Round the Sphere Again

An all-Bible edition.

Translation
Bill Mounce (Koinonia) discusses how to translate Galatians 3:24 and gives us very interesting background on the word sometimes translated tutor or guardian or teacher. The law, Paul tells us, was a pedagogue to lead us to Christ. But just exactly what was a pedagogue?

Boice defines the παιδαγωγος as this. “The pedagogue was a slave employed by wealthy Greeks or Romans to have responsibility for one of the children of the family. He had charge of the child from about the years six to sixteen and was responsible for watching over his behavior wherever he went and for conducting him to and from school” (EBC).

“Paul is,” says Mounce, “using a very specific social role with very specific meanings and nuances that the native readers of the epistle would immediately understand.”

Read the whole post to find out more.

Inspiration
How did the gospel of Luke come to us? Don Carson has some thoughts from Luke 1. (For the Love of God)

…Luke tells us he himself “carefully investigated everything from the beginning.” The words suggest that he read the sources, talked with all the principals he could find, and evaluated the reports. We can glimpse at least a little of his method when we read his second volume, the book of Acts. There, by following his movements, we discover that he can be placed in all the early major Christian centers, where he would have the opportunity to talk to all of the earliest Christian leaders, and to read all of the earliest reports and archives. It is not too much of a leap, then, to infer that if Luke the doctor (see Col. 4:14) has some extra information about Mary’s unique pregnancy (Luke 1:26ff.), it is because he looked her up and had some long chats. In due course, then, he chose to write “an orderly account” (1:3).

Read the rest.