Threads from Henry's Web

Author: henry

  • Audiences and the KJV

    . . . or any Bible translation, for that matter.

    My post on reading from the KJV elicited a response from Iyov, who doesn’t agree with a number of things, some of which I haven’t said. But some of them I have said, so I want to clarify just a bit.

    Note that I will make a couple of comments that are direct responses, which will be headed by quotes from his post as linked above. Where I am not directly responding to one of these quotes, I am making general comments, and these comments should not be read as directed at Iyov. I agree with a number of things he says, and would prefer that readers not assume disagreement where it doesn’t exist.

    I related my experience with young readers who did not comprehend passages from the KJV, and Iyov responds thus:

    Neufeld’s argument is odd. Certainly we expect young people to learn material substantially more difficult than the KJV. I do understand that Shakespeare and Milton remain in the high school curriculum, and those works use language far more complex than the KJV.

    I’m afraid I find his counterargument odd. I cannot comment on his hypothetical young people who have supposedly studied more complex English literature in High School, but the actual young people in front of me were not comprehending the KJV. Further, when I asked them to read from the not-so-good NASB they were quickly able to comprehend things that they did not from the KJV. The NIV was even better.

    Now I don’t want to make assumptions as to Iyov’s position, but I have had many people argue that I should teach the young people to read and understand the KJV. So in response to those who have made such an argument to me, I must say that I find it ridiculous. I also like the French Louis Segond version. Should I perhaps teach them French before I teach them a Bible class? Whether the educational system should prepare them to read Jacobean English or not (and I would say NOT as a general rule), when I teach Bible class I need to start from a text they can read. If I’m going to teach them anything about a language that is foreign to them, it will be about Greek, Hebrew, or Aramaic, as appropriate.

    Of course there are varying levels of difficulty in the Bible, but that is hardly the point. In general use, a translation should not make the text more obscure than is necessary in order to convey the intent of the writer.

    Iyov states further:

    The Bible, even to those who have access to Biblical languages, is difficult. The Hebrew of the Bible is often obscure and difficult. Translations that hide this fact from readers (and this category includes the vast majority of all translations) are not accurately reflecting the text.

    Again, I find this argument odd. One of the difficulties with the Hebrew text is that we lack cultural context and knowledge of the usage of certain words and constructions. In order to translate at all, one must make decisions on these matters and convey the result. There is no particular value to maintaining obscurity, except by indicating in a footnote that there are alternatives.

    I’m not sure what Iyov expects translators to do with these obscure texts. Perhaps they should translate obscure Hebrew words with nonsense syllables in English so that the English reader can experience the frustration of trying to work through a difficult passage. No, that would be a bad idea. On of the tasks of a translator is to work through that sort of difficulty. He is a specialist, presenting a text to non-specialists.

    Quoting Iyov again:

    Even stranger is the claim the implication that the KJV allows religious leaders to “infuse meaning” through interpretively biased readings in a way that more modern translations do not.

    It may be strange, though I think it is actually quite plain, and I have observed it many times. This is not, as Iyov seems to have understood me to say, the fault of translators. In fact, I regard the KJV as the greatest single achievement in English Bible translation. I fault the translators for practically nothing. Most criticisms are based, in my view, on applying a later standard to their pioneering work.

    But in many modern congregations, some very near to where I live, the majority of the people do not understand the KJV, and the KJV-Only preachers tell them that the KJV is the sole word of God, superior even to the source texts in Hebrew and Greek. They then use the fact that the congregation is ill-equipped to question them as part of the process of manipulation.

    The KJV was once a great translation for use in church. It is not so in present day America. In fact, I have not seen it used in any church where I would say the choice of the KJV was appropriate to the congregation in question. Hypothetically, I believe there could be such congregations. I have simply never encountered them.

    One of the things I found after I left seminary, went to work in the secular market for some years (also dealing with language), and then returning to the church was that I am simply not the best judge of what a text means. I started learning Biblical languages in my teen years. I have been fascinated by history, geography, and sociology since I could read. What I read in scripture is heavily influenced by this broad exposure to the backgrounds.

    When I first started teaching after returning to the church scene, I tried to teach based on what I assumed people were understanding. I found out very quickly that my assumptions were wrong. So I did something that seems to escape many people, especially scholars–I started asking my audiences what they were hearing or understanding from the scripture texts I used.

    What I found was that they were very often not hearing the same thing, especially from formal equivalence versions such as the NASB (which was once a favorite of mine) or even my much favored NRSV. The situation became much worse when they used the KJV.

    Many languages scholars assume that ambiguity from the source text that is translated by ambiguous English text is more faithful, giving the audience the option of choosing for themselves. (My uncle, Don F. Neufeld, who started me on both Hebrew and Greek, made this argument to me, and it took me some time to realize it was not so.) But the audience doesn’t hear the same set of options that the scholar does.

    A much better approach is for the expert to make a choice, and indicate alternatives in footnotes. Now the audience can comprehend the text with a probable reading, and those who are willing to put in a very small amount of work, much smaller than would be required to learn the source languages or Jacobean English, can get good alternatives.

    I recommend to my students now that they use a variety of translations, and read those footnotes. If they want to get closer to the source languages, a standard battle cry of the formal equivalence advocates, they need to learn the source languages. Formal equivalence has its place, in my view, but it does not better reflect the meaning of the text.

    The meaning of a text is only properly reflected in translation if that translation is understood by the target audience. There is no such thing as accuracy without understanding. If the target audience for a translation is scholars who have some knowledge of the source language, then perhaps formal equivalence will work as it is claimed. For the vast majority of the people I teach on a regular basis, formal equivalence fails to meet that promise.

  • -MORE- Tags: To Use or Not

    The -MORE- tag in this blog software breaks out a portion of the post to show on the main page, while requiring you to click on a link if you wish to continue reading. I keep trying to remember to use them, but I generally forget.

    What do you readers think? Do you like to see just a sample on the main page, and only see the full post if it interests you, or is it easier just to scroll through even the longer posts? I’d be interested in any comments.

  • Political Purity and Small Political Parties

    With Ralph Nader on the left and Allan Keyes on the right, and the Libertarian Party wherever they may be found, we certainly have options for voting third party this year.

    I have voted for third parties in the past, specifically for the Libertarian Party, though I once offended a roomful of Libertarians who were trying to persuade me to join the party by telling them that the best characteristic of the Libertarian candidate in my view was that he had no chance of winning. For me, voting for a third party is a protest vote, designed to point in the direction in which we need to move, and not to indicate full support for the person I vote for.

    There is a critical difference between all of our current minor party movements and the major parties. The major parties seek some kind of compromise and consensus. As an independent, I often think they do a very poor job of this, but at least coalition building is a goal. The minor parties tend to seek political purity, and to provide a “correct” option for which their supporters can vote.

    A party that remains in that minor party mode will never become a major party. They will remain minor. Political purity is not going to win elections. Compromise is a requirement of political life, and a requirement of governing. Compromise laws and policies will always find plenty of critics. It’s easy to criticize when you don’t have to provide a positive alternative that not only would work, but that could be passed.

    (more…)

  • Replacing Reading Scripture with Presentation

    Lingamish made an excellent comment on my previous post, which I want to promote into a post of its own along with a few comments of my own.

    There are a lot of variables to fiddle with on this subject. We tend to assume that reading out loud while a room full of people listen is a valid activity for 21st century believers. But most of these people are used to sitting and watching a screen whether TV or computer and they process information much differently than people did even fifty years ago. So as much as I am an advocate of public reading I can see the strength of an approach that is more multimedia and interactive.

    Another variable is of course the lack of recognized authority. If the pastor told you something in the good ol’ days he had a lot of authority behind him. These days he is just one voice of millions and post-modernists are going to be using the pastor’s message as one element of their own solipsistic truth construct.

    Finally, there’s quite a retro impulse in a lot of modern spirituality so I can imagine that KJV/ESV can exert a strong attraction because of their foreignness. The human heart hungers for holiness and KJV oozes it.

    Now I would plead innocent to the tendency to assume that public reading is the way to present scripture, though most of us will find ourselves reading at least a few lines publicly at one time or another. Personally I have tried combining this with PowerPoint and also using some of the multimedia scriptures prepared by the American Bible Society. But I’m not really that good at creative presentation.

    I like to hear the Bible read aloud, and I like to read it aloud. I frequently read it aloud during my own devotional time. Sometimes my wife and I will read passages to one another. It helps me in study.

    Now notice the use of I and me in that previous paragraph. My wife, while she indulges my desire to hear scripture read, is less enthusiastic about it than I am. She is much more visual. She is much more likely to be impressed by a multimedia presentation or a drama that presents the scripture. That doesn’t mean she never wants to hear it read; it just means that there are other means that work for her.

    I have tried asking these questions in classes on Bible translations or Bible study, and it’s interesting to watch the responses. In one class I had perhaps thirty people divided pretty evenly along generational lines. The older group wanted to hear more scripture read, and they wanted to hear it from the KJV. The younger group was OK with hearing it read, but after hearing me read from several versions during the class, they preferred something like the CEV.

    But there was a minority in both groups that heard a different question, one I was ready to present explicitly, but which I hoped somebody would notice. And in that class, somebody did. What about seekers who come in off the street? What is going to reach them? And that is another matter.

    This is where Philippians 2:4 comes in. We each need to think about what other people need. How does someone like me, who is not oriented toward video and multimedia, and who is just a bit old fashioned, learn to reach other people? Well, I can think of a few ways. Drama, multimedia, more interactive presentations, and so forth. But the real way to work is to ask the folks you’re going to work with just what it is that they want to hear.

    What is a good time for the service? Ask the people you hope will attend.

    How should the scriptures be presented? Ask the people you hope will attend.

    What type of music should be played? Ask the people you hope will attend.

    How much preaching should there be? Ask the people you hope will attend.

    Now there is a place for education, for expanding people’s horizons. But very often if you listen to the answers to these questions you can create a worship service, a class, or an event that will both attract people, and also present the content you believe needs to be heard and understood.

    It does no good to present good material to an empty room, or to a room filled with people who are not the ones who need it. Just as I argue that inspiration must include a consideration of both the human and the divine side, good teaching has to consider both the teacher and those taught, and may often confuse or even practically erase the categories.

  • Reading from the KJV

    I chose to do my lectionary reading today from the KJV, and specifically from an edition of the C. I. Scofield study Bible. This is an interesting exercise for me, since I grew up on the KJV. In fact, it’s no harder for me to do my reading from the KJV than from a very modern version.

    There’s a great scene in The Fountainhead, in which Howard Roark is criticizing the architecture of the Parthenon in the presence of the dean of the school of architecture. The dean’s response? “But it’s the Parthenon!” That seems to be the most common response I get to comments on the KJV. People love the quality of literature it represents, and so they want to stick with it. How can I criticize it? It’s the KJV! And to be honest, a literary appreciation is a good reason to hold onto your KJV.

    But very often when we appreciate something, we try to force it on others on whom it may not have the same effect. Consider the Revised English Bible. There is no modern version I would prefer to hear read aloud. Yet when I read it aloud to most American audiences, the response is disappointing to say the least. The particular vocabulary and cadences of the REB just doesn’t strike them in the same way. Thus in recommending Bible versions I have to remember that what strikes me as high literary quality doesn’t necessarily strike someone else in the same way. (The New Jerusalem Bible is another version that I love to hear read aloud, but which often doesn’t elicit the same response from others. I’m not sure why.)

    Nonetheless, within proper boundaries, the literary beauty argument is a good argument for the KJV. Those constraints must include considerations of audience. A key factor in making me change from the KJV in public reading and teaching was that I noticed that young people very simply didn’t understand it. They could make out the words, but they couldn’t express the content in their own words. That is, of course, an important limitation.

    I do believe that many KJV-Only teachers and preachers actually prefer this state. If their audience doesn’t comprehend the words of scripture, the teacher can infuse into them just about any meaning he prefers. Some of the things I have heard recently suggest that this is not something I imagined. Having scriptures in language the people do not understand is a great boon to those who would like to maintain power over them. It seems like we’ve tried this sort of thing before, only then it was the Latin Vulgate that was God’s gift to the church, and the sole translation of the word of God worth reading.

    For enjoyment and literary appreciation–if you do, in fact, understand it–the KJV is good. For understanding by most modern church members and seekers, not so much.

  • Acts 2:45 – A Short and Simple Lesson in Gender Accuracy

    This passage in the KJV reads:

    And sold their possessions and goods, and parted them to all men, as every man had need. [italics in original]

    Note that the italicized “men” is an indication from the KJV translators that this was an addition of a word not reflected in the Greek. But the adjective here, “all (pasin)” is masculine in form (it could be neuter, but in context doubtless is not), and thus is translated “men” by the KJV.

    As a side note, the use of italics to indicate added words is questionable, because since there are no words in the English text that are also in the Greek text, it is difficult to draw the line. What exactly is reflected in the Greek text, and what is added by the translators? Note the second word “man,” which is not italicized in my edition of the KJV. (Not all KJV editions are identical.) It is reflected in the Greek text just as little, or just as much, as is the first “men,” but it is not italicized. It is probably impossible for someone to be perfectly consistent on this point.

    Now note a couple of modern versions that normally try to reflect the masculine in their translations, at least where those represent words like “adelfoi (brothers)” or “anthropos (human being).”

    And they were selling their possessions and belongings and distributing the proceeds to all, as any had need. (ESV)

    and sold their possessions and goods, and divided them among all, as anyone had need. (NKJV)

    I haven’t searched exhaustively, but I haven’t found any of the translations that avoid gender neutral language that reflect the masculine form here. And of course they should not. They should refer to its referent by the appropriate English form for referring to a referent that doubtlessly included both men and women. One is conveniently available in this case, “all” which is not specified as to gender in English. So we don’t hear about “male representation” in this case.

    But I believe a similar argument could be made for dozens of cases at least of occurrences of “anthropos” or “adelfoi” in the Greek text where those terms refer to groups of mixed gender.

    In general, this whole debate is more about modern culture and language usage, I suspect, than it is about reflecting the actual meaning of the Biblical writers.

  • Judas Richardson?

    James Carville thinks Bill Richardson is like Judas.

    He could be right, provided that you accept the notion that Hillary Clinton is entitled to the presidency, and that anyone who served with her or her husband has a duty to support her. I suspect instead that Carville isn’t too well acquainted with the story of Judas and just wants a word that is maximally pejorative.

    Oh, and the Obama aid who compared Bill Clinton to Joe McCarthy was over the top as well, but he didn’t use a Biblical name, so I’m less interested. My hopes were and are (though diminishing) that the Obama camp will try a different brand of politics. Problem is, the old version still works.

    We voters need to get that through our heads. Negative campaigns work because voters respond to the negative ads, even when they don’t remember the exact accusations. As long as voters respond, politicians will act!

  • Is Anything Biblical?

    Over on Complegalitarian Wayne Leman asks whether either side of the complementarian/egalitarian debate should claim to be Biblical. Since I am openly egalitarian, perhaps I should try to answer the question “is egalitarianism Biblical?” instead.

    But the fact is that I’d rather question the term “Biblical,” as indeed some of the commenters to Wayne’s post have done. The fact is that most people in the Christian community claim to believe things that are Biblical in one way or another. And depending on one’s approach, almost anything can be called Biblical.

    I’m sure I’ve told the story before of the young man from an Independent Baptist church who came to my door wanting to share the gospel with me. It didn’t matter to him that I was already a Christian, or that I pulled out my Greek testament to follow along with his texts. He was arguing in favor of “once saved, always saved” but more particularly that the “once saved” had to be a complete and total dependence on grace without any inkling of any form of works. He had a quite legalistic definition of grace, in fact! We both presented texts, and as those of you acquainted with the topic may guess, books like Matthew, Hebrews, Acts, 1 John, and James featured in my part of the discussion. When it was over and he was about to leave he said, “I’m worried about your salvation. I’ve presented you with nothing but scripture, but you haven’t responded with any scripture.” Then he paused. “Well, except for Matthew, Acts, Hebrews, and James, and they don’t count!”

    His reason they didn’t count was that according to him those books were written either for the Jews or for a “transition period” between the Jewish dispensation and the dispensation of the church. Those with theological training will recognize a fairly detailed and intense form of dispensationalism.

    Now my point isn’t whether his form of dispensationalism is right or wrong–I happen to think it’s silly, but that is unimportant here. Rather, I’d like you to notice that both of us though we were being Biblical, but neither of us would be likely to recognize what the other one was doing as Biblical. I wouldn’t be surprised if he has a sermon illustration about visiting this guy who read Greek and who kept using texts that just didn’t apply in that particular context.

    Depending on how you approach interpretation, a great variety of things can be made Biblical or not Biblical. That’s because the Bible is a collection of different books from different times, places, and written for different purposes. They are brought together as a “Bible” by the recognition of the Christian community. I happen to think that collection is Holy Spirit driven, but that’s not the key issue here.

    There is enough diversity in all those books that depending on how I tie them together, I can come up with very different results. Yet over and over I encounter people who won’t even discuss their approach to interpretation or their understanding of the Bible as a “canon.” What many want to say is that they are just teaching what the Bible says, and then they quote a line, a verse, or a passage and apply it to their particular time and circumstances. But that line, verse, or passage wasn’t written at that moment, and its author didn’t point it at that particular time, place, and circumstance. The interpreter is taking something that was written at one time and place and applying it to another.

    And we have to do that. But we should acknowledge that our understanding is involved in our interpretation and application of the passage. We each interpret, we each have to take responsibility. Some think it appears selfless and humble to take ourselves out of the equations. “I’m just proclaiming the word of God.” But it isn’t humble to do the work and then claim that it was really God all along instead of you.

    Let me just list some key approaches to understanding the Bible as a complete canon.

    1. Community – the community receives, collects, and interprets, then in various ways mediates the application. The Catholic church’s “magisterium” is one aspect of this type of approach though there are many others. In some charismatic churches the pastor has become a local “magisterium” and nobody can question the pastor’s understanding of scripture. It may get labeled in different ways, but few of us are immune to the attempt to create some kind of authority.
    2. Dispensationalism – since the Bible appears to say very different things in different places, one way to make it work is to divide it up. Then if you have one text that says “faith without works is dead” and another that “you are saved by faith apart from works” (pardon my loose paraphrasing here), you just assign them to different dispensations.
    3. Proof texting – rarely claimed as a method, but very commonly used, this involves taking your favorite key texts and applying them while ignoring everything else. The more accomplished proof-texters have ways of explaining away all other texts, and seem oblivious to how ridiculous such explanations may seem to others.
    4. Historical-critical – I enjoy the tools of this method, but it too has its weaknesses, usually in that it takes texts apart without ever putting them back together. One can come up at the end knowing about everything there is to know about a text, but still having no idea what it actually means.
    5. Covenant theology – fit the texts within the various covenants God made. I like large portions of this idea, though a bit of overdoing it can result in something that looks remarkably like dispensationalism, though the two are not really that closely related.

    Of course there are more, and I’m not here trying to advocate one or the other. I’m just trying to point out that we all have some approach or combination of them, and often when we think someone else is hopeless non-Biblical, it is more the result of a difference in approach than to any ignorance on their part.

    In the end, however, I think the term “Biblical” is not a very meaningful one. I’d prefer “true” and “false.” Once we’ve made our claims we can then discuss the issues based on whatever evidence and process of logic we used to arrive at them. At a minimum, however, we have to look at the approach, otherwise the debate will be intractable.

  • Believing in Words and Symbols

    In a previous post I discussed “true belief” and some of the comments have gotten quite interesting. I’ve considered promoting part of the exchange with commenter Lifewish to a post of its own.

    One commenter mentioned the issue of essentially believing the Nicene Creed as opposed to a more simple statement of belief in God, the divine, the supernatural, or another similar concept. I want to make even clearer that my own leap of faith was not to the Nicene Creed, but rather to a simple belief in a “ground of all being” underlying and beyond existence. Now the same theologian who coined the phrase “ground of all being”, Paul Tillich, also noted that all language referring to God was by nature symbolic, which is one of a number of substantial contributions he has made to theological discourse. I could wish that I had been less concentrated on pure Biblical studies, and a little more open to theological reflection, as a seminary student. Had I read Tillich in seminary I might have saved myself much needless confusion.

    I believe that our theological language tends to begin in spiritual experience. That is not to say that all theologians are somehow mystics and relate their own experiences, but rather that theology starts with people who hear voices, see visions, or dream dreams that they regard as meaningful. I have a certain amount of the mystic in me, as I have related recently, and thus I can state the first of two points from personal experience: When you put a spiritual experience into words it immediately loses something. When I feel the presence of God I cannot completely relate that story in words. Words are limited. Words are, by nature, intended to describe things. We even find them a bit inadequate dealing with emotions.

    Thus the validity of what I say about spiritual experience is automatically subject to question. When I take a step further, and start generalizing doctrines, such as the doctrine of the trinity, I have taken several steps beyond that, as I use symbolic language to describe generalized, common spiritual experience. There is a big difference in my mind between saying, “I believe in God,” and saying “I believe in the trinity.” If nothing else, the first is part of the “leap of faith” I described previously, while the second is something derived from that, and form the experience and teaching of others.

    Some of my orthodox brethren may get pretty uncomfortable with this, but while I regard myself as a trinitarian Christian, because I find the language of the trinity most useful in talking about God, I have serious doubts about how accurately that doctrine, or any other doctrine of God, actually describes God. I find that the language of trinitarian theology combines quite well the mystery and the experience of God as I encounter it. The language of the trinity works perfectly well for me. But I have no basis for jumping on people who cannot accept it. While I have said that I no longer can imagine not believing in God–I’ve tried to disbelieve and failed–I could easily imagine a set of circumstances that might cause me to quit believing in the trinity. Just provide me with a better set of symbols to use in talking about the divine, tie them into the tradition (long-term experience) of my community, and I’ll take a look.

    One argument that will not convince me that the trinity is false (or not useful), however, is the argument that it doesn’t make sense. It does, and it doesn’t. In my view it describes our experience of God quite well, and it points me toward God effectively. At the same time it has the truly endearing quality of refusing to let me feel that I have fully grasped it. In a similar way, I think that if I think I have grasped God fully, that is the best indication that I’m off the track. I think it’s going to be hard to invent a doctrine that works better (for me) as a symbol for God than the trinity, but I leave open the door to such trials.

    In conclusion I just want to say that I find tinkering with theological concepts great fun. It is unfortunate that there has been so much judgment applied to the process, and that people have been put to death over mysterious doctrines such as the trinity. Considering our infinite ignorance of God (at least I regard myself as infinitely ignorant of an infinite being), it seems awesomely arrogant to burn other people at the stake over disagreements between our various forms of ignorance–or to condemn or ostracize them.

  • Happy Easter!

    I’m waiting till it’s time to head off for our Easter service with my wife, so I thought I’d wish everyone a happy Easter. I don’t expect to post more today, though I’m going to follow an older church practice by talking about Easter through the Easter season. I’m going to call your attention to my short story from last years, Easter Morning Resurrection.