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*ravenous
It's ravenous wolves, not ravening. WTH does that even mean?
Okay but it still says 'ravenous' in the original.
ravenous is adjectival
ravenning is the participal or gerund
There are multiple translations of the bible. Anything but the original Hebrew is a translation after all.
TL;DR: Ravening seems common in the King James Version and some of it's derivatives, while Ravenous is common in more modern translations, even the strictly literal ones.
From Bible Gateway:
- KJ21, ASV, BRG, DARBY, DRA, GNV, JUB, KJV, AKJV, NMB, RGT, WEB, YLT say ravening (13)
- AMP, DLNT, EHV, ESV, ESVUK, EXB*, LSB, LEB, MEV, MOUNCE, NABRE, NASB, NASB1995, NCB, NKJV, NRSVA, NRSVACE, NRSVCE, NRSVUE, OJB, RSV, RSVCE, & TLV say ravenous (22)
- AMPC says devouring (1)
- CSB & HCSB say ravaging (2)
- CEB, EXB*, GW, NOG, & NLT say vicious (4)
- CJB, NIRV, NLV, NTFE, & VOICE say hungry (5)
- CEV says "wolves who have come to attack you" (1)
- ERV & ICB say "really dangerous like wolves" (2)
- EASY says "like hungry wild dogs" (1)
- EXB says "dangerous like wolves [underneath/inwardly they are ravenous/vicious/ferocious wolves]" (1, only one to say vicious)
- GNT says wild (1)
- ISV says savage (1)
- PHILLIPS says greedy (1)
- TLB says "wolves and will tear you apart" (1)
- MSG gets rid of the metaphor entirely (1?)
- NCV, EXB* say dangerous (1)
- NET says voracious (1)
- NIV, NIVUK, EXB* say ferocious (1)
- WE says "wolves, bad animals that kill sheep" (1)
- WYC says "wolves of raven" (1)
That's 13 which say ravening, 22 that say ravenous, and 27 that say something else.
Lets ignore the frivolous rewritings and retranslations and go with popular books. This list is biased toward new versions because it's partly based on bestselling versions, but if you have readership data, I'd love to see it! In no particular order: The New International Version (NIV), the King James Version (KJV), the New Living Translation (NLT), the Common English Bible (CEB), the New American Standard Bible (NASB), the New English Translation (NET), the New Revized Standard Version (NRSV), and the English Standard Version (ESV).
- NIV: Ferocious
- KJV: Ravening
- NLT & CEB: Vicious
- NASB & NRSV & ESV: Ravenous
- NET: Voracious
King James seems alone with Ravening, but I know many people are King James only, so that's pretty common. New International Version not being either Ravening or Ravenous surprised me, but there you go. Ravenous is definitely common in modern versions, including the NASB which seems to be very literal.
/c/theydidthemath
Thanks for your thorough investigation into this.
smh no translations as "om nom" or "yummy yummy yummy"? 😡
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