HALIFAX, Nova Scotia, October 24, 2026 – If you do any Bible research at all, sooner or later you’ll come across that guy whose sole purpose is to remind you that your Bible is a translation. And he doesn’t stop there; along with constantly repeating his reminder, he also makes sure you realize just how much you’re missing out by reading God’s Word in translation. He rubs your face in it. He baits you into believing you’re somehow to blame for not speaking both Biblical Hebrew and Koine Greek as your first languages. And then, after he’s sufficiently intellectually demoralized you, he scuttles off to do the same thing to someone else.

I was raised to speak English as my first language. During his ministry years, Jesus didn’t speak English; he spoke Aramaic, as did his followers. He also spoke Hebrew and likely had more than a passing knowledge of Greek and Latin, along with a smattering of other languages and regional dialects. However, he didn’t teach and preach in Greek or Latin. He taught and preached in Aramaic, as Aramaic was his mother tongue and his target audience would have been almost exclusively Aramaic speaking.

And yet the New Testament was allegedly not written in Aramaic but instead in Koine Greek, which was the lingua franca (universal language) at the time. I say the New Testament was “allegedly” written in Greek, because there’s evidence that some of the gospels and letters were probably first written in Biblical Hebrew and then translated into Greek. In any case, Jesus, as I mentioned, didn’t teach or preach in Greek or Biblical Hebrew. There’s no evidence that he taught or preached in Greek or Biblical Hebrew. Which means the New Testament was already a translation of Jesus’ Aramaic words when it first came into being.

(Now I’m starting to sound like that guy!)

Having very little to no knowledge of Aramaic, let alone Biblical Hebrew or Koine Greek, I still don’t believe I’m missing out on anything by reading the Bible in English. Jesus would certainly have known when he gave his directive to go out into the world and preach the Good News that translations would be involved. How could they not be? Which means that teaching and preaching God’s Word in translation was baked into the Gospel message. You can almost say that the Bible was meant to be read in translation, if not at least expected to be read in translation. And being expected to be read in translation must mean that God’s Word translates very well, losing none of its impact. And how can that be? Because we absorb God’s Word supernaturally, not intellectually. Learning God’s Word is not an intellectual pursuit but a spiritual one.

I have toyed with the idea of improving my knowledge of Biblical Hebrew for no other reason than to read scripture “in the original”. I even went so far as to sign up for a course. And then God said to me: “Why are you going backwards?” Just that: Just “Why are you going backwards?” Biblical Hebrew is not my language. It was the language of the people who wrote the books that eventually became the Old Testament and who were the original intended audience of that scripture, but it’s not my language. I have no cultural context for Biblical Hebrew. It’s not alive for me like it was for them. It doesn’t resonate. It doesn’t sing.

But the reality is that in the 21^st century, Biblical Hebrew is not alive for anyone anymore. It’s a dead language. Why would I, a native speaker of English, go to the trouble of learning a dead language for the sole purpose of reading a book written in that dead language when the same book can be read in my very much very alive and very serviceable language of English, with all its pulsating and resonating cultural contexts? Why would I go “backwards” to learn a dead language when I already know a living one?

Again, we absorb God’s Word supernaturally, not intellectually, which is why the language our Bible’s written in doesn’t matter: It truly doesn’t matter. God will supernaturally convey whatever it is we’re open to learning from any given scripture on any given day: No knowledge of Biblical Hebrew is required. All that’s required of us is to pick up the Good Book and open it.

God will do the rest.