NOTABLE SCRIPTURAL CORRECTIONS
HOLY BIBLE:  ANCIENT PATHS VERSION (APV)

COLOSSIANS 2:16-17
"Body is of Messiah" vs "Body of Messiah" in APV

Colossians 2:16-17 in the King James Version, reads, “Let no man therefore judge you in meat, or in drink, or in respect of an holyday, or of the new moon, or of the sabbath days: Which are a shadow of things to come; but the body is of Messiah.”

Mainstream Christianity interprets these Scriptures to mean that the Feast Days, the new moons, and the Sabbath days “are a shadow of things to come,” in the sense that they were fulfilled by Yeshua, who is their “body,” their “substance” or their “reality.” As a result of this interpretation, they conclude that Believers are no longer required to keep the Feast Days, the new moons, and the Sabbath days. 

This is not true. The key to understanding these Scriptures is to understand that they were not translated correctly!

In verse 16, the phrase, “in respect to,” is a prepositional phrase and was purposely incorrectly translated as “meros,” which is a noun that means, “a part,” “a “portion” or “an aspect” of something. If the Apostle Paul intended to convey the meaning “in respect to” or “regarding,” he would have used the preposition “peri,” which includes the meaning “concerning,” as it is rendered in 1 Corinthians 8:4.

In this case, the word meros applies to, “a part,” “a portion” or “an aspect” of the Feast Days, new moons, and Sabbath days. Thus, verse 16 is correctly translated in the Wycliffe, New Testament Translation which reads, “Therefore no man judge you in meat, or in drink, or in part of feast day, or of new moon, or of Sabbaths....”

In verse 17, the word “is” in the phrase, “the body is of Messiah,” is italicized in the King James Version. This means that it is not in the original text, but was added by the translators for clarification. While adding words to the text for the sake of clarification is common, and even helpful in most cases, in this case, it was unwarranted. The phrase should read, “…the Body of Christ, not “…the Body is of Christ.

Every time the phrase, “de soma Christos,” appears in the Greek New Testament, it is rendered as, “the Body of Christ” (Col. 1:18, 24; 2:19; 3:15), except in verse 17 where the translators purposely mistranslated a prepositional phrase as a noun to make it fit with their preconceived doctrine. Of course, the Body of Messiah is the congregation Yeshua is in the process of building (Matt. 16:18), the Israel of Elohim (Gal. 6:16).

Thus, these Scriptures are correctly translated: “Let no one therefore judge you in food or in drink or for any part of a Feast Day, new moons, or Sabbath days, which are a shadow of things to come, but the Body of Messiah.” Translated correctly, Colossians 2:16-17 confirms the truth that the followers of Yeshua are required to keep the biblical Feast Days, new moons, or Sabbath days. This is how these Scriptures are translated in this version. 

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