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How To scripturally Determine the Mind of God on the Modern Practice of Paraphrasing His Words
- Thread starter JD731
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I was speaking to you, not about you. I had been speaking to Van. See context.
I do not wish to be your enemy.
I'll accept that. But please know that ambiguity is not your friend. If you answer a post of mine and say such things, it's only natural for me to think it's about me.
Several of your posts with their condescending, negative, unkind accusations or assertions suggest that you at times do treat non-KJV-only believers as though they were your enemy and as though you consider yourself to be spiritually superior.
Your stated position concerning Bible translations is not logical and reasonable, and it is not sound scripturally. You display a very negative attribute toward the word of God translated into present-day English.
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Like so many of our "hidden agenda" threads, do we really think God wants us to present a corrupted gospel? Of course not.
Are we to think God does not want us to translate Greek, Hebrew and Aramaic texts into languages understandable to all nations? Off course not.
Are we to define one translation as "God's word" and all other efforts as "paraphrases" meaning corrupt versions? Of course not.
Does God want us to loosely translate His word, missing His intended message? Nope
Does God want us to do our best to present His word as accurately and as understandably as we can? Of course.
Does God want us to study God's word on our own, in addition to seeking wise counsel? Of course.
Does that mean we need to use a version we can understand, rather than one that has to be explained to us because it is in another language or an outdated vocabulary of our language? You bet
Are we to think God does not want us to translate Greek, Hebrew and Aramaic texts into languages understandable to all nations? Off course not.
Are we to define one translation as "God's word" and all other efforts as "paraphrases" meaning corrupt versions? Of course not.
Does God want us to loosely translate His word, missing His intended message? Nope
Does God want us to do our best to present His word as accurately and as understandably as we can? Of course.
Does God want us to study God's word on our own, in addition to seeking wise counsel? Of course.
Does that mean we need to use a version we can understand, rather than one that has to be explained to us because it is in another language or an outdated vocabulary of our language? You bet
I am not superior but the one way I differ from you is that I provide scripture quotes for my points while you rarely do. Your beliefs about Bible translations cannot be proven from the scriptures. I know that because my last two threads has been a perfect opportunity for you to prove it. You haven’t even tried. You have instead spent your time attacking me and what you think I believe.
it is time for you to admit that you have chosen the wrong side and repent. It is not too late.
You have not proven your human opinion that I have supposedly chosen the wrong side to be true. Your opinion is incorrect.
Your providing scripture quotes does not prove your human KJV-only opinions to be scriptural since those scripture quotes do not state what you suggest concerning the KJV. You read your opinions into the verses or add your opinions to them.
I have chosen the right side--what the Scriptures teach.
God does not change, and He did not change in 1611. I believe God was just as faithful and true to keep all His promises before 1611 as after 1611 while KJV-only reasoning suggests that God changed in 1611 or that God's promises changed in 1611. KJV-only reasoning suggests that God was required to provide a perfect English translation in 1611 or in 1769 while He was not required to provide one before 1611 and was not required to provide one to believers who spoke other languages such as Spanish, German, French, Dutch, etc. The truth is consistent while human KJV-only reasoning/teaching is inconsistent.
The wisdom from God above is without partiality (James 3:17) while your human wisdom shows partiality to one exclusive group of Church of England critics in 1611.
The Scriptures do not state, teach, or suggest that the word of God is bound to the textual criticism decisions, Bible revision decisions, and translation decisions of one exclusive group of Church of England critics in 1611.
Preferring one English Bible translation or esteeming one English Bible translation above others is a personal preference and involves Christian liberty (Romans 14:4-6), and it is not a command or doctrine of God. You have not demonstrated your opinions to be a doctrine of God.
You choose to believe assertions for the KJV that are not true and that are not scriptural.
Okay, but this thread is about the modern practice of paraphrases of God’s words. What has he told you about that? Who has the worse sin in your view, someone who believes God can inspire every word in a translation or someone who paraphrases the whole Bible and deceives men into thinking it is God’s idea and then selling it at the Bible counter at the book store?
Can you answer this question? Can you understand it?
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Lousy: The Message, the Living Bible, etc. A paraphrase is not really a Bible, but a sort of commentary, usually with man places different from the original language Bible.
Both would be wrong. All sin is equally sin. Do the Scriptures teach that one sin is worse than another sin as your question asserts?
The issue is not what God could possibly do, but what He choose to do and what the Scriptures teach He did.
God could inspire every word in a Bible translation, but according to the Scriptures, He did not choose to do that since He would not contradict Himself and lie by showing partiality. God could have had copies of the original-language Scriptures made by a miracle of direct inspiration, but He did not choose to do so. God could have had perfect Bible translations produced by a miracle of direct inspiration for people of every language, but He did not choose to do so. It is impossible for God to lie and contradict Himself (Hebrews 6:18) as human KJV-only reasoning in effect suggests.
Human KJV-only reasoning/teaching deceives people into believing assertions that are not true and that are not scriptural.
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How bad can a paraphrase be? I'll post some notes about a Japanese paraphrase from my lecture notes:
Here are some passages back-translated into English from the Gendaiyaku [meaning simply "Modern Translation"], a macro-paraphrase done by a well-known Japanese pastor named Reiji Oyama.
John 1:1—
Ἐν ἀρχῇ ἦν ὁ λόγος, καὶ ὁ λόγος ἦν πρὸς τὸν θεόν, καὶ θεὸς ἦν ὁ λόγος.
「まだ、この世界も何もなかった時、すでにキリストは存在しておられた。キリストは神といっしょにおられ、また神ご自身であられた。」
Back translation: “When there was nothing at all in this world, Christ already existed. Christ was with God, and was God himself.”
He has substituted “Christ” for “Word,” but the term “Word” is vital in this passage in order to get across the divine Author’s intended meaning. Also, he paraphrased “In the beginning” in such a way that the connection with Gen. 1:1 is completely lost. Here is the KJV, of course: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.”
John 1:2—
Οὗτος ἦν ἐν ἀρχῇ πρὸς τὸν θεόν.
「このように、キリストは神ご自身であられながら、唯一の神のうちにいますもう一つの人格があって、父と子と聖霊とである。キリストは子でいます。」
Back translation: “In this way, while Christ is God himself, within the unique God he is another person, there being the Father and Son and Holy Spirit. Christ is the Son.”
He has turned this around to his own understanding, and paraphrased badly. Compare the back translation with 29 words to the KJV with only 8 words: “The same was in the beginning with God.”
John 3:16—
Οὕτως γὰρ ἠγάπησεν ὁ θεὸς τὸν κόσμον, ὥστε τὸν υἱὸν αὐτοῦ τὸν μονογενῆ ἔδωκεν, ἵνα πᾶς ὁ πιστεύων εἰς αὐτὸν μὴ ἀπόληται, ἀλλ᾽ ἔχῃ ζωὴν αἰώνιον.
「神は、そのひとり子でいますイエス・キリストをこの世に遣わされ、十字架上で私たちの罪の身代わりとして死 なせるほどに、私たちを愛してくださった。それは、イエス・キリストを信じる人が誰であろうと、滅びること が泣く、救われるためなのである。」
Back translation: “God sent his only Son Jesus Christ to this world, and to the extent that he made his Son die on the cross in the place of our sin, God loved us. So, anyone who believes in Jesus Christ will not perish, but will be saved.”
There are so many mistakes in this paraphrase that it is hard to know where to begin! He definitely is not going directly from the Greek. In the Japanese he has added thirteen words and changed two. And that isn’t even looking at the grammar!
Changing “that” (ὥστε) to “to the extent” is horrible. But perhaps the most obvious and egregious error is changing “have eternal life” to “saved.” These renderings are very different in meaning.
Here are some passages back-translated into English from the Gendaiyaku [meaning simply "Modern Translation"], a macro-paraphrase done by a well-known Japanese pastor named Reiji Oyama.
John 1:1—
Ἐν ἀρχῇ ἦν ὁ λόγος, καὶ ὁ λόγος ἦν πρὸς τὸν θεόν, καὶ θεὸς ἦν ὁ λόγος.
「まだ、この世界も何もなかった時、すでにキリストは存在しておられた。キリストは神といっしょにおられ、また神ご自身であられた。」
Back translation: “When there was nothing at all in this world, Christ already existed. Christ was with God, and was God himself.”
He has substituted “Christ” for “Word,” but the term “Word” is vital in this passage in order to get across the divine Author’s intended meaning. Also, he paraphrased “In the beginning” in such a way that the connection with Gen. 1:1 is completely lost. Here is the KJV, of course: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.”
John 1:2—
Οὗτος ἦν ἐν ἀρχῇ πρὸς τὸν θεόν.
「このように、キリストは神ご自身であられながら、唯一の神のうちにいますもう一つの人格があって、父と子と聖霊とである。キリストは子でいます。」
Back translation: “In this way, while Christ is God himself, within the unique God he is another person, there being the Father and Son and Holy Spirit. Christ is the Son.”
He has turned this around to his own understanding, and paraphrased badly. Compare the back translation with 29 words to the KJV with only 8 words: “The same was in the beginning with God.”
John 3:16—
Οὕτως γὰρ ἠγάπησεν ὁ θεὸς τὸν κόσμον, ὥστε τὸν υἱὸν αὐτοῦ τὸν μονογενῆ ἔδωκεν, ἵνα πᾶς ὁ πιστεύων εἰς αὐτὸν μὴ ἀπόληται, ἀλλ᾽ ἔχῃ ζωὴν αἰώνιον.
「神は、そのひとり子でいますイエス・キリストをこの世に遣わされ、十字架上で私たちの罪の身代わりとして死 なせるほどに、私たちを愛してくださった。それは、イエス・キリストを信じる人が誰であろうと、滅びること が泣く、救われるためなのである。」
Back translation: “God sent his only Son Jesus Christ to this world, and to the extent that he made his Son die on the cross in the place of our sin, God loved us. So, anyone who believes in Jesus Christ will not perish, but will be saved.”
There are so many mistakes in this paraphrase that it is hard to know where to begin! He definitely is not going directly from the Greek. In the Japanese he has added thirteen words and changed two. And that isn’t even looking at the grammar!
Changing “that” (ὥστε) to “to the extent” is horrible. But perhaps the most obvious and egregious error is changing “have eternal life” to “saved.” These renderings are very different in meaning.
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It could depend upon how they are used. It would be wrong and harmful for paraphrases to be read and treated as if they were Bible translations. A paraphrase is not a Bible translation.
On the other land, if they are read as one man's interpretation or commentary on Scripture, then they would be similar to reading Bible commentaries. