There’s a moment in sermons that makes me cringe and my wife grin. She kind of enjoys seeing me squirm. What is this important moment? It’s when a pastor says, “What the Greek really says is . . .” Sometimes it’s worded a bit differently, but I believe that when you hear or read that…
Peter Kirk has writtten that he finds a complementarian bias in the TNIV. He says: A major aim of the changes made in Today’s New International Version (TNIV) was to avoid the danger of such misunderstandings. I don’t think anyone can complain about TNIV’s rendering of 2 Thessalonians 3:10: “Anyone who is unwilling to work…
A friend recently e-mailed with the following request: Tell me why you like the REB. First let me qualify what I mean by liking a translation. There are many factors that go into making a translation suitable for a particular purpose or person. Without knowing that context, it’s impossible to give a meaningful answer to…
A frequent criticism of The Message or The Living Bible is that they are not really translations, but rather paraphrases, and thus should not be regarded as Bibles. Often “translation” is contrasted to “paraphrase” almost as though the two are antonyms. Others draw the boundaries in a much narrower way, calling translations like the Good…
I am frequently asked to compare various translations. Generally my questioner wants me to declare one translation correct, and the other incorrect, or at least to state that one rendering is better than the other. Translators know that this is frequently difficult to do, because there is no one-to-one relationship between source language and target…
I’ve just located a wonderful series of blog entries on Textual Criticism of the Hebrew Bible online through my own complete laziness and the hard work of someone else! (Hat Tip: Suzanne McCarthy at Better Bibles Blog in her entry Textual Criticism of the Hebrew Bible. Suzanne’s entry is worthwhile itself for its list of…
One frequent accusation I hear because I prefer modern translations over the KJV for most purposes is that I hate the KJV. Presumably, the people who say such things think that they honor the KJV by means of their doctrine. Nothing could be further from the truth. I believe that the KJV was probably the…
Recently I’ve talked a fair amount about using numbers as a means to dress up lies and make them look more respectable. I even discussed the issue in a Sunday School class I was invited to teach last Sunday, using the various ways in which grocery (or any) prices and sales can be stated and…
Suzanne McCarthy, on the Better Bibles Blog has blogged somewhat about nostalgia for the KJV language and for the standard English Bible that was accepted by everyone in a post titled The 1611 King James Text. I like Suzanne’s work, and this is not intended as a critique of her comments, but she collects the…
I’ve pretty much quit bothering with the KJV only folks since their arguments are so repetitive. Yet occasionally I run across one that so illustrates the failings of this entire movement that I want to take the time to comment briefly. Of course, you all know already that I rarely comment briefly . . ….
