Sense: to disbelieve (trust)
v. — to not trust in or rely on someone or something; especially used of not trusting in or relying on the God of Israel and Jesus as His Messiah.
If we are faithless [ἀπιστέω], He remains faithful, for He cannot deny Himself.
2 Timothy 2:13 (NASB)
2 Timothy 2:13 presents us with an interesting translation issue. In every other circumstance, the NASB translates ἀπιστέω as “not believe,” “disbelieve,” or “refuse to believe.” These translation values sound more active than “are faithless.” The translators possibly wanted to capture the sound correspondence between ἀπιστέω and πιστός in 2 Timothy 2:13 by using the sound correspondence between “faithless” and “faithful.” But the BSL tagging of “to disbelieve (trust)” indicates that we ought to give this rendering a closer look. Is the disbelief in this verse more active, as it is in places with similar morphology, like 1 Peter 3:7: “but for those who disbelieve”? The translation of choice for the NASB seems to be give and take. The translators gain sound correspondence, but they do so at the potential cost of turning an active verb into a verbal adjective.
What is the Bible Sense Lexicon?
Sense of the Day is based on content from Logos’ Bible Sense Lexicon, which organizes biblical Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek words by meaning based on a variety of semantic relationships. Sense of the Day provides examples of senses in context, along with insight into their application for theology and interpretation.
The Bible Sense Lexicon is a Logos dataset available in Logos 5 Gold and higher base packages. If you’re enrolled in the Logos Academic Discount Program, you can also find the Bible Sense Lexicon in the Biblical Languages base package. Take your studies even further by exploring semantic domains, engaging the biblical text like never before.
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