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Hebrews 4:8
#1
in Heb. 4:8, Lamsa has
Hebrews 4:8 - For if Joshua the son of Nun had given them rest, he would not afterward have spoken of another day.
whereas the KJV has
Hebrews 4:8 - For if Jesus had given them rest, then would he not afterward have spoken of another day.

i do not want to debate the Joshua/Jesus issue here. i am focused on the "son of Nun" part. i have checked for greek variants, but i found none. Interestingly, we have two very early Greek fragments of this passage, P13 and P46, and there are no variants here either. It seems there is no greek variant here. Can anyone with access to other manuscripts check for variants? Dropping the "son of Nun" seems quite strange to do for a translator. Yes, translation usually looses information, but not purposefully. This information would even be of special interest as it is quite helpful to have it there to distinguish between Jesus and Joshua.

Strangely, though hebrews originally was my top candidate for originally not being Greek, it gives me lots of signs it was not Syriac either (Also i more and more think Luke was in fact written in greek).
Jesus is the one true God of the Bible.
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#2
This is the first time I've looked at this verse in any detail. OK, your question is on "the son of Nun". I see your point, why would a Greek translator omit it?

But beyond that, and without the intention of drawing in the "Jesus/Joshua" debate, I could not help but notice how the Aramaic phrase "Yeshua son of Nun" also departs from the Hebrew text, which is "Yhoshua son of Nun".

So to apply that to your premise, could it be that the Aramaic writer saw the misplaced Greek word "Jesus/Yeshua"; knew it was really referring to "Joshua/Yhoshua" of the OT, but instead of correcting it to "Yhoshua", (maybe because he had limited knowledge of the Hebrew text, or didn't take the time to look carefully), added the "son of Nun" instead so as not to have it confused it with "Yeshua"; yet leaving in place the misplaced name "Yeshua" from the Greek source text?

FWIW, I am not a primacy buff one way or the other, I just try to make the best sense of things that I can.
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#3
Jerry Wrote:This is the first time I've looked at this verse in any detail. OK, your question is on "the son of Nun". I see your point, why would a Greek translator omit it?

But beyond that, and without the intention of drawing in the "Jesus/Joshua" debate, I could not help but notice how the Aramaic phrase "Yeshua son of Nun" also departs from the Hebrew text, which is "Yhoshua son of Nun".

So to apply that to your premise, could it be that the Aramaic writer saw the misplaced Greek word "Jesus/Yeshua"; knew it was really referring to "Joshua/Yhoshua" of the OT, but instead of correcting it to "Yhoshua", (maybe because he had limited knowledge of the Hebrew text, or didn't take the time to look carefully), added the "son of Nun" instead so as not to have it confused it with "Yeshua"; yet leaving in place the misplaced name "Yeshua" from the Greek source text?

FWIW, I am not a primacy buff one way or the other, I just try to make the best sense of things that I can.
i agree with your theory. It is the only logical answer i can currently see. But i don't think there was another was to spell Joshua.

It is my understanding that Jesus and Joshua are 100% the same name. It may not be in Hebrew, because it is Aramaic. Many names have a little different spelling in Aramaic as far as i can tell. Acts 7:45 uses the same spelling. i know of no other mentionings of Joshua in the NT. The LXX uses Iesus (=Jesus) for Joshua as far as i know, just like the Greek NT.
Jesus is the one true God of the Bible.
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#4
The Hebrew Masorete OT lists names in this fashion:

y:how-shu-a = Joshua (KJV)
y:how-shu-a bin nuwn = Joshua son of Nun (KJV)

yei-shuw-a = Jeshua (KJV)
yConfusedhuw-ah = salvation (KJV)

If the Peshitta lists the name of Jesus / ye-shuwa similarly to "Jeshua" and "salvation" of the OT; I guess it just seems odd that the Aramaic, a sister language to Hebrew, would not distinquish "Joshua" in a fashion similar to that of the Hebrew OT, something like y:how-shu-a. These are not just subtle vowel variations between "Joshua" and "Jesus", but consonant variations as well.

It seems odd because most other proper names in the Peshitta NT have a close similarity to that of the Hebrew Masorete. So I guess it is possible that the Greek LXX, which had apparently morphed the two names together, might have had more influence on the Peshitta NT than what I had previously thought, or at least for Hebrews 4:8.
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#5
Shlama Jerry,

How do you know those are two different names? Might they be one-and-the-same name and thus any distinction between them is artificial?

Since every instance of Joshua in the Hebrew OT is spelled Iesou in the LXX, as is my understanding, and similarly spelled `w$y (YeSHuWa`) in the Peshitta (Acts 7:45), then where is the evidence that these names are different? I don't think it's strange that a name like Joshua would change pronunciation over the years and be spelled a different way when it makes its way into a new language and alphabet.

bar Sinko
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#6
Jerry Wrote:The Hebrew Masorete OT lists names in this fashion:

y:how-shu-a = Joshua (KJV)
y:how-shu-a bin nuwn = Joshua son of Nun (KJV)

yei-shuw-a = Jeshua (KJV)
yConfusedhuw-ah = salvation (KJV)

If the Peshitta lists the name of Jesus / ye-shuwa similarly to "Jeshua" and "salvation" of the OT; I guess it just seems odd that the Aramaic, a sister language to Hebrew, would not distinquish "Joshua" in a fashion similar to that of the Hebrew OT, something like y:how-shu-a. These are not just subtle vowel variations between "Joshua" and "Jesus", but consonant variations as well.

It seems odd because most other proper names in the Peshitta NT have a close similarity to that of the Hebrew Masorete. So I guess it is possible that the Greek LXX, which had apparently morphed the two names together, might have had more influence on the Peshitta NT than what I had previously thought, or at least for Hebrews 4:8.
i apologize if i was somwhat unclear. i will try to show what i meant:

Jesus (English) comes from Iesous (Greek).
Iesous (Greek) comes from Yeshu (Aramaic).
Yeshu (Aramaic) comes from Yeshuah/Yehoshuah (Hebrew).

Joshua (English) comes from Yeshuah/Yehoshuah (Hebrew).

There is definite proof for all these. What i wrote before also supports this. Bear in mind, Jesus was a quite common name. i think there was also a "son of Jesus" in Acts 13:6. Of course, when we call upon the name of Jesus, it does not matter who else bears that name, and we are not using a "magic formula", but the knowledge of who he is, what he did and what he offers makes our prayer valid.

Thus Joshua and Jesus are the same name originally, much like e.g. James and Jacob. Though there may or may not have been a small variation in pronounciation. i cannot tell (but i don't think so), and both Greek and Aramaic did not carry any different pronounciation across.
Jesus is the one true God of the Bible.
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#7
Andrej Wrote:Yeshu (Aramaic) comes from Yeshuah/Yehoshuah (Hebrew).
Joshua (English) comes from Yeshuah/Yehoshuah (Hebrew).
Perhaps so, but not in the Hebrew that I am familiar with, which admittedly is limited to the Hebrew Masorete text. From my limited perspective:

Yeshu/Yeshua (Aramaic) is a derivative of Yeishua (Hebrew H3442) and in some part (H3444) "salvation".
Yeshu/Yeshua (Aramaic), when it applies to "Joshua", is written in Hebrew (H3091) as Y'hoshua.

So, maybe there is a Hebrew source text that lists OT "Joshua" as Yeshua, and not Y'hoshua (y'how-shu-a)? Something that the Aramaic OT and Greek LXX translations relied upon. I'm just not familiar with it. Which leaves me wondering why the Aramaic OT and Greek LXX translations, supposedly translations of the Hebrew text, did not pick up on the Hebrew distinction between "Jeshua" and "Joshua", that of Yeshua and Y'hoshua.

It would be interesting to know how the Hebrew Dead Sea Scrolls wrote the name of "Joshua". I did a brief search on the topic, but could not come up with anything.
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#8
Shlama Jerry,

It seems all references to Jeshua in the OT are in Ezra and Nehemiah. Thus, after the exile in Babylonia when the Jews would have been steeped in Aramaic. Perhaps the spelling of the name changed during the exile under the influence of the Aramaic language.

bar Sinko
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#9
Greetings bar Sinko,

I found this in Nehemiah 8:17: ... from the days of Ye'shua son of Nun ...

I haven't researched any further, but at first glance it does appear that the ... Y'hoshua son of Nun ... of Exodus and Numbers may have morphed into Ye'shua son of Nun by the time of Nehemiah. Which would give credence to the Aramaic OT and Greek LXX rendering it per Hebrew Nehemiah.

My thanks to you and Andrej for your patience with me. It is starting to make more sense now.
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