Translation

Translation - (Webster's 1828 Dictionary)

TRANSLA'TION, n. [L. translatio.]

1. The act of removing or conveying from one place to another; removal; as the translation of a disease from the foot to the breast.

2. The removal of a bishop from one see to another.

3. The removal of a person to heaven without subjecting him to death.

4. The act of turning into another language; interpretation; as the translation of Virgil or Homer.

5. That which is produced by turning into another language; a version. We have a good translation of the Scriptures.

trans-la'-shun: The verb "translate" is found once in the Old Testament (2Sa 3:10 the King James Version, in the sense of "to transfer") and 3 times in the New Testament (Col 1:13, methistemi, where it means "to transfer"; twice in Heb 11:5, where it has the quasi-technical sense of removing one from the earthly to the heavenly state without the intervening experience of death).

The noun "translation" occurs only in Heb 11:5, metathesis, where it refers to the transition, the general nature of which has just been described in connection with the verb. With their customary reserve in regard to such matters, the Scriptures simply record the fact of Enoch's translation without commenting either upon the attendant circumstances, or upon the nature of the change involved in his experience. Doubtless what Paul says in 1Co 15:51,52 applied in the case of Enoch and also in that of Elijah (2Ki 2:11).

W. M. McPheeters