Exegesis, a Protestant and My Response

They Say 'The Greek Means This.' Here's Why They're WRONG!
BiblicallyMotivated | 19 Jan. 2026
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AswxB6gBTbM

3:54 Were Jesus and Nicodemus speaking Greek or Aramaic?

If Aramaic, is there an Aramaic word that means both "from above" and "again"?

Because a word used in translation being misunderstandable or punnable doesn't guarantee the original is.

I suppose you are not pretending the dialogue was ahistoric and originally written in Greek by John after the Resurrection, in order to make a point?

BiblicallyMotivated

@BiblicallyMotivated

The data we have about the conversation is written in Greek. That’s all we have. How would the conversation actually have sounded? Couldn’t say for sure. But it’s irrelevant because we don’t have that data.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

@hglundahl

@BiblicallyMotivated You can check Aramaic lexica.

Is there a single word in Aramaic which has both meanings or not?

13:09 The two meanings do not exclude each other.

Baptism is from above, not from the flesh.

But it comes after birth (as some Catholic midwives know: after birth has started ... if there is a danger of death, you remember Jacob's hand and the red string? ... that hand could have been baptised by a midwife, if she feared the head wouldn't come out alive). In that sense it really is a second birth.

I

BiblicallyMotivated

The English translation is correct because it’s trying to show that Nicodemus misunderstood Jesus, which is apparent because Jesus corrects him and then highlights the heavenly “from above origin”

Hans-Georg Lundahl

@BiblicallyMotivated The Latin is correct.

It has "denuo" and that means again, and the "from above" items are never resumed as "from above" but given in detail.

BiblicallyMotivated

@hglundahl the Latin is irrelevant. The Bible was written in Greek and that’s the data that matters.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

@BiblicallyMotivated Not if Matthew 28:20 is a promise Jesus kept, if so, what the Catholic Church uses matters.

Or any other single persisting Church you might prefer, I don't recommend tracing your line from Novatians over Albigensians, though.

II

john irish

@johnirish989

Jesus was baptized. So He was born twice. His Father was never birthed.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

@johnirish989 The Baptism of John was not the Baptism in the Name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost.

Jesus, even as Man, was already Son of the Father.

john irish

@hglundahl His first creation. A creature. Still God. Created before time and place.

Without sin. Needing no cleansing. Baptized to fulfill Scripture.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

@johnirish989 To fulfill scripture is correct, no sin, needing no cleansing is correct.

But first creation is not. Creature is not.

john irish

@hglundahl So you believe. LOL. My condolences.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

@johnirish989 So you don't believe? My condolences!

john irish

@hglundahl Wow. Shameless plagiarism. I forgive you.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

Thanks, I suppose.

17:22 Thank you for the lesson. I was not unaware of this stuff. On βατταλογέω, Matthew 6:7 I have done my own work. It is a hapax. The meaning in Strong matches a Protestant reading. The one Greek occurrence outside the NT is lacking from the LXX and is centuries later. Can't be bothered to repeat the Perseus search.

You know what I did?

The Vulgate, one fairly early translation, doesn't use "repeat" but inserts "multum loqui" from the context. I asked on quora about the Syriac and Coptic translations, which I also knew to be early, I just don't know the languages. Both of them use "stammer" (or stutter, if you prefer) ... the most probable isn't that battologein or battalogein means "speak like Mr. Battos" (if such a man existed) but more like "speak like you were stuttering" ... what exact attitude comes across both as "stuttering" and as "many words"?

Putting a prayer on repeat, until you fly over the single words, thinking about sth else entirely, hopefully something related to the reason of the words (like, in the Rosary, the mysteries instead of the words of Hail Mary)? No.

The attitude you want is, like a teen not following school rules, trying to explain himself with the principal, he'll both start many diverse trains of thought and be insecure about many of them.

And what do we find among Greco-Roman Pagans? Not just that, but the very same year that Jesus preached, i e the sixteenth year of Tiberius? Velleius Paterculus ends book II of Roman Histories with a prayer to his gods. I'm not sure the Christian copyists have left it entirely intact. But half short as it is, it has the traits of a teen before the principal (like Edmund would have before the White Witch at a point, if she hadn't cut him short). To god after god, three different ones, with well-chosen attribute after well-chosen attribute, he requests, with no word repetitions, except "Romani" and "orbis" a preservation and blessing on the rule of Tiberius and giving him successors to the end of time ... but obviously he has to explain, he doesn't mean weak successors, but capable ones ....

The point is, the real God Who takes us as His children and becomes our Father, doesn't need those kinds of explanation. He doesn't love tricking people with the verbal meanings of their requests, unless the words are very carefully chosen.

This verse says nothing against (and also not much for) repeating prayers. Unless you fall into the trap of trusting Strong and Perseus (both operating under the KJV tradition) to tell you the word meaning.