McWhorter on "cast the mote"

[Joel S. Berson]

At 1/13/2010 02:11 PM, Arnold Zwicky wrote:

>>2)  Is there really "the Biblical passage about trying to take a
>>speck out of someone's eye when you've got a log in your own"?  I'm a
>>non-believer, so I really don't know.  Please cite chapter and verse.
>
>Matthew 7:5 in the KJV:
>
>Thou hypocrite, first cast out the beam out of thine own eye, and then
>shalt thou see more  clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brother's.
>
>[the very next verse has not casting pearls before swine in it]
>
>other translations of Matthew 7:5 have somewhat different wording --
>"plank" and "speck" rather than "beam" and "mote", for instance.

"Mote" and "beam" I knew; I was looking for the
log.  (BibleGateway.com did not help with "log".)  I now see
"parallel translations" with plank, log, beam (a considerable
majority), and bit of wood.

So should I understand "beam" not as a ray of unenlightenment but
more like "plank" and therefore wooden?  What is the sense of the
"original" word here (Aramaic, Greek, or whatever)?

Joel

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