The key issue in interpreting this statement revolves around the word infants
: did Paul originally write infants
(Greek νήπιοι/nēpioi), or did he write gentle
(Greek ἥπιοι/ēpioi)? Almost all the English translations, and many modern commentators, opt for gentle,
but is this correct?
To answer this question, the first thing we need to consider is the evidence of the manuscripts: are there a larger number of earlier and more reliable manuscripts and manuscript families which reflect one or the other reading? In this regard, it is generally acknowledged that the manuscript evidence is strongly in favour of the reading infants.
A larger number of earlier manuscripts, coming from diverse geographical areas, read infants
rather than gentle.
1,2
Despite the manuscript evidence pointing to infants
as the original reading, many modern commentators claim that it would be highly inappropriate for Paul to compare himself to an infant. Furthermore, the quality of gentleness seems natural in a context where Paul compares himself to a nursing mother. It is therefore argued that the word infants
does not make sense in this context, and that Paul must have written gentle.
3,4 But if that is what Paul wrote, and if that reading makes the most sense, it is almost impossible to explain why this reading is absent from the manuscripts of the first four centuries: the scribes copying the manuscripts would not easily have replaced a sensible reading with one that makes no sense.
Seeing that there is such strong manuscript evidence for the reading infants,
we should try to make sense of it before rejecting it in favour of a much weaker reading. In our analysis we indicate that the statement we were infants among you
is the positive counterpart to the denial nor were we seeking honour from people
etc. So if Paul was claiming to be like an infant,
then that idea must in some way be opposed to the idea of seeking honour and emphasizing one’s own importance.
7 But we were gentle among you, like a nursing mother taking care of her own children.