Posted on 04/02/2003 11:56:15 AM PST by fortheDeclaration
The problem is incrementalism. The current versions will soon be further diluted in a continuing process that started with the RSV.
No, the problem is that you can't accept modern scholarship but instead cling to a 17th century translation.
Please remove me from your ping list.
I am no KJV nor NIV advocate, but I do know this much -
No matter how "accurate" or "inspired" the translation of the KJV is, it (the KJV) is still written in a language that's four centuries old, replete with ancient grammar and syntax. If you want to see an idea of how much the "english" language has changed over time, take a look at side-by-side comparison of the prologue from the Canterbury Tales, in 1400AD english and 1996AD english. 1611AD is a lot closer to 1400AD than it is to 2003AD.
At some point (and I think we've reached it already), the language preserved in the KJV will become like Latin, i.e. a dead language requiring specialized skills to read it. Why not just cut out the middleman? If we have to be trained to read our Bibles, why not learn to read the Greek or Hebrew texts? And if you can read it, what's wrong with making a fresh, accurate, and literal translation of the original texts?
The NIV deletes the word inspiration from the text altogether and substitutes "God breathed".
That's what "inspiration" means. Don't believe me, check the dictionary. It's from the Latin inspirare, which means "to breathe." Thus, "God-breathed" is a legitimate, literal translation.
Those who use the Authorized Version are looked down upon by the apologists for the NIV as ignoramuses... Those who use the Authorized Version are looked down upon by the apologists for the NIV as ignoramuses, who do not understand the Hebrew and the Greek and therefore are in no position to judge. Unable to answer the arguments of the defenders of the Authorized Version, they turn to pouring scorn on their scholarship or lack of scholarship. In reality their argument is blatantly false for they are really affirming that all who use the NIV have the scholarship to make the right judgment.
Absolutely not true. I claim that the NIV is a serviceable translation, not the evil counterfeit y'all claim it is. And I argue that the NASB is more precise than the KJV, though some of the textual notes are screwy. I have no problem with people using the KJV -- it's a good translation, and the better for being 400 years old and with fewer manuscripts than the newer ones. What I take objection to is the arrogance of forcing everyone to use the KJV. The NIV/NASB are better suited for today's audience -- the diction choice is far more comprehensible to the modern mind. The English language has changed quite a bit in the past 400 years: imagine if I go up to my college buddies and say, "Wot thee what thou doest this eve?" How many of them are going to know what I just said?
God has delivered His Book to the custody, not of the scholars, the universities, colleges or seats of learning, but only to His saints.
As opposed to the state? Let's not forget who financed the KJV.
Can any ordinary saint know what is a proper version of God's Word? Can any ordinary saint who has no knowledge whatever of the original languages know what is a proper version of God's Word or which is absolutely reliable? The answer is "yes" or else Jude verse 3 is error. Jude verse 3 is not error but divinely revealed truth. The attempt to bamboozle the ordinary saints of God with irrelevant controversy must be demonstrated. The ploy to take from the saints their divinely appointed role of custody of the Book and place it in the hands of scholars must be exposed for what it is, a device of the devil himself.
I have access to everything I need. I have self-taught myself enough Greek to work my way through the definitive works like Kittel. I know enough about textual criticism to hold my own against liberal professors at a secular university. I posssess no formal theological training, yet I have all the resources I need to check the rendering of any translation -- and they cost me at most $200.
"But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned" (I Corinthians 2:14).
Is the article arguing that a Christian who cannot understand KJV diction is somehow deficient spiritually? That's not what 1Cor 2 is talking about -- that's explaining the paradigm difference between the Christian and the unbeliever. That assertion is not spiritual discernment, its hubris.
Moreover, the NIV perpetuates the big lie that the quotations are from Isaiah the prophet even although in its additional notes it makes clear that one of them is from Malachi
That's because the NIV is correct in its translation of Mk 1:2. Yes, the majority reads "in the prophets." But siginificant earlier texts and extrabiblical sources have "in Isaiah the prophet." The sources backing up this are early and geographically widespread, covering the most important Alexandrian, Western, and Casarean witnesses: aleph, B, L, delta, theta, f, 33, 205, 565, 700, 892, 1071, 1241, 1243, 2427, it (such as a, aur, b, c, d, f, ff2, l, q), g sy(rp),pal, cop, geo, arm, Irenaeus (Greek), Origen Serapion, Epiphanius, Severian, Cyril-Jerusalem, Hesychius, Victorinus-Pettau, Chromatius, Ambrosiaster, Jerome (who has a variant of this reading), and Augustine. Given such an early and geographically diverse support, it is more plausible to attribute the variant to the "helpful scribe" correcting a perceived inaccuracy, rather than an introduced error -- especially when one considers that in that era, attributing it to "Isaiah the prophet" meant little more than that was what scroll it would be found in. The minor prophets were not always cited, but often referred to by the major prophet their book was placed with. Another example of this was in Matthew 27:9, which attributes a quote from Zecariah (Zec. 11:11-12) to Jeremiah. (It's that way in the KJV too.)
The thing is, it takes work to check this stuff out. The Isaiah thing sent me all over the web, spending about 20 minutes on it (and I knew where to look.) It's easier to just reject the translation out of hand and revert to KJV-onlyism. But that's just intellectual laziness.
They explain their translation choices pretty in-depth.
STATEMENT OF FAITH DOCTRINE: We accept the scriptures as authoritative and adopt the following Confession of Faith as our interpretation of Bible doctrine.
We believe the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments are verbally inspired of God and inerrant; that this divine inspiration and inerrance extends equally and fully to all parts of the Scripture, and whatever scripture teaches is to be trusted and relied upon as being true and of supreme and final authority.
We believe in one God, eternally existing in three persons: Father, Son and Holy Spirit, three in one, co-equal, which is the Trinity.
We believe that Jesus Christ was begotten of God, conceived of the Holy Spirit, and born of the Virgin Mary.
We believe in the Holy Spirit, one of the three persons of the Trinity, who convicts the world of sin, of righteousness, and of judgment. He is the life of every believer, and He empowers the preaching and teaching of the Gospel.
We believe that man was created in the image of God, that he sinned, and thereby incurred not only physical death, but spiritual death, which is separation from God, and that all human beings are born with a sinful nature and those who reach moral responsibility become sinners in thought, word, and deed.
We believe that the Lord Jesus Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures and as a representative and substitutionary sacrifice, and that all who believe in Him are justified on the ground of His shed blood.
We believe in the resurrection of the crucified body of our Lord, His ascension into heaven and His present life there as High Priest and Advocate for all believers.
We believe in the "blessed hope," the personal, premillennial, and imminent return of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
We believe that all who receive by faith the Lord Jesus Christ are born again of the Holy Spirit, and thereby, they become children of God, and heirs of eternal life. This is a relationship in which they are eternally secure.
We believe in the bodily resurrection of the just and the unjust, the everlasting conscious punishment of the lost in hell, and the everlasting blessedness of the saved in heaven.
We believe in the existence of a personal devil, who is still working in the world to destroy the souls of men and that he and all his angels and all who receive not Christ as their Savior will eternally perish in the lake of fire. We believe in the Church, the Body of Christ, whose mission it is to preach the Gospel to all the world, all of its endeavors being supported by the free will offering of God's People.
We believe that the ordinances of the Church, given by our Lord, are Baptism and the Lord's Table.
We believe that all the foregoing are Bible doctrines; therefore, we stand firm upon this Declaration of Our Faith.
If you accept the above statement, then It looks like we agree on far more then on what we disagree over!
You are welcome.
The NIV deletes the word inspiration from the text altogether and substitutes "God breathed". That's what "inspiration" means. Don't believe me, check the dictionary. It's from the Latin inspirare, which means "to breathe." Thus, "God-breathed" is a legitimate, literal translation.
Thats funny, my American Dictionary of the English Language has to breathe into .
Where the notion of 'God breathed' came from was the Greek, which B.B. Warfield used (theopneustos)to get away from the idea of Biblical Preservation.
Every English Reformation translation had inspired not 'God breathed'
Yet, even Warfield could not get away from the idea of inspiration totally, since he states,
In the beginning of Genesis to the Amen of the Apocalypse, breathed into by God and breathing out God to every devout reader (emphasis added) ( The Inspiration and Authority of the Bible, Benjamin B. Warfield, p.125)
When God breathes into something, He gives it life as He did with Adam (Gen.2:7) as He does with His Holy words (Heb.4:12).
Those who use the Authorized Version are looked down upon by the apologists for the NIV as ignoramuses... Those who use the Authorized Version are looked down upon by the apologists for the NIV as ignoramuses, who do not understand the Hebrew and the Greek and therefore are in no position to judge. Unable to answer the arguments of the defenders of the Authorized Version, they turn to pouring scorn on their scholarship or lack of scholarship. In reality their argument is blatantly false for they are really affirming that all who use the NIV have the scholarship to make the right judgment. Absolutely not true. I claim that the NIV is a serviceable translation, not the evil counterfeit y'all claim it is.
It makes Christ a sinner in Matthew 5:22 cf Mk.3:5 does it not?
And I argue that the NASB is more precise than the KJV, though some of the textual notes are screwy.
The NASB is so 'precise' that even the NIV did not follow their making Christ a liar in Jn.7:8, by leaving out 'yet', despite the fact that they both use the same Greek text!
I have no problem with people using the KJV -- it's a good translation, and the better for being 400 years old and with fewer manuscripts than the newer ones.
Amen!
What I take objection to is the arrogance of forcing everyone to use the KJV.
It is not we who are forcing anyone to 'use' anything!
What we are saying is that God has one Bible in the English language and that is the KJV!
