More Sensuousness -- "He stinketh"

Some of the humor in the KJV comes from what I’d call its earthiness—what Ann Wroe (see my post from two days ago) calls its sensuousness. Sometimes those divines and Puritans knew how to paint a picture just right. They sometimes told it straight and bluntly about matters that we have sanitized today.

I’m thinking of the occasion in John’s gospel when Jesus raises his friend Lazarus from the dead. Lazarus has been lying dead in the tomb—“a cave, and a stone lay upon it”—for four days by the time Jesus arrives. That’s a long time … so long that the guys on CSI would don serious masks before sneaking a peek.

But Jesus says to the people gathered nearby, “Take ye away the stone.”

Martha, the sister of Lazarus, steps forward and offers a mild protest. Imagine what she must have been thinking. Without missing a beat, Martha interjects: “Lord, by this time he stinketh” (John 11:39).

Stinketh indeed! We have no trouble imagining the truth her words represented. The only other time the word “stinketh” occurs in the KJV comes in Isaiah 50:2 and it refers to fish. Lots of today’s translations are more sanitized and, as a result, are less interesting. The NIV accounts for a “bad odor” around Lazarus’s tomb, which is pretty good, but the NRSV only has Martha offering that “there is a stench.” Much of the frankness and earthiness are missing.