Here are the Greek terms used in this issue:

Some versions of the LXX (mostly Jewish translations of the Hebrew Bible) have kardia for heart and others have dianoia for heart…

Here are some Data points to consider:

• "[Matt ] 22:34–38. This commandment was so important to Judaism that it was regularly recited. In the Greek language, adjectives like “great” had come to be used sometimes for superlatives like “greatest.” Deuteronomy 6:5 demanded loving God with all one’s “heart, soul and might”; “might” here becomes “mind” (which was implicit in the Hebrew understanding of “heart”), but the image is still “with one’s whole person.” [Bible Background Commentary, Matthew]

• "[Matthew 22] 37–38 Jesus draws his answer from the Shema, which was recited twice daily by the Jews. After the opening words, “Hear, Israel, the Lord our God is one Lord,” which are included in Mark 12:29, comes the commandment quoted by Jesus. The wording of the citation itself agrees nearly verbatim with the LXX of Deut 6:5, except for Matthew’s use of en and the dative for ek and the genitive (no doubt reflecting the Hebrew preposition B, “with,” of the Hebrew text of Deut 6:5) and the alteration of the third noun from dunavmew, “strength,” to dianoiva, “mind” (the latter, however, occurs in a cognate passage in the LXX of Josh 22:5). Dianoia is derived from Matthew’s source, Mark 12:30 (which, however, has four modifying nouns). The first and great commandment is to love God with all one’s being: with heart, soul, mind, and whatever else one might care to add. This commandment from Deut 6:5 can easily be recognized as a kind of elaboration on the first commandment of the Decalogue: “I am the Lord your God … you shall have no other gods besides me.”[Word Bib. Comm, Matthew ]

• Joshua 22.5 has "“Only be very careful to observe the commandment and the law which Moses the servant of the Lord commanded you, to love the Lord your God and walk in all His ways and keep His commandments and hold fast to Him and serve Him with all your heart and with all your soul" (NAS, with dunamis and psuche in the LXX).

• Lane notes (NICNT, Mark): "'Soul' and 'mind' represent a double translation of the Semitic term nephesh." (in other words, it really took TWO works to translate the Hebrew).

• Notice how the scribe, in responding to Jesus, does EXACTLY that: translates the nephesh term as BOTH mind and strength.

  • In Deut, heart, soul, and mind are often connected (noted by Craigie, in NICOT):

  1. Deut 4.9 (nephesh translated as 'desire') and 'lest they slip from your mind' (the word for heart)

  2. Deut 4.29 (with all your heart (lav) and all your soul (nephesh))

  3. 4.39 (call to mind)

  
  

  • "Citations of the OT in the Gospels reflect the Hebrew (Mt 11:10, 29; Mk 10:19; 12:30; Lk 22:37), the Greek (Mt 18:16; 21:16; Mk 7:6–7; 10:8; Lk 4:18; 23:46; Jn 12:38), and the Aramaic (Mt 4:10; Mk 4:12; 9:48). Given the nature and origin of the material, the respective contexts of the Evangelists and the fact that they wrote their Gospels in Greek, such diversity is hardly surprising. But citations attributed to Jesus also reflect the same diversity. Since Jesus likely did not speak much Greek, he probably did not quote the Greek version (LXX). But the Greek citations are not necessarily inauthentic, that is, deriving from the Greek-speaking church rather than from Jesus. In many cases Jesus’ citations of Scripture have been assimilated to the wording of the Greek, especially when the point that he had made was not lost in such assimilation. [Green, Joel B., Scot McKnight, and I. Howard Marshall. Dictionary of Jesus and the Gospels. electronic ed., Page 579. Downers Grove: InterVarsity, 1997, c1992.]

  • "McBride observed: "The three parts of Deut 6:5 : lev (heart), nephesh (soul or life), and meod(muchness) rather than signifying different spheres of Biblical psychology seem to be semantically concentric. They were chosen to reinforce the absolute singularity of personal devotion to God. Thus lev denotes the intention or will of the whole man; nephesh means the whole self, a unity of flesh, will, and vitality; and meod accents the superlative degree of total commitment to Yahweh."...The NT struggles to express the depth of the word meod at this spot. In the quotation in Mk 12:30 it is rendered “mind and strength,” in Lk 10:27 it is “strength and mind,” in Mt 22:37 simply “mind.” [Harris, R. Laird, Robert Laird Harris, Gleason Leonard Archer, and Bruce K. Waltke. Theological Wordbook of the Old Testament. electronic ed., Page 487. Chicago: Moody Press, 1999, c1980.]

  • The Aramaic targums render the last phrase (strength, 'muchness') as wealth…(smile)…and Mishnah explains the Hebrew word in the same way--Wealth (b. Ber 9.5).

• So, I can see how 'power' became "understanding plus strength" or some similar groupings of words. [By the time we get to the NT, dunamis is probably NOT a good word for 'muchness' anymore, so they would need to find a substitute for common conversation anyway…(like the Aramaic used the word 'wealth' for meod…see below).]

• Any "doorpost-versions"-- by ONLY the VERY ORTHODOX in this pre-rabbinic age-- (and the daily prayers) would have been in Hebrew and thus reflect the Deut text, but the conversations recorded in the Gospels would have been in Aramaic, and the NT would have translated the Aramaic forms into the Greek ones--with perhaps a backward glance at the LXX.

• The LXX came in 'two flavors'-- one translating 'heart' as kardia and one translating it as dianoia…There was no particular need to quote it in Hebrew for those discussions, so any complex of the five-Greek words would have 'worked adequately' to make the point…it IS interesting that TWO of the sayings in the gospels are NOT by Jesus, but by those 'versed in the Law' (a lawyer and a scribe), and THEY both used the Dianoia term--indicating that perhaps that was a 'common way' to express the Shema in ordinary parlance.