Here is how the RSV (Revised Standard Version) translates this saying of Yeshua:

The eye is the lamp of the body. So, if your eye is sound, your whole body will be full of light; but if your eye is not sound, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light in you is darkness, how great is the darkness!

For reasons I will argue below, this translation is definitely substandard.

In my opinion, the worst translation of the verse is the NET version (New English), though I do like a lot of things about the NET. But their books are all translated by different scholars with little consistency in translation philosophy. I think they did harm on this verse:

The eye is the lamp of the body. If then your eye is healthy, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eye is diseased, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light in you is darkness, how great is the darkness!

The CJB (Complete Jewish Bible and also the Jewish New Testament) does much better, but loses any illusion of close translation by paraphrasing:

‘The eye is the lamp of the body.’ So if you have a ‘good eye’ [that is, if you are generous] your whole body will be full of light; but if you have an ‘evil eye’ [if you are stingy] your whole body will be full of darkness. If, then, the light in you is darkness, how great is that darkness!

The nice thing about the CJB here is that the reader gets help understanding the idiom (the good eye = generosity) and this interpretation is, in my opinion as argued below, correct.

The strangest is the King James, but then perhaps in Elizabethan English “single” had some denotation I am not familiar with:

The light of the body is the eye: if therefore thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light. But if thine eye be evil, thy whole body shall be full of darkness. If therefore the light that is in thee be darkness, how great is that darkness!

Here are some comments I have written about Matthew 6:22-23 and then I will talk about Delitzsch’s choice of Hebrew words in his translation and how the DHE helps readers see a meaning within the orbit of Jewish discussion and terminology (as it should be):

The saying about the eye as the lamp of the body is hard for moderns to grasp. It is evident that Yeshua, and the ancients, are thinking of the eye as giving light and not just receiving it. Yeshua combines the idea of bright eyes (a sign of goodness) with the opposing idea of an evil eye, one that curses and does not bless others (the evil eye is an idiom for a curse). Yeshua teaches his disciples that their eyes should be filled with generosity and devotion to good deeds. A person with shining eyes has an interior light, their whole being is good. So with the eyes we see the needs of others and bless, but with bad eyes, darkness issues from the body and continues the world’s curse.

Now, on the Delitzsch’s translation via the English rendering in the DHE:

The lamp of the body is the eye, and if your eye is whole, your entire body will be illuminated. But if your eye is evil, your entire body will be darkened — and if the light within you is darkened, how great is the darkness!

The DHE’s whole translates תמים or “without blemish.” In the preface to the DHE, the editors thought perhaps Delitzsch should have chosen a term more familiar from rabbinic writings (“beautiful eye” instead of “whole eye”). On the other hand, Delitzsch’s choice of “whole eye” relates the saying of Yeshua to the sacrificial terminology, the offerings of animals that are “whole” or “without blemish.”

As for “evil eye,” you are probably familiar with the idea of a person with an evil eye, one who has the ability to curse and looks at people in order to curse them. It does not matter whether the curse has any valid power behind it. The motive of an evil eye is enough to suggest a great darkness within us when we choose to wish others ill.

So, following the DHE, I think we see a great contrast, a moving lesson.

The generous person is “whole,” even “without blemish” before God. The one who denounces, speaks rudely, and wishes ill of others is filled with darkness.

Generosity erases many sins. Having an evil eye toward others erases many good deeds.

And the DHE helps us, in the limited way a translation can, as opposed to a commentary. Matthew 6:22-23 is another reason I use the DHE and value it.

This has nothing to do with the scientific or pre-scientific way of looking at vision. It is the observation, which moderns also make, that a person’s eyes show their inner character. So what does Yeshua’s saying mean and what does it have to do with the evil eye?

Yeshua contrasts two kinds of eyes. The problem is knowing how to translate best the first word. It can mean single, healthy, or possibly generous. It is contrasted with the evil eye. The concept of the evil eye is well known in rabbinic and pagan texts as an idiom for one giving a curse. So, Yeshua’s meaning is to contrast the eye that curses others with the eye that blesses or desires good for others. Generous is a good translation (possibly healthy could work as well, though the understanding is that the healthy eye sees people as needing blessing).

So, Yeshua’s saying now makes sense. If the eye is generous, it is bright and the body is filled with interior light or goodness. But if the eye is set on cursing others, the body is full of darkness. In simplest terms, Yeshua is saying that generosity is the ultimate sign of a righteous disciple.