Beresford Job's Biblical Church - 11

Ch. 12 is entitled, "To Submit or Not to Submit". Here, Job tackles the verses often cited to support the idea that laymen must submit to clergymen, in Protestant churches, typically the Head Pastor.

He first points out that if you start reading through the epistles in the New Testament, you get all the way through Romans, 1 & 2 Corinthians, Galatians, and Ephesians "without so much as a single word being either written to, or concerning, church leaders." (143) Evidently, they were addressed to whole assemblies, or groups of assemblies in a town.

But 1 Thessalonians 5 says, "we ask you, brothers, to respect those who work hard among you, who are over you in the Lord and who admonish you. Hold them in the highest regard in love because of their work." (144) Ain't that hierarchical leadership?

No. Job argues that the culprit here, and also in Romans 12:8 and 1 Tim 5:17 is the word proistemi. This is normally translated "stand before", "stand over", or "have charge over". Vine's Expository Dictionary lists these meanings: "'to stand before', hence to lead, to attend to (indicating care and diligence)." (144) Frustratingly, without citing the sources, Job cites F.F. Bruce and "some of the newer Bible translations" as endorsing the translation "care for you". (144)

Job is certainly right that if this is what was meant, then those texts take on a different color - they are exhorting people not to bow to hierarchical authority, but rather to respect their spiritual parents, as it were, who care for them.

But I don't think enough has been said here. What are these newer translations? NIV, NLT, HCSB, CEV, translate as above, or something like "your leaders". Note: leading terms are ambiguous - they can have to do with hierarchical leaders, or with those who provide initiative and guidance without have any special office or rights. A "leader" could be a king or pope (hierarchical) or the bravest guy in the platoon. (non-hierarchical) The coach, or the pro-Bowl middle linebacker.

The excellent Good News Bible has "[those] who guide". Score one for Job's preferred rendition. The Message (not a translation, but a paraphrase) has "honor those leaders who work so hard for you, who have been given the responsibility of urging and guiding you along in your obedience." (1 Thess 5:12) But is that right?

Perhaps Job was referring to the TNIV, which has

Now we ask you, brothers and sisters, to acknowledge those who work hard among you, who care for you in the Lord and who admonish you. (1 Thess 5:12)

Perhaps this explains why there was no reference - this 2002 revision of the popular NIV Bible has been perceived as wrongheadedly politically correct because of its rigorously gender-neutral translations. (e.g. "and sisters" above instead of "brothers" for adelphoi) They actually have a website constructed to explain various departures from the NIV. In any case, the TNIV translates "lead" for the same word in Romans 12:8.

The IVP Bible Background Commentary says that proistemi

...was especially applied in the Greco-Roman world to patrons, sponsors of clients and religious associations. If that sense is in view here, those would be the Christians who opened their homes for the churches to meet in them and sponsored them, providing what financial and political help they could... (595)

I suspect that is a dead-end, though. Why would those be singled out as ones who "labor among you"?

All in all, it seems to me that it is best to translate this verb as "lead" - leave the ambiguity in the translation which is in the original. It is up to the reader to discern that Christ-like, "foot-washing", servant-leadership is in view. I think Job is right about the meaning of these passages; I just don't think it makes the case to cite (without citing) an authority or two as to the proper translation. It's really interpretation that matters, in the context of the teaching of Jesus and it's fit with that of the apostles.

Next time: more Greek-word-fu.