "deacon" or "bishop" was reserved for men because Paul clearly states that they should have a wife. Therefore, he believed, women were excluded.

And you know what, he's right! There are like a gazillion male pronouns…in English. But — big surprise! None in Greek.

Let's take a look right at the beginning of this passage:

It is a trustworthy statement: if any man aspires to the office of overseer, it is a fine work he desires to do. (NASB)

The NLT went a bit further and pulled out of thin air adding, "he must be a man" to 1 Timothy 3:2.

The real challenge is to overcome the extent to which patriarchy and misogyny have influenced biblical translation. It rather boggles the mind, to be honest.

Translators have inserted those male pronouns into texts. Sometimes because of an agenda or flat-out misogyny and patriarchy, which I talked about extensively in my last article. Often it was because they were the product of their time and were blind to their own bias.

The NIV version captures the true meaning of 1 Timothy 3:1: "Whoever aspires to be an overseer desires a noble task."

Problems with the English language

As a little schoolgirl in Brazil, on the days we had to memorize verb conjugations, my eyes would roll back in my head with boredom. However, since each verb's conjugation depended on which pronoun was used, all you needed to do to be gender-neutral, was say the proper form of the verb and omit the pronoun.

Even though in English we can substitute "they," to make it gender-neutral, it poses other problems — It's awkward and not clear if we mean singular or plural. But in Portuguese, using the third person singular overcomes all those problems.

Cue Greek to English translation. We run into the same problem with gender-neutral pronouns that do not exist in English, and none more obvious than in 1 Timothy 3, which uses gender-neutral language.

Not surprisingly, though, the English version has all references to "he" or "man" inserted because the men who translated Scripture could not fathom women holding the office of an elder or bishop. They wanted it to be that way, and they could get away with it.

Let me repeat: There are no male pronouns in 1 Timothy in Greek that refer to the office of deacon, elder, or bishop.

Taking a look at the passage in Timothy and remaining faithful to the gender-neutral pronouns that are in Greek, the requirements for being an elder would read more like this:

• Here is a trustworthy saying: Whoever aspires to be an overseer desires a noble task. (v. 1)
• Leaders are to be above reproach, of good moral standing, temperate, self-controlled, respectable, hospitable, and skillful in teaching. (v. 2)
• Leaders must not overindulge in wine, not be a bully, be gentle, not contentious, and free from the love of money. (v. 3)
• Leaders must manage their households well, keeping their children under control with all dignity. (v. 4)
• If a leader doesn't know how to manage their own household, how can they take care of the church of God? (v. 5)
• A leader must not be a new convert so that they will not become conceited and fall into condemnation. (v. 6)
• Leaders must have a good reputation with those outside (the church) so that they will not fall into disgrace and the snare of the devil. (v. 7)
• Deacons (servants) must be people of dignity, not insincere, not prone to much wine, and not greedy for money, but hold to the mystery of faith with a good conscience. (v. 8, 9)
• Leaders must first be tested; then have them serve as deacons if they are beyond reproach. (v 10)
• Women likewise (must be) dignified, not slanderers, clear-minded, faithful in all things. (v. 11) Paul was dealing with a specific issue in Ephesus (more on that in another article).
• Deacons must be monogamous (see above) and good managers of their children and their own households. (v. 12)
• For those who have served well as deacons obtain for themselves a high standing and great confidence in the faith that is in Christ Jesus. (v. 13)

See how beautiful that is? It's also rather daunting! I wonder how many male leaders fulfill those requirements! The irony is that those same men want to bar women solely based on their gender.

Now, I want to address the verses in 1 Timothy that the NASB — and many others — translates as a "deacon should be the husband of one wife."

One-horse-town

There's an idiom in English, "One-horse-town." We understand that to mean it's a really small town of little significance. It's so small, in fact, that one horse is enough for everyone's use.

But let's say a few hundred years in the future, someone came along with no cultural or linguistic understanding of that word and decided to translate that to "town with one horse." Not only would that completely miss the meaning, but it would wreak havoc on subsequent uses of that word, creating nonsense.

For example, let's say this imaginary future person took that "town with one horse" one step further and asserted that only those towns with one horse were legal. To further their cause, they went on speaking tours, created podcasts, and wrote books declaring that only towns with one horse were sanctioned by God.

Do you know what is astounding?

That is exactly what's happened to the verses I Timothy 3:2 and 12.

Let's take a look at the two verses in question:

2 An overseer, then, must be above reproach, the husband of one wife, temperate, self-controlled, respectable, hospitable, skillful in teaching. (NASB)

12 Deacons must be husbands of one wife, and good managers of their children and their own households. (NASB)

The only problem is the translation rendered "husbands of one wife" is an idiom. A more accurate reading would be "one-woman-man." As an idiom, it applies to both men and women and has to do with monogamy, moral standing, and the faithfulness of the elder — not who they are married to. In fact, a closer reading does not even include the words "married" or "wife," which is an entirely different ball of wax.

Do you see the problem here? The translators have taken an idiom, turned it around, and built an entire theology and culture around the belief that Paul, speaking for God, is denying women leadership within the church.

It would be hilarious if it weren't so tragic.

Ironically, the same ones who insist that 1 Timothy 3:12 validates that leadership is a males-only club conveniently forget that a literal application of that verse would mean that divorced, widowed, and single men would also be barred. Oh — and all Catholic priests.

Like that's happening…

Once you start down the path of male-only headship or leadership, everything needs to bend to that view. That is how passages like 1 Timothy got so garbled. That is how men have used that passage to silence and sideline women.

Unfortunately, it has also made men less able to see their blind spots or have access to another point of view that did not confirm their own.

Times are changing

We still face challenges to Bible translation, as evidenced by the assumptions my male reader had. Men in power remain the gatekeepers of information, even today, and like dragons of old, jealously guard their quickly dwindling power.

I'm here to help as many as I can to get on equal footing and, to use another metaphor, shout, "The emperor has no clothes!" Let's see the mirage for what it is.

May the truth set us free.

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