The Sacred Roots of Holy Orders

In order to decide to accept or reject the modern translations vocabulary of Holy Orders used in English language bibles, it is useful to study the development of the terms used in biblical Hebrew, Greek, Latin, and English. You will see how all three orders mentioned in the bible, bishop, priest, and deacon, have to some degree been changed back to a literal translation of the biblical Greek: episkopos was changed from bishop to ‘overseer’, presbuteros was changed from ‘priest’ to ‘presbyter’ (or ‘elder’), and diakonos was changed from ‘deacon’ to ‘servant’. This reversion introduces the possibility of understanding these terms in a secular way (based on the fact that the traditional wording was replaced with a literal rendition of the biblical Greek). Under normal circumstances, a more literal translation is a truer or more authentic translation, but not in the case of substituting terms with broad meaning for those traditionally used, which have a specific Christian meaning, based on the development of a sacred vocabulary. The facts surrounding these changes indicate they were neither an accident nor a mistake, and should be the subject of my next article.

The bishop

The words for the secular term ‘overseer’, Hebrew paqid, and Greek episkopos, are used in the bible and other literature with both a sacred and a secular sense. Once Latin borrowed Greek episkopos, it changed the ‘k’ to a hard ‘c’, and changing the final ‘o’ to a ‘u’. Antistite is the native language word in Latin for overseer. It was used in a sacred sense only, primarily in pagan literature. The Old Testament Vulgate uses antistite and episcopus each in a single verse; the New Testament Vulgate uses only episcopus, which was a Greek loan word. English later borrowed the term as bishop. Here is a partial list of languages which also borrowed the word: Dutch bisschop, French eveque, German Bischof, Danish biskop, Italian vescovo, Portuguese bispo, Spanish obispo, Swedish biskop, Hungarian puspok, Polish and Slavic biskup. Yet, modern biblical translations in many of these languages no longer mention bishops. The Dutch bible uses opziener (overseer) rather than bischop; the Danish uses Tilsynsmaed (supervisor) for all six verses; German uses Aufseher (overseer) for all 6 verses; Swedish uses forestandare for all 6 verses. To revert back to the original secular meaning in Greek, that of overseer, as modern bible translations do, denies the Christian development of English via the Latin language, and forces the reader to find meaning in the word overseer which it does not convey by itself, i.e., spiritual authority. This is in no way an attempt to denigrate the Greek use of episkopos, since native Greek speakers would have no trouble distinguishing between the secular meaning (overseer) and the sacred meaning (bishop).

The Hebrew precursor to of the Christian Bishop

The leader of the community mentioned in the Dead Sea Scrolls is called paqid in Hebrew. The literal English translation of paqid is overseer, ‘appointed one’. There are 13 Old Testament verses containing the noun paqid. As a verb, Hebrew paqad means ‘to oversee’, ‘to visit’, ‘to appoint,‘ ‘to number’, and ‘to punish’. Notice that these actions are the duties of the Christian bishop.

Overseer in Greek and Latin

Where Hebrew paqid (overseer) is not translated by the Greek episkopos, such Greek terms as toparchas (governor), epistates (chief) and prostates (ruler) are used instead. The 12 verses in the Old Testament which contain the word episkopos in the Greek Septuagint, eight of those 12 have a sacred context. The Hebrew original in all 12 verses is some form of paqad. As a verb paqad is contained in 2 of the eight verses; the noun paqudah (office of overseer) is contained in 3 of the verses, and paqid (overseer) is contained in 3 verses. The Latin equivalents of these eight occurrences of pqd/episkopos break out as follows: praepositus [meaning 'commander'] (4 verses), episcopus (1 verse), super [meaning 'over') 1 verse, custodias (1 verse), and praefectis (1 verse). Clearly then, in the Old Testament Latin, the word episcopus was not favored, even when the original Greek was episkopos, and used in a sacred context. This seems to be a deliberate attempt to restrict the use of the Latin word to the followers of Christ of the New Testament. The single verse where Latin episcopus is used is Neh 11:22: "And the overseer of the Levites in Jerusalem, was Azzi the son of Bani....".

The main difference between the Greek and Latin use of the word for bishop, Greek epikopos is used not only in a sacred sense (as in Latin), but also in a secular sense (which Latin does not do). This is important to know because modern translations of the bible have reverted back to the original Greek of the New Testament, mistranslating the four verses containing episkopos by substituting “overseer”, for bishop.

