This is not a seriously doubtful textual issue, but I wanted to make a brief summary and comment on it, because it can help illustrate the interaction between internal and external evidence in a case where the two point in the same direction. For a very brief outline of textual criticism, see Textual Criticism-Briefly. In…
I’m doing some studying in 2 Corinthians right now, and I encountered the following translation while reading it through in the Holman Christian Standard Bible (HCSB): 11But now finish the task as well, that just as there was eagerness to desire it, so there may also be a completion from what you have. 12For if…
In my ratings for the Bible Version Selection Tool, one of the areas on which I compare translations is capitalization of pronouns referring to God or to Jesus. The interesting thing about this is that the Hebrew text has no analog to capitalization of any kind, while edited Greek texts and some late manuscripts can…
After my comments earlier about Piper and the ESV, I found this comment by Raymond Brown in An Introduction to the New Testament: For the purpose of careful reading or study, which concerns us here, one must recognize that sometimes the biblical authors did not write clearly, so that the original texts contain certain phrases…
A friend drew my attention to this article on the ESV today, and I’m deeply disappointed in what I found there. I’m going to comment on some key difficulties with that article. But the author also links to this article by John Piper, which doesn’t so much surprise me, as put in context some other…
Via John Simons – Theology, Technology, and Stuff, I discovered the new location for Resurgence Greek (ReGreek.com). It’s now being maintained and further developed by Mars Hill Church. Resurgence Greek is not a general Bible study tool, but rather a specific tool for folks who know some Greek and want to be able to read…
Regular readers of this blog (that imaginary group every blogger hopes he has!) will know that I am not a fan of the [tag]ESV[/tag]. More precisely, I’m not a fan of the hype that surrounds it in certain circles. It’s not a bad translation in my view–it’s just not very special. Thus I was not…
I just read two excellent articles on Bible translation, one on a blog, and the other coming to me via e-mail. It seems to be very difficult for people to get an idea of just how language works. The notion that each word has a fixed, eternal, precise meaning just seems to hang on. Learning…
I recall an argument in my freshman year in college, in which a fellow-student who was much larger than I was decided to end the debate by saying, “I think I’ll just beat you up!” He could have too. I wouldn’t have stood a chance. So obviously he was right. Well, I’ve found a second…
Or should I make that AKOH PISTEWS? Note that a similar question can be asked in Galatians 3:5, but I will assume due to theme that one will give the same answer in both places. Writing an exegetical article on this verse could be quite lengthy, but I agree with J. Louis Martyn in his…
