Stop saying “the meaning has changed”

Transmutation, the meaning has “changed”

An oft-repeated Bible discussion “throw-away” line is that this or that word has “changed meaning” over time. “X word” no longer means what it meant in 1611. I have found no examples of that being strictly true. We should stop stressing “the meaning has changed” and calculate how to state this reasonably, succinctly, and more precisely.

Bloggers, Facebook fiends, self-styled theologians, and ranking academics direct this diatribe against the King James translation.[i] The statement “the meaning has changed” implies or even charges that a word once meant one thing, but now means something different. That oversimplification ignores language, history, and reality. Words have what is called “semantic range” (that is, every word has a variety of senses/meanings and connotations/significations). Within that range, the context of usage determines the meaning. Few words have a sole – one literal and only – meaning. The semantic range of a word is a breadth of meaning. For example, “cleave” might mean anything from split, divide, hew, part, and penetrate, to abide, adhere, agree, stick, and remain faithful.[ii]

Yes, our language, including the definition of words, changes. We call this “semantic shift.” “Gay” is an English word used in the Bible and culture, of which many of us have lived to see an expansion of its semantic range. Its meaning includes joyous, having or showing a merry or lively mood, bright or showy (as in colors, clothes). “Gay” meaning “homosexual” was not a usage in our area when I was young – though it probably was used that way as slang at least by the early 20th century. In grade school we sang lustily (another word you may need to use carefully), “And we’ll all feel gay, When Johnny comes marching home!” Today the most common use of “gay” references male homosexuals. However, it still means “joyous, having or showing a merry or lively mood, bright or showy.”[iii]

Not so fast

Daniel B. Wallace claims “300 words found in the KJV no longer bear the same meaning.” This is something of a misnomer. Rather than the word no longer bearing the meaning used in the KJV, it is that its most common use is no longer the same as the meaning most commonly used in the KJV. Wallace gives as examples “suffer” (permit) and “study” (be diligent). The meaning in the KJV may not be the first meaning contemporary English speakers think of when they hear these words, but my Webster’s New Collegiate Dictionary supports the so-called “changed” meanings. Suffer means “to allow” (# 4) and study means “endeavor/try” (# 3) – substantially the same definitions given by Wallace that he claims have “changed.” My modern dictionary even tells me that “prevent” means to “arrive before” or “go before” (Cf. 1 Thessalonians 4:15).

A quick survey of the word “suffer” in the Bible shows it did not “change meanings.” It meant BOTH permit and endure (hurt, bad things) in 1611. For example, compare Matthew 3:15 (permit, “Suffer it to be so now”) and 1 Peter 3:14 (endure, “if ye suffer for righteousness’ sake”).

Notice “let” in the Bible. It did not transmute from having one meaning in 1611 to having another meaning in the 21st century. Compare 2 Thessalonians 2:3 and 2 Thessalonians 2:7. The “let” that means “to allow” and the “let” that means “to hinder” are homonyms – two different English words that are spelled the same but mean something different. The words each have a different origin or entrance into the English language.

Some words may have fallen completely out of use in our language. However, even such a word as that has a sense in its historical context that still means what it meant. On the other hand, the words of the King James translation have been in constant use since 1611. We (at least some of us) still use them. Yes, they may not be common in day-to-day speak, but they are still in use in English speaking churches around the world. English Bible readers still read them, have been reading them for 400 years. They still mean what they meant in 1611!

Just stop

If you do not use the King James Bible, please modify your rhetoric. Be more precise. Recognize that you often give a false impression (whether or not you intend to). If you use the King James Bible, admit that some words are obsolete “in common use.” Take up your “cross” and learn what the words mean – what they meant when they were translated, even if others use them in some other way today. Bible study includes word study. Go, and do thou likewise.

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[i] Rarely, but sometimes against any (especially) “old” translation.
[ii] Both senses are still in modern parlance, and both are used in the KJV. Compare Psalm 137:6 and Psalm 141:7, for example. Like let and let, cleave and cleave in the strict sense are homonyms – two different English words that are spelled the same but mean something different. They each have a different source of entrance into the English language.
[iii] It is nevertheless a matter of fact that because of the predominance of the use of “gay” for homosexual orientation, most people hesitate to use it in its other senses.