Paraphrasing

The New Testament writers really do handle Israel’s Scriptures with a kind of interpretive agility that focuses on meaning rather than exact replication of wording. This is easy to show with actual OT–NT comparisons, and the text itself does the heavy lifting.

Here are the clearest examples from both Testaments where you can see the Apostles and Evangelists paraphrasing, adapting, or reshaping Old Testament wording for theological purposes.

Matthew 2:15 vs. Hosea 11:1

Matthew uses Hosea in a way that is recognizably not a word-for-word citation.

Matthew 2:15 (NT)

“Out of Egypt I called my son.”

Hosea 11:1 (OT)

“When Israel was a child, then I loved him, and called my son out of Egypt.”

Matthew compresses, removes the temporal framing, and applies a historical text about Israel to Christ. He treats Hosea typologically, not as a direct predictive prophecy. The shift is obvious: Hosea speaks of Israel in the past; Matthew applies the same line to Jesus in the present. This is precisely the phenomenon Jerome noticed.

Matthew 12:17–21 vs. Isaiah 42:1–4

Matthew does not reproduce Isaiah’s Servant Song verbatim; instead he reshapes phrases and smooths them for Greek readers. Compare how different the wording is even in English translation.

Matthew 12:19–20

“He will not quarrel or cry aloud… a bruised reed he will not break…”

Isaiah 42:2–3

“He shall not cry, nor lift up, nor cause his voice to be heard… a bruised reed shall he not break…”

The broad thought is retained, but the phrasing is absolutely not identical. Matthew’s Greek is cleaner and more idiomatic, signaling paraphrase rather than quotation-by-dictation.

Mark’s retention and translation of Aramaic (Talitha koum)

Jerome’s observation about Mark is directly supported by the text.

Mark 5:41

“He took her by the hand and said to her, ‘Talitha koum,’ which means, ‘Little girl, I say to you, arise.’”

Mark preserves the Aramaic phrase but immediately adds a dynamic translation. That habit reveals the Evangelists’ willingness to adapt language for comprehension rather than strict literalism. The very phrase “which means…” shows an awareness that translation is interpretive and flexible.

Paul’s flexible citation practice

Paul is the clearest example of “meaning over words.” His letters almost never contain strict verbatim quotations of the Hebrew text. They drift between the Septuagint, paraphrase, and his own theological adaptation.

Romans 9:33 vs. Isaiah 8:14 + 28:16

Paul actually combines two different passages and modifies the language.

Romans 9:33

“Behold, I lay in Zion a stumbling stone and rock of offense, and whoever believes in him will not be put to shame.”

Isaiah 8:14 says Israel will stumble on Yahweh himself. Isaiah 28:16 says the cornerstone is laid in Zion and the believer will not be ashamed. Paul fuses the two, alters wording, removes Hebrew parallelism, and adds Christological meaning. It’s a theological remix, not a verbatim citation.

Ephesians 4:8 vs. Psalm 68:18

Here Paul alters the verb completely.

Ephesians 4:8

“When he ascended up on high, he gave gifts to men.”

Psalm 68:18

“You have ascended on high; you have received gifts for men.”

Paul reverses the verb to make a theological point about Christ giving gifts to the church. That is not a slip—it's interpretive reframing. The meaning matters more to Paul than sticking perfectly to the lexical form of Psalm 68.

The Apostles’ own statement about their method

Jerome’s summary—“They strove not for words but for the meaning”—is not theological embroidery. It’s just an honest reading of how the Apostolic writers interact with their Scriptures. Their practice is clearly meaning-driven, contextual, and often midrashic (interpretive and expansive).

What this does to strict Verbal Plenary Preservation (VPP)

If VPP requires that every biblical quotation must retain every original word in exact form to count as “preserved,” the New Testament immediately destroys that requirement.

Matthew alters wording.

Mark translates freely.

Luke smooths Greek idiom for clarity.

Paul paraphrases, fuses texts, and modifies verbs.

The very people through whom inspiration came were not bound to a “word-perfect” citation standard. They treated the sense of Scripture as the inspired unit, not the exact syllables of a previous manuscript tradition. This does not weaken inspiration; it reveals the dynamic nature of it.

If the Apostles did not consider themselves chained to exact reproductions of earlier wording, then binding the modern church to the wording decisions of a single 17th-century English committee has no biblical justification. Their method simply wasn’t built on that kind of textual rigidity.

The interesting part is that this flexibility didn’t make the text weaker. It made it powerful, communicative, alive—always aimed at meaning, not mechanical replication. That approach opens all sorts of fruitful paths for thinking about how Scripture speaks across languages and centuries.