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Old 12-05-2008, 08:48 AM
Steven Avery Steven Avery is offline
 
Join Date: Apr 2008
Posts: 462
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Hi Folks,

Overall I am more warm to such a web-site, preferring in a case like this to emphasize agreements more than differences. Or at least to point out that they can still be largely allies, even while their presentation has flaws.

There is an irony in placing the Scrivener back-translation, derivative from the King James Bible, over the King James Bible itself. This is only a result of paradigmic muddle, the refusal to simply see and declare our Bible as the pure and perfect word of God.

Stephen, they are referring to the Greek Scrivener back-translation, not the deficient Cambridge Paragraph Bible done by Scrivener. The back-translation to Greek (ie. picking and choosing sources from Beza, Stephanus and other) is a decent scholarly work, the Greek text today closest to the King James Bible.

The list of Bibles in other languages is fairly good, and at least can be a help. I have seen one other web-article with similar information.

Among those who believe that Bible translations into other languages can be a positive effort, the issue of the source text (when skills in Greek or Hebrew as well as English are available) is a fascinating question. As of today I would not belittle the arguments on either side.

Although the "men" argument for Greek translation given in their article is flawed since someone translating from the King James Bible is likely to know full well when "men" is inclusive of men and women, simply by English knowledge and context. They also would likely know full well that "God forbid" is idiomatic, or dynamic equivalence. And the web site articles clearly do not see God's hand in the English Bible as we do. And by their theories could easily end up translating incorrectly from "the Greek" (e.g. they could crash-up some 'faith of Christ' into 'faith in Christ'). Thus the Greek-Hebrew-Aramaic TR alone would be a very dubious source option today, if the KJB was not included.

Another strange aspect that pops up continually is how there could be over 50 pages (in two articles) on the "LXX" with no mention of the Psalm 14 gross tampering. This always amazes me.

Beyond that, I hope to look at those articles a little closer. Oh, I note that they mention Josephus but miss the fact that the Antiquities Preface indicates the lack of an available Greek translation of the Old Testament histories in the late first century. This is a bit more nuanced than the Psalm 14 issue but should be in every substantive "LXX" article.

Shalom,
Steven Avery