The native Latin equivalent of Greek episkopos in its meaning of ‘religious overseer’ is antistite, which also means president, chief priest. Latin Antistite is used in this sacred sense in the Roman Missal, in the 1st prayer found in the canon (Eucharistic Prayer I) where the bishop is prayed for: “una cum famulo tuo Papa nostro "N." et Antistite nostro "N." (“as also for Thy servant N., our Pope, and N., our Bishop”). This shows that the Latin Mass text as translated from the original Greek used in Rome did not adopt the Greek word for overseer (St. Jerome did so in the New Testament use of Latin episcopus). There is a single verse in the Latin bible which contains antistite: 2Ch 29:34: “But the priests were few, and were not enough to flay the holocausts: wherefore the Levites their brethren helped them, till the work was ended, and priests (antistites) were sanctified, for the Levites are sanctified with an easier rite than the priests.”

The sacred meaning of paqid is expressed in the Vulgate or Latin version by a single use of the Greek loan word ‘episcopus’, in Neh 11:22, (as described above). The rest of the verses containing paqid are translated in the Latin Vulgate as secular, political terms: praepostitus, (commander) praefectus, (superintendent), princeps (prince), or dux (leader). Antistite, the native Latin word for overseer, is not used in the Vulgate New Testament, the Latin loan word from Greek, episcopus preferred by St. Jerome instead.

The English Bible and ‘bishop’

The word ‘bishop’ does not appear in the Douay (English) Old Testament. In the English language Rheims New Testament, the word bishop occurs in 6 verses:

Acts 20:28 Take heed to yourselves, and to the whole flock, wherein the Holy Ghost hath placed you bishops, to rule the church of God, which he hath purchased with his own blood.

[the word ‘bishops’ replaced with ‘overseers’ in the KJV and in the U.S. bishops’ New American Bible (NAB)].

Philippians 1:1 Paul and Timothy, the servants of Jesus Christ; to all the saints in Christ Jesus, who are at Philippi, with the bishops and deacons.

[The NAB uses the word ‘overseers’ instead of bishops].

1 Timothy 3:1 A faithful saying: if a man desire the office of a bishop, he desireth a good work.

[The NAB maintains the word ‘bishop’].

1 Timothy 3:2 It behoveth therefore a bishop to be blameless, the husband of one wife, sober, prudent, of good behaviour, chaste, given to hospitality, a teacher,

[The NAB maintains the word ‘bishop’].

Titus 1:7 For a bishop must be without crime, as the steward of God: not proud, not subject to anger, not given to wine, no striker, not greedy of filthy lucre:

[The NAB maintains the word ‘bishop].

1 Peter 2:25 For you were as sheep going astray; but you are now converted to the shepherd and bishop of your souls.

[The NAB uses the word ‘guardian’ instead of ‘bishop’].

The New American Bible, the official biblical version used by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, eliminates the word ‘bishop’ from half of the New Testament verses in which it exists in the original Latin and English versions. It is somewhat ironic that the very authority which approved bible versions for use, episcopal authority, is undermined by limiting the use of their title as a Christian bishop. ‘Guardian’ and ‘overseer’ do not convey the spiritual authority to which bishops are invested by apostolic succession.

The priest

Aramaic qashysha

In the Aramaic New Testament, Peshitta version, qashysha is used to translate Greek presbuteros. In the Malabar language used by Catholics in Kerala India, kashisha means priest. The word in Persian for priest is also qashiysh. It appears to be the original which was borrowed from Persian into Aramaic.

The Hebrew words for ‘Priest’

In Hebrew, there are two terms for the word priest: kohen, and kamar.

The Greek words for ‘Priest’

In the Greek bible, two main words are used: hiereus [32 verses] and presbuteros [67 verses].

The Latin words for ‘Priest’

In the Latin language, there are at least five words for priest: popa (the priest who slaughtered the sacrifices), acolytes (a helper priest), mysta (related to the word mystery), pontifex (high priest), presbyter (elder, priest), sacerdos.

In the Vulgate or Latin version of the bible, there are three words used in the New Testament for priest:

sacerdos, [121 verses, referring to the Jewish priests of the Temple, and to Melchisedek)

pontifex [34 verses, referring to the Jewish high priest, also to Jesus];

presbyter [7 verses, a priest chosen from the followers of Christ].

