As I urged you will be expressed in some languages “As I asked you very strongly,” or even idiomatically in others; for example, “As I pressed your heart to.”

When I was going (Good News Translation “when I was on my way to”) may also be rendered as “while I was traveling to.”

Ephesus was a port city in Asia Minor. It was the site of the temple of Artemis (Diana), considered one of the seven wonders of the world in New Testament times. There is a reference to this temple in Acts 19.23-41. The book of Acts also contains information on Paul’s first visit to Ephesus (18.19-21) and also records a meeting of Paul with the Ephesian elders at Miletus, during which Paul gave his farewell speech (Acts 20.16-38).

Macedonia on the other hand, was a mountainous Roman province in the northeastern part of the Greek peninsula. In a modern map it would cover parts of North Greece, South Yugoslavia, and Southwest Bulgaria. Included in this province or region are cities that Paul visited in his missionary journeys, among which are Beroea, Thessalonica, and Philippi. (See Acts 16.9–17.14; 20.1-6; and others.) A Roman “province” was a large region or area that included many cities and even states, and it was organized in this way for effective government control by the Romans. In many languages it will not be possible to find a term that is like the English word “province.” In such cases one must use a general term referring to a large area of land; for example, “region,” or even “big (or, wide) land named Macedonia.”

Since the false teachers seemed to have Ephesus as their headquarters, Paul urged Timothy to stay on in Ephesus, an instruction that Paul had already given his young co-worker while Paul was on his way to Macedonia. In some languages it will be helpful to identify Ephesus as a “city.” In cultures where cities are unknown, one may speak about “a very large village with big walls around it” or “a place with many houses.”

A comparison between Revised Standard Version and Good News Translation shows various changes and adjustments that have been made during the translation process. For example, As I urged you when I was going to Macedonia is in the initial position in RSV, following the order of the Greek text, while in Good News Bible it is transferred into the second part of the verse. Furthermore, remain at Ephesus is in second position in both Revised Standard Version and the Greek text, but in initial position in TEV. One other thing to notice is that the imperative in this kind of a construction would not be natural in English; TEV’s restructuring of the imperative into an indicative, “I want you to stay in Ephesus,” is much more natural. The important thing to note here is that translators should use grammatical constructions that are most natural and appropriate in the receptor language. For example, in some languages it will be helpful to divide the first part of the verse into two sentences and say “I want you to remain in the city of Ephesus. This is what I urged you to do when I was traveling to the province of Macedonia.”

Charge (Good News Translation “must order”) is the same word used in verse 1. Another way to express this clause is “you must demand that they stop….” The false teachers are simply referred to as certain persons (Good News Translation “Some people”) but are not otherwise identified; it is therefore difficult to determine whether they were members of the Christian community or were outsiders. Timothy is exhorted to order these people not to teach any different doctrine. There are two pieces of information here: (1) certain persons are teaching different doctrines; and (2) Timothy should order them not to do so. In terms of time sequence, (1) of course occurs earlier than (2), and Good News Bible restructures the text according to this order of events. A literal translation is ambiguous since it allows the understanding that certain people are about to teach some unacceptable doctrines. Translators in many languages will wish to follow TEV’s ordering of the clauses. Different doctrine translates a rare Greek expression that can be translated literally as “other things.” The focus, however, is on the nature of these teachings as immoral, resulting in changes being made in the accepted teachings within the Christian community; these teachings were therefore heretical or “false” (Good News Translation). The term doctrine refers to an organized body of teaching that the believing community accepts as the basis and expression of its faith.

One other thing that needs to be noted is that the Greek text does not seem to be a complete sentence and can be translated “As I urged you … to remain at Ephesus” without any main verb. Nevertheless most translations have translated this as a complete sentence. What is important, though, is that an incomplete sentence in the Greek has some rhetorical functions, since it doesn’t occur very often, and when it does, it is in a context where the writer is deeply concerned with a problem and is writing about it in an extremely emotional state. Thus in the present passage one can imagine the concern of Paul with regard to what was happening in the Christian community to which Timothy belonged. Translators will do well to try to recapture the emotional impact represented by this seemingly ungrammatical construction.

Alternative translation models for this verse are:
• As I urged you when I was traveling to the province of Macedonia, you must remain in the city of Ephesus. I want you to do this so that you can command certain people there to stop teaching false doctrines.

Or:
• I want you to stay in the city of Ephesus. This is what I urged you to do when I was traveling to the province of Macedonia. Some people there in Ephesus are teaching false doctrines, and I want you to command them to stop doing this.

Quoted with permission from Arichea, Daniel C. and Hatton, Howard A. A Handbook on Paul’s First Letter to Timothy. (UBS Handbook Series). New York: UBS, 1995. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .