Carrying the TNIV
I started carrying the TNIV recently. I had been using it only in electronic form to do some studying and comparison, but I decided to see how it would work as a “carrying” Bible. That means I take it to church, Sunday School, study groups, and I keep it at hand during my study time in the morning.
Since I study primarily from the texts in their original languages, that doesn’t mean that the TNIV has become my study Bible. But it does mean that I follow scripture readings in church with it, and that I will read from it as appropriate in various groups.
Now this isn’t a review, nor is it a statistical study, nor is it a careful comparison of the TNIV to its source languages. This is just a personal “feel,” a general impression I’ve gotten over the last two weeks.
This value of this version has been completely lost in the smoke of the controversies about it. There is no reason for this to be a controversial Bible!
I can easily follow scripture readings when my pastor reads from the NIV. I find many less instances in which a single translation choice tends to obscure other possibilities. I don’t think it leans substantially more toward the dynamic equivalence end of the scale than did the NIV. I have yet to find a significant theological point put in jeopardy by differences in TNIV renderings.
The single reason this version has come under criticism is the issue of gender accuracy. None of the other issues would come to the fore if it were not for that one. And the TNIV is not all that far to the “gender neutral” end of the spectrum. The problem is simply that the NIV has been the Bible for many conservative evangelicals, and a certain percentage of them object to gender accurate renderings. Everything else follows from that position.
I’ve written elsewhere about all those issues (search Threads or this blog for TNIV to see more information). Here I just want to give my impression, which is simply that if a certain small number of theologians who have “persecuted [the TNIV] without a cause” (with apologies to Psalm 119:161), and that if they had not done so, the TNIV would have taken an honored place amongst those versions that have helped advanced scriptural knowledge.
I hope that this can happen even now.
It has been seemingly overlooked that the NRSV is also gender neutral.
I don’t know if the NRSV has so much been overlooked in the discussion, only that the TNIV is the latest release of gender accurate bibles in a time of greater sensitivity to language change and its effect on translation word choices. For better or worse, the NRSV had it’s day 17 years ago or so and for the most part, won’t likely engender much further discussion.
Oh, how I agree with you. I had never looked at a TNIV because for some reason I had listened to the critics who attacked it and made it sound like an evil, horrible translation. Most of the critics I heard were KJOs, who have nothing nice to say about God’s word outside their 400-year-old English translation, anyway. Just recently, I purchased a paperback TNIV and searched through it to find all these horribly twisted, “perverted” scripture passages. Guess what…they weren’t there. Some critics had actually misquoted the TNIV to make it sound like it was terrible but looking at the TNIV for myself, I saw that the critics had no argument so they had to lie about what was in it. I now stress that it is of utmost importance for Christians to check out everything they are told, no matter how much they might trust the person telling them. The devil is clever and the Father of Lies, who pops up in some unlikely places to get you to not trust God’s word.
GOD HAS ALREADY TRANSLATED HIS BIBLE
INTO THE KING JAMES VERSION!
AND WHEN ALL OF THESE OTHER BIBLES
START COMING ON THE SCENE, I
AM LEARY OF THEM!
AND WOULD NOT WANT TO ADD OR
TAKE AWAY FROM THE HOLY GOD’S WORD
AT ALL!!!
LETS STICK WITH KING JAMES BIBLE PRIMARILY
AND TREAT IT AS THE TRUE AND
ACCURATE WORD OF GOD AS
IF IT CAME STRAIGHT FROM THE MOUTH OF GOD!
AND NOW IF THEY ALREADY HAVE GENDER
BIBLES OUT THERE, WHO KNOWS??
NEXT THEY MIGHT START HAVING
AGE-GROUP OR AGE-BRACKET
BIBLES OUT THERE!!
AND THEN WHITE PEOPLE’S BIBLES
& BLACK PEOPLE’S BIBLES!
AND THEN COLLEGE GRADUATE- BIBLES
AND NON-COLLEGE GRADUATE -BIBLES!
AND THEN BIBLES FOR EMPLOYED
PEOPLE & ALSO FOR UN-EMPLOYED PEOPLE!!
P.S—-IF YOU CANT UNDERSTAND THE KING-
JAMES BIBLE FOR SOME REASON! THEN
GUESS WHAT PEOPLE??—– WE ARE SUPPOSED
TO PRAY SO THAT WE CAN UNDERSTAND
IT!!!!—— INSTEAD OF SWITCHING AND SWITCHING
OUR PRIMARY BIBLE OUT FOR SOME
OTHER BIBLE AND EXCHANGING OUR
PRIMARY BIBLE FOR SOME OTHER BIBLE!!
—-FROM—-BIG MOUTH!!!!!————