Dear Editor,
In his review of the Christian Standard Bible (en February), Vernon Wilkins bemoans the replacement of “propitiation” by “atonement”.
Like many, he has missed a key fact: the human authors of the New Testament knew that the Greek words traditionally rendered “propitiation” and “mercy seat” were those that the Septuagint used to translate the Hebrew words that Tyndale rendered as “atonement” and “mercy seat”. Using similar expressions in New Testament translations fulfils the intention of the original by pointing the (modern English-speaking) reader to the Old Testament scriptures which inform our understanding of the New.
