Featured Any here used the Zondervan Niv Study Bible yet?

You never learn. With the exception of your preference for "flesh", there are many improvements that have been made in the NIV which you have not adequately examined.

If you would do a little investigation of the use of inclusive language in the HCSB and ESV you would lose most of your bias. If the use of inclusive language in those two versions would be considered acceptable then that would whittle down your NIV bias. If the use of inclusive language in the NET (which goes beyond that of the ESV and HCSB) is also acceptable to you --then that leaves a bare fraction of verses that you might object to. But, here you are always at a disadvantage because you don't like to get specific and do homework. You are much more comfortable in merely asserting blanket charges against the NIV. That has been the earmark of your history.

 

When you say "gender language" you mean inclusive language, because the NASB certainly uses gender language.

That's your flawed opinion. Permit me to quote again from How To Choose A Translation For All Its Worth by Gordon Fee and Mark Strauss.

"So while formal equivalent translators try to proceed with a method of formal equivalence (word-for-word replacement), their decisions are in fact determined by a philosophy of functional equivalence (change the form whenever necessary to retain the meaning)." (p.28)

"An accurate translation is one that reproduces the meaning of the text, regardless of whether it follows the form." (p.32)

 

It is seldom possible because even the so-called formal translations have to modify Greek and Hebrew forms in order to convey the meaning of the text. And, as I had quoted, their philosophy is that of functional equivalence despite their self-proclaimed "formal" approach.

 

Ha, ha, ha, ha.

 

"It ought to be obvious that to some extent every translation from anywhere on the spectrum, is necessarily involved again and again with finding the dynamic equivalent. (D.A. Carson :The King James Version Debate).

 

So with you it is a matter of degree. You acknowledge that all translations use functional equivalence. As was quoted before --all translator decisions are based on a philosophy of functional equivalence.

 

The term "essentially literal" is meaningless.

 

Well Duh, of course he believes the ESV is essentially literal. But his belief is essentially silly.

 

Is that a disease?

Seriously, the claims made about the ESV in their PR program and in the very preface of the ESV are bogus. I question the claims being made. What is "essentially"-- 88% of the time? Is it 75% or 51%?

Is it only on rare occasions that it uses anything other than a so-called literal approach? Or does the ESV use functionally equivalent expressions a lot more often than as advertised?

Does the ESV step away from being essentially literal only when a wording cannot be expressed word-for-word? Or does the ESV often adopt a more dynamic rendering when a more literal rendering still makes sense in English?

 

Essentially Literal Translation" "seeks as far as possible to capture the precise wording of the text.....the emphasis is on word-for-word correspondance....at the same time taking into account differences of grammar, syntax, and idiom between current literary English and original languages."...."the principle underlying essentially literal translation is "verbal equivalence, " meaning that the translators have provided the equivalent English word or phrase for everything that is in the orginal text." - Leland Ryken, Professor of English at Wheaton College

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