In the Old Testament Septuagint Greek version, there are seven verses which show a sacred context for presbuteros translated as ‘ancients’ or ‘elders’ in the English Douay:

1. Judith 15:9 And Joachim the high priest came from Jerusalem to Bethulia with all his ancients to see Judith.

2. Judith 15:10 And when she was come out to him, they all blessed her with one voice, saying: Thou art the glory of Jerusalem, thou art the joy of Israel, thou art the honour of our people:

3. Sirach 4:7. Make thyself affable to the congregation of the poor, and humble thy soul to the ancient, and bow thy head to a great man.

4. Sirach 6:34 Stand in the multitude of ancients that are wise, and join thyself from thy heart to their wisdom, that thou mayst hear every discourse of God, and the sayings of praise may not escape thee.

5. Susanna 1:5 And there were two of the ancients of the people appointed judges that year, of whom the Lord said: Iniquity came out from Babylon from the ancient judges, that seemed to govern the people.

6. Susanna 1:34 But the two elders rising up in the midst of the people, laid their hands upon her head.

7. Susanna 1:41 The multitude believed them as being the elders and the judges of the people, and they condemned her to death.

The distinction between elder/presbyter and priest is simple enough to understand: elders and presbyters were in charge of non-liturgical functions, priests were in charge of liturgical functions of the temple. The elders or ancients (called zaqen in Hebrew) mentioned in the New Testament were ordained (as mentioned in the Jewish Encyclopedia).

Linguistically, this distinction in roles is the basis for the double naming system in the Christian Rites whose heritage is Aramaic: the Chaldean, Malabar, etc.;when the priest is carrying out the liturgical functions, he is referred to as kahna. This Aramaic word is related to the Hebrew kohen, which as we have seen, is a priest who performs sacrifices. Kohen comes from the Hebrew root ken, meaning “office”. This office was chosen among the tribe of Levi, and those priests who were in a state of purity were chosen by lot to serve in the temple (as described in the Mishnah).

When the priest is not on the altar, he is referred in his non-liturgical role as qashysha, a Persian word borrowed into Aramaic which means presbyter or elder.

In English, the word priest derives ultimately from Greek presbuteros, via Latin presbyter. In modern English, presbyter has a double meaning: in certain denominations, it means priest, with a group of priests called a presbyterate. In other denominations, a presbyter means just an ‘elder’. The New American Bible has translated all four references to the Christian priesthood by “presbyter” rather than the word ‘priest’ as used in the Douay Rheims. What is lost in the “mistranslation” is the liturgical role of the priest as the agent of the sacrifice of the Mass. An additional problem with the word ‘presbyter’ is that in the United States, it normally reminds us of the Presbyterians, the denomination that broke from the Anglican Church because they preferred elders (presbyters) rather than bishops as their central authority figures. The third problem with the word ‘presbyter’ is that it is a technical word in English, a very learned word. Can you imagine people saying, I saw a presbyter and a nun walking down the street? Or, “call a presbyter”, I think that man is dying? The Catholic bishops in America are always using the excuse that words such as ‘consubstantial’ cannot be used because the language of the Mass in English must be simple and clear or the common people will not understand it. Shouldn’t the same standard apply to their New American Bible? The word priest has been in use in English since the period of Old English (which begins in the 5th century). It is part of our culture; presbyter is not, nor will it ever be.

The same analysis of the word deacon follows that of priest and bishop above, the Greek diakonia can be used in a secular or a sacred context; the Latin diaconos is only used in a sacred Christian context as the title of the assistant to the bishop and priest. In the New American Bible, of the three verses referencing the Christian deacon, two retain the word, and one changes deacon to “minister”. While minister has an ecumenical connotation, it is not correct to say that deacon and minister are synonymous. Deacon can only be used in a religious context, it is a sacred term. Minister can be a political position. Also, an un-ordained layman can be a minister, but not a deacon.

There is one interesting aspect to the Aramaic word for deacon, shamash. In Egyptian (a Semitic language related to Aramaic and Hebrew), the word for shems means “to be an adherent, a follower,” “to follow in someone’s footsteps.” This can be seen most clearly when Josephus says that Elisha became Elijah’s disciple and servant (diakonos]; (see 1Ki 19:21). In Joesphus’ text, diakonia is also used in the context of a cup-bearer; is it a coincidence that the liturgical role of the deacon in the Roman Rite Mass is to hold the chalice of wine?

The fact is that all three ranks of Holy Orders have been to some extent obscured in the official bible of the United States bishops. Any institution which obscures its own identity does itself grave harm. At a time when vocations are being promoted more seriously, and seminaries are being asked to clean up their act, it would be helpful to return to literal, sacral translations in the bible which bolster the Church’s identity and leadership, not undermine it.

Ed Snyder