It is the only one that is from the correct texts both Old and New Testament.
The NIV/NASB are better suited for today's audience -- the diction choice is far more comprehensible to the modern mind.
The English language has changed quite a bit in the past 400 years: imagine if I go up to my college buddies and say, "Wot thee what thou doest this eve?" How many of them are going to know what I just said?
Aw come on now!
You said that your friends were reading much harder things then the King James!
Did you think I would forget that statement!
I twot not!
The question is, when the two versions disagree, which one is the final authority, in other words, which is the Bible?
God has delivered His Book to the custody, not of the scholars, the universities, colleges or seats of learning, but only to His saints. As opposed to the state? Let's not forget who financed the KJV.
The King James was fiancied by the State because the Church of England was a state church.
The question is, who is making money off the King James and who is making money off of the endless series of 'new' translatons, all of which are copyrighted.
Can any ordinary saint know what is a proper version of God's Word? Can any ordinary saint who has no knowledge whatever of the original languages know what is a proper version of God's Word or which is absolutely reliable? The answer is "yes" or else Jude verse 3 is error. Jude verse 3 is not error but divinely revealed truth. The attempt to bamboozle the ordinary saints of God with irrelevant controversy must be demonstrated. The ploy to take from the saints their divinely appointed role of custody of the Book and place it in the hands of scholars must be exposed for what it is, a device of the devil himself. I have access to everything I need. I have self-taught myself enough Greek to work my way through the definitive works like Kittel.
Did you know that Kittel was convicted of warcrimes against the Jews?
That he denies the effacy of the blood atonement, making it 'symbolic' of Christs death?
I know enough about textual criticism to hold my own against liberal professors at a secular university.
Well, why should you hold your own with textual criticism against liberal professors when they believe the same thing that you do, that no perfect Bible exists!
I posssess no formal theological training, yet I have all the resources I need to check the rendering of any translation -- and they cost me at most $200.
In the end, how do you know except you have to use your own opinion.
Even the scholars cannot agree on readings, giving them 'grades' on wheather they should be in or out (see Metzger's textual commentary of the Greek New Testament)
"But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned" (I Corinthians 2:14). Is the article arguing that a Christian who cannot understand KJV diction is somehow deficient spiritually?
What 'diction' cannot be understood?
Any archaic words can be looked up!
That's not what 1Cor 2 is talking about -- that's explaining the paradigm difference between the Christian and the unbeliever. That assertion is not spiritual discernment, its hubris.
And many men who are behind the lexicons are either unsaved or apostate men
Thayer was a Uniterian, Briggs was defrocked for heresy, Kittle was a antisemite etc
Moreover, the NIV perpetuates the big lie that the quotations are from Isaiah the prophet even although in its additional notes it makes clear that one of them is from Malachi That's because the NIV is correct in its translation of Mk 1:2. Yes, the majority reads "in the prophets." But siginificant earlier texts and extrabiblical sources have "in Isaiah the prophet." The sources backing up this are early and geographically widespread, covering the most important Alexandrian, Western, and Casarean witnesses: aleph, B, L, delta, theta, f, 33, 205, 565, 700, 892, 1071, 1241, 1243, 2427, it (such as a, aur, b, c, d, f, ff2, l, q), g sy(rp),pal, cop, geo, arm, Irenaeus (Greek), Origen Serapion, Epiphanius, Severian, Cyril-Jerusalem, Hesychius, Victorinus-Pettau, Chromatius, Ambrosiaster, Jerome (who has a variant of this reading), and Augustine. Given such an early and geographically diverse support, it is more plausible to attribute the variant to the "helpful scribe" correcting a perceived inaccuracy, rather than an introduced error -- especially when one considers that in that era, attributing it to "Isaiah the prophet" meant little more than that was what scroll it would be found in. The minor prophets were not always cited, but often referred to by the major prophet their book was placed with. Another example of this was in Matthew 27:9, which attributes a quote from Zecariah (Zec. 11:11-12) to Jeremiah. (It's that way in the KJV too.)
Oh, my friend so many errors!
Starting with the last first, the King James in Matthew 27:9 is stating something that Jermmiah said and which Zecariah wrote down later.
It states Then was fulfilled that which was spoken by Jeremy .
Jermiah never wrote that down, but did speak it, as it was revealed to Matthew.
As for the first issue, clearly, the witnesses given (Alexandrian) indicate that it was a mistake (for evidence of this, see the comments on the mess the scribes made of Aleph by Burgon)
What was said in Mal.3:1 was not said in Isa.40:3, the correct way of stating it is prophets.
The thing is, it takes work to check this stuff out. The Isaiah thing sent me all over the web, spending about 20 minutes on it (and I knew where to look.) It's easier to just reject the translation out of hand and revert to KJV-onlyism. But that's just intellectual laziness.
No, that is good sense, since you are wasting a lot of time reading the wrong readings when you could be reading the Bible instead!
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