January 12th, 2007
Congradulations to Hank and Brad for getting picked up this week by the ESV Bible Blog.
Brad was picked up for his post, “a question of accessibility,” where Brad argues for more depth in songs as a way to facilitate deeper worship.
Hank was picked up for his post, Translation Issues, where he suggests that we should utilize Sunday school to ground Christians in Greek and Hebrew in order to by-pass some of the translation shortcomings in every translation.
Categories: Blog Issues |
2 Comments
January 8th, 2007
Since the topic of the week seems to be translation issues, let me add to the debate Henry Thomas and I are having. As I have made muddled earlier, I am very concerned with word-for-word translations misleading non-students of the 1st Century in serious errors in doctrine. The Better Bibles blog points out a case where the ESV does this. They point to 2 Timothy 2:2 (1-5 quoted, emphasis added)):
1You then, my child, be strengthened by the grace that is in Christ Jesus, 2and what you have heard from me in the presence of many witnesses entrust to faithful men who will be able to teach others also. 3Share in suffering as a good soldier of Christ Jesus. 4No soldier gets entangled in civilian pursuits, since his aim is to please the one who enlisted him. 5An athlete is not crowned unless he competes according to the rules.
To whom is the teaching entrusted, so that those entrusted with it might spread the teaching? If one is going solely off of the ESV, they see that Paul makes it a point to say that it is only men that are entrusted with the teachings and therefore it is only the men that are able to teach it. I checked with my ESV, the one I use for personal study and there is no footnote for this verse as there is elsewhere.
Is this a case of pre-fabricated theology getting in the way of accurate Bible translation? The people at the Better Bibles blog think so, and they make a good case. They note that Paul uses anthropoi instead of pistois andrasi, which would have been used it Paul was indeed limiting it to only the faithful men.
To further their point, they point to several other translations that render the word as people, such as the NET Bible and the ISV. The translators of these translations are complementarians, just like the translators of the ESV. I like the way the NET Bible does it. They translate it as people and include the following footnote:
Grk “faithful men”; but here ἀνθρώποις (anqrwpoi”) is generic, referring to both men and women.
The Better Bibles Blog concludes, saying:
The HCSB, ESV, NET, and ISV are all recent translations. I assume that each was translated by men who are complementarians, believing that women should not be pastors. Yet the NET and ISV put Greek scholarship above their own ideology and translate anthropois correctly as ‘people’ in 2 Tim. 2:2.
The big issue here is that if one only uses the ESV, one is mislead to Paul’s message here. It might even lead one to use the verse as a proof-text to demonstrate that women are not to be entrusted with the Gospel. On the contrary, an accurate translation of the texts shows that Paul says that faithful people are to be entrusted with the teachings and they are to teach.
Does this make the ESV a bad translation? No, I am going to keep using it as my primary text. But it does underscore the need to consult different translations in personal study and teaching.
Categories: The Bible, Women in Christianity |
8 Comments
January 7th, 2007
This is a reply to Henry Thomas’ post on Justice and equality.
A major component of justice is that it is applied equally. HT is correct to assume that everyone would be justly damned in Hell is God did not act. However, since God has let us know that He is not a respecter of persons, the ESV rightly translates this as showing no partiality (Acts 10:34) and that Jesus died for the sins of the world (John 1:29, 1 John 2:2 John 4:42 ) and he is a perfectly just being we can assume that He gives everyone the same shot.
He has made His mercy available to those that would choose Him. He demands for Himself in His justness to open the offer to all, not just a preselect few. Otherwise, the human in Heaven was treated differently than the human in Hell. Real and true justice means giving everyone the same chance.
One last thing. If God is omnipotent and wishes (i.e. it is His will) than none perish - why do some perish? Does that not defeat His will?
In the Free-Will position, God is all powerful, but that does not necessarily mean that He chooses to use His power at all times. We are told that He is delaying the Judgment - He is holding back His power - for our benefit. Similarly, while God can make us do anything He wants, such as choose Him, that does not mean that He necessarily forces us to do so.
To say that God doesn”t treat all men equally and thus he is a respecter of persons is to misunderstand the Calvinist position and to not truly understand the Arminian position. For God to treat all men equally as Arminians purposes God does, he would be the respecter of persons that the Bible claims he is not. In Calvinism, this whole mess is avoided because the idea of equality is not imported into justice and it does not force God to be a respecter of persons.
When it is said that God is not a respecter of persons, it refers to Him not showing partiality (Deut 10:17; 2 Chr 19:7; Rom 2:11; Gal 2:6; Eph 6:9; Col 3:25; 1 Pet 1:17), not disrespecting a person”s choices. When the full nature of Justice is realized, it incorporates notions of due rewards and punishments along with a consistent application of the notions.
Categories: Calvinism vs Arminianism |
3 Comments
January 7th, 2007
Travis Gilmore has introduced and lent me a book by J. Budziszewski entitled The Revenge of Conscience, Politics and the Fall of Man. I am only into the first chapter, but it has been engaging and challenging. It hits on several things that I often find myself drifting towards in thought.
I believe the book serves as a introduction to genuine Christian Political Philosophy. Budziszewski suggests that in all the politics we see around us, Liberal, Conservative, Progressive, Libertarian and others, there is a lack original sin. Correcting this fundamental flaw will guide us to developing a proper, more helpful political philosophy. He defines original sin as humans that are created good, but broken. Thereby bypassing the either-or of humans being basically good or bad.
So far, he has discussed his foray into and retreat from nihilism. He has argued against Pluralism and for a return to Classicism. Pluralism, for Budziszewski, is the maintaining of all worldviews as fundamentally compatible. Classicism, on the other hand, allows for one worldview being correct, and has the participants of Babel struggle to convince others of the truth that they have.
“Each makes some one voice in the Babel his own and then takes on his competitors by arguing the issues on their merits. The Epicurean tells you why he thinks pleasure is the sovereign good; the Christian tells you why he thinks Jesus the risen son of God; the Gnostic tells you why he thinks evil coeval with good.” (p. 7)
Pluralism’s acceptance of each particular truth leads to a denial of all truth.
This and the continuing discussion in the book is of particular importance to me. This is the POV that I am required to assume in my writing, the assumption of Atheism. I cannot, in academic writing, betray to the reader my faith, nor let it influence my work. There are areas where this can be a good thing. In the area of textual scholarship, I should not let my theological views influence a study of the 1st Century worldview and culture, nor allow Church Traditions or theological implications have the final say in a study of the authorship of the Pauline letters.
However, after a while all of this is just speech on the first things, or the foundations of theological study, or any kind of ultimate evaluative determinations. Ultimately, we need to, in addition to merely discussing how things are, discuss how things should be. A return to Classicism does that. In my personal reflections durring this past semester, I had come to similar conclusions, albeit poorly worded conclusions.
But all of this is a side-track to what the book is really about. I am looking forward to finishing the book. From the little that Travis has told me about his criticisms of Progressivism, Libertarianism, and Conservatism, they seem to be spot on with my personal reservations.
Categories: Culture |
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January 4th, 2007
I thought a post would be a better way to answer the second question to Henry’s post Bible Versions.
For me personally in response to the first question on Henry’s post, I prefer the ESV for my preaching and personal study. But I also use the NASB for cross checking translation issues. I find that the ESV does a better job of translating the Greek into a more readable format than the NASB does.
My preference for translation philosophy is formal equivalent or word-for-word translations. These do the best job of what putting into the hand of the reader the words that God inspired the biblical writers to write. This does create some PC issues for our 21st century culture, I understand that.
There is an amount of interpretation that goes on when translating the original languages into English. An example is the English word “love” has three equivalents in Greek. There are two words for “heart” in Hebrew, one that includes the mind and one that is the deep guttural emotions that refers tot he kidneys. An example of grammatical ambiguities is in John 1:1, “and the Word was God.” Literally the Greek reads kai theon en ho logos or “and God was the Word.” The subject is “the Word” and the direct object is “God.” But in Greek the subject and direct object and indirect object can be moved around. So one must do some interpretation to fit the original language into English.
However, dynamic goes beyond this and begins to interpret that actual verse for the person. There is fitting the original grammar into English and deciding what is the best English rendering of a term in the original language in a given context, then there is what the dynamic equivalence does. They remove the ambiguity that the reader should remove by his or her personal study. An example from the NIV is Romans 1:5, “the obedience that comes from faith.” The Greek reads hupakoen pisteos. Pisteos is a genitive and literally reads “of faith.” The ESV and the NASB reads it “the obedience of faith.” Let the reader figure that out. Give the reader a translation that will encourage study, not one that does all of the work for them and they no longer need to ponder over texts to understand them. Don’t circumvent serious Bible study for ease. A second example is Hebrews 6:1 where the NIV reads “acts that lead to death.” The Greek here reads nekron ergon. A literal English rendering of this would be “dead works” as the ESV and NASB do. What are dead works, what does that mean? Let the reader study this and find out.
The issue brought up in why to use the NRSV is the gender issue. I believe Galatians 3:28 whole heartedly when it says that in Christ gender is no longer a distinction. But the ambiguity of adelphoi should remain and let the one who is studying the text find that out.
I believe this is why we have such a high biblical illiteracy rate in the church. The popular translations don’t encourage study of the Scripture. Really the popular translations are paraphrases (e.g. NLT, TNIV, Message, Phillips, Amplified). I even consider the NIV in the paraphrase group because of all of the lose interpretation in translation going on–I know that might cause a lot of flack from anyone reading this post.
Bad theology has developed because of paraphrases being used instead of good, word-for-word, translations. Here is an example of this. The NIV reads Romans 8:36 as “we face death all day long.” The Greek says thanatoumetha holen ten hemeran or “we are being put to death all the day.” From the NIV one can read it to be a health wealth gospel because the NIV says we face death but don’t die for they have enough faith to survive the persecution in v.35. But literally Paul says the church is being killed, murdered, put to death. It didn’t matter if that Christian had enough faith, they were still dying. Bad theology can come about when the translation doesn’t stay as close to the original as possible.
Dynamic equivalence aren’t evil translations, they are just not very good for personal study and use as a primary text. They can be used to compare different translations to see the full range if translation. But they should not be used as the primary memorizing and study Bible.
Here is a site that compare several translations of some verses.
Here is a site that shows a list of evangelical scholars and leaders who have rejected the TNIV because of its extremely lose handling of Gender issues as well as other translation errors. I only singled out in this link section the TNIV because it is the main source of translation controversy in the church today.
I used to read NRSV my senior year of high school and my freshman year of college before I switched to NASB. Here is an article that examines the NRSV and other paraphrases/dynamic equivalents and the problems that come from gender inclusive language that is fair to the NRSV when the changes made are acceptable.
Categories: The Bible, Unity |
3 Comments
January 3rd, 2007
I have been a big supporter of hymns if not for the sole reason of their depth. Brad, of relevintage, looks at the issues of accessibility and depth in contemporary worship.
relevintage :: a question of accessibility
Here is the irony to me. For example, it is known that hymns, or theology set to music, have long been a vehicle for learning the deeper things of God. Isn”t that what worship is about? Jumping headfirst into the mystery and beauty of God? Yet, we have waffled on the issue of lyrical accessibility for almost two decades. And honestly, the depth of our worship is malnourished.
“Isn”t that what worship is about? Jumping headfirst into the mystery and beauty of God?” is quite possibly one of the most beautiful statements about worship that I have heard in a while.
It is a good read - all of it.
Categories: Culture |
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January 2nd, 2007
Why The Nativity Story flopped, from the creator of Veggie Tales.
Phil Vischer :: What”s up with The Nativity?
I would suggest this particular film never had much of a chance due to two factors: First, it had no well-liked artist behind it whose involvement would create high expectations or intrigue, and, second, it told a story that we’ve seen told a million times in the corniest of animated specials and low-budget Christmas dramas. No intrigue about the artistic vision, combined with no intrigue about the subject matter, leaves a movie with very little to stand on except, “Hey Christians! Please come see our movie about your savior! We made it just for you!” And that pitch, as Hollywood is about to learn, will only get you so far.
I’d have to agree.
Categories: Culture |
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January 1st, 2007
I am sure that some of you have happened across Slice of Laodicea. Dave at the Mindful Mission first pointed me in their direction. I tried having a conversation with them, but since I was in disagreement, my comments were deleted. Since then, I have poked my head their way a few times, but they just seems to be overly paranoid and seem to call everyone but a couple of the disciples heretics.
Anyway, Dave has now pointed me to a site that tries, amongst other things, to point out some of their silliness. It is a play off of Slice of Laodicea, Sliced Laodicea.
I have only read a couple of their posts, so this is not an evaluation or endorsement of the site, but it is worth checking out, if only for a counterweight to Slice.
Categories: Culture, Unity |
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