As many of know, I have been working on a Master degree in Biblical Studies with Languages, and this year I am taking Greek. I have seen that an understanding of the Greek is very beneficial in understanding some of the nuances that we don't get in the English translations. It has been very exciting.
Any way, I was looking at 1 Cor. 13, trying to understand it in the Greek. I came to verse 7, "πάντα στέγει, πάντα πιστεύει, πάντα ,ἐλπίζει, πάντα ὑπομένει." All but the first phrase were fairly easy to translate. Referring to love, "in allthings trusts, al things hopes, all things endures." The first verb, στέγει, I was not familiar with. I knew that the NIV 2011 translated it as "protects."
I looked at the note in the Greek New Testament I was using. It said that the word was the
3rd person singular present active indicative of στέγω, which means, "to put up with,"
so πάντα στέγει, would mean, "loves puts up with all things." Ok, “protect” and “put up with” do not mean the same thing. So which one is it? I pulled out my Greek lexicon (aka BDAG) and looked it up. The lexicon's first definition, is: To keep confidential, cover, pass over in silence. then it makes specific reference to 1 Cor. 13:7 by saying, “of love that throws a cloak of silence over what is displeasing in another person.” (BDAG, p. 942) Apparently, “puts up with” is the better translation. So all these years that I thought I was really loving my family by protecting them, (and I was!) the greater love may have been the times when I merely put up with them. To be honest, the BDAG definition of throwing a cloak of silence over the things that are displeasing in other people is a high calling indeed. And I hope that my family can πάντα στέγει (always put up with) me.
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