In John 10, Christ declares that He is “the good shepherd.”
Or does He?
1 “Very truly, I tell you, anyone who does not enter the sheepfold by the gate but climbs in by another way is a thief and a bandit. 2 The one who enters by the gate is the shepherd of the sheep. 3 The gatekeeper opens the gate for him, and the sheep hear his voice. He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. 4 When he has brought out all his own, he goes ahead of them, and the sheep follow him because they know his voice. 5 They will not follow a stranger, but they will run from him because they do not know the voice of strangers.” 6 Jesus used this figure of speech with them, but they did not understand what he was saying to them.
7 So again Jesus said to them, “Very truly, I tell you, I am the gate for the sheep. 8 All who came before me are thieves and bandits; but the sheep did not listen to them. 9 I am the gate. Whoever enters by me will be saved, and will come in and go out and find pasture. 10 The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly. 11 I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. 12 The hired hand, who is not the shepherd and does not own the sheep, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and runs away—and the wolf snatches them and scatters them. 13 The hired hand runs away because a hired hand does not care for the sheep. 14 I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me, 15 just as the Father knows me and I know the Father. And I lay down my life for the sheep. 16 I have other sheep that do not belong to this fold. I must bring them also, and they will listen to my voice. So there will be one flock, one shepherd. 17 For this reason the Father loves me, because I lay down my life in order to take it up again. 18 No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it up again. I have received this command from my Father.” [John 10:1–18]
In both passages (10:11 and 10:14), the Greek is not agathos but ho kalos poimēn, which might be equally well—or better—translated “the noble shepherd.” At least, that’s what my sense of Attic Greek suggests. (Perhaps the difference between Attic and Koine extends to this as well—if you know, please enlighten me!)
KALOS, beautiful, beauteous, fair, Lat. pulcher, of outward form […] II. in reference to use, beautiful, fair, good […] 2. of sacrifices, good, auspicious […] III. in moral sense, beautiful, noble […] 2. to kalon: moral beauty, virtue
AGATHOS, good, Lat. bonus. I. of persons, 1. in early times, good, gentle, noble, in reference to birth […] 2. good, brave […] 3. good, in a moral sense […] II. of things, 1. good, serviceable
Liddell & Scott, Greek–English Lexicon
What’s at stake in how we render ho kalos poimēn?
“The good shepherd” seems good to me so long as we preserve in our minds the connection between “good” and “good at” or “excellent.” Christ is the good shepherd, the best shepherd, the exemplar shepherd, the apex shepherd, the one-who-excels-at-shepherding. He not only has the right to “enter the sheepfold” legitimately (10:2) and knows each sheep by its name (10:3); he excels at leading the sheep, for he “goes ahead of them” and they follow him willingly (10:4). No “leading from behind” here!
What else does the “good shepherd,” the one who excels at the art of shepherding, do? He “lays down his life for the sheep”; unlike the hired hand who “does not care for the sheep”—like the mercenary who does not care for king or country—the shepherd does care for the sheep, and so will confront “the wolf” as it approaches (10:11–13).
Perhaps it is a function of our democratic souls that calling something “good” too often fails to convey “excellence,” but rather, “kind” or “gentle” or “agreeable” or “not-harmful.” To be sure, Christ is gentle; but that is not what He emphasizes in John 10. Christ as Shepherd lays down His life for His flock—He performs the paradigmatically noble action of Aristotle’s courageous man, the heroic risk and ultimate sacrifice on the battle-field.
Perhaps we would be reminded of how much is being said when Christ calls Himself “the good shepherd” if we kept in mind the alternate translation.
What would it mean to be a “Noble Shepherd”? Of course we do not here mean “noble” in the sense of “distinguished by high birth and rank” (though Christ is, without parallel), much less a technical term denoting membership in British peerage. “Nobility” of action is, in Greek, the same term for “beauty” of appearance. There is a certain logic at work here, present in the range of meanings in Greek. We say, in common speech, “That was a beautiful pass!” referring to a (I can’t resist) Hail Mary on the football field, or, “That was a beautiful thing to do,” referring to an impressive moral act.
Liddell & Scott capture this well when they define to kalon as “moral beauty, virtue.” Moral deeds are called kalos because they are attractive. We want to look upon them, to admire them, precisely because we are constituted to be moral creatures, whose perception of speeches and deeds cannot be separated from our judgment of them as noble (beautiful) or ignoble (base); just as we admire or look at beautiful physical sights, which, when seen, are pleasing to us.
Hence, Plutarch in the opening to his Life of Pericles explains his project of writing “parallel lives” as an attempt to put before our eyes (and his own) a great series of “virtuous deeds,” which “implant in those that search them out a great and zealous eagerness which leads to imitation.”
Of course the Christian, by definition, must desire to conform himself to Christ, to be and become Christ-like. Understanding that Christ is the noble shepherd emphasizes both the heroic daring of the shepherd’s laying-down-of-self as well as the attractiveness of such a deed. Perhaps to call Christ the Noble Shepherd would be more akin to the Anglo-Saxon depictions of Christ in, e.g., Dream of the Rood.
Doubtful koine Greek goes in for this sort of subtlety.