¶ … Dinner The Parable as Guide to Life and History

The Bible is filled with parables, short tales that attempt to communicate profound truths. A parable is in some ways like a satirical comic strip -- it uses ordinary persons and events to discuss that which might otherwise be considered beyond the pale; to daring or outrageous to speak of in more direct terms. The parable of "The Great Dinner" that is found in Chapter 14 of the Book of Luke is an excellent example of this technique. A relatively simple, and very short, story, it nevertheless illustrates a point. Of course, what that precise point is depends upon the reader -- it also depends upon the exact wording of the story. For as the Bible was originally written in a tongue that is entirely foreign to most modern-day Americans, it is only in the form of various translation that this, and other Biblical passages are available. The New Revised Standard Version of the Bible (NRSV), the New English Version (NEV), and the King James Authorized Version (KJV), each renders this parable in slightly different form. More than simply being different translations of what presumably was once a single text they are also -- in some sense -- different stories. Much as several individuals can write several different descriptions of the same event, so too do these varying translation offer variant pictures of the same story. How an event is presented: what words are used, which details are emphasized, and so forth, can alter our impressions of that event. Additionally, we frequently choose our words to suit our audience. We would not use the same kind of language, or even the same kinds of examples, were we speaking to a group of young children instead of a gathering of adults. By the same token, the same episode might be described differently if re-told at different historical periods. What might have been easily understood in one age might seem mysterious or arcane to those of another. All...

In KJV, the meal is a "supper," in NRSV it is a "dinner," and in NEV, it is a "banquet." While today, the words "dinner" and "supper" are usually virtually synonymous, they did at one time refer to two different kinds of meals. Dinner was the main meal of the time, and could be eaten at different hours. At the time the KJV was written, in the early Seventeenth Century, dinner was usually taken some time during the afternoon. Today, the main meal is usually eaten in the evening. Historically, at least to people in, say, the Nineteenth Century for example, supper was a light meal; a snack that was consumed not long before going to bed. But a banquet, well even to the modern reader a banquet is different from a dinner or a supper. Presumably the NEV uses the term "banquet" to go with the theme of a rich man being the meal's host. Banquet is suitably grand. It doesn't sound ordinary like supper or dinner. The same discrepancy can be found with KJV's use of the word "lord" to describe the gathering's host. That sounds very, very grand to people today, but would have largely had the connotation of a master or "boss" to people in the 1600's. Also notable is NRSV and NEV's use of the word "slave" where KJV has "servant ... which brings us to the next point.
Each of these different versions attempts to reach a particular audience, and also to provide what it believes is the most accurate rendering of the story i.e. The translation that is closest to the words of the very first, and original, version of the story. Slaves weren't very common in the England of James I. They aren't very common today either, but we have a better understanding of what they are than did the Englishmen of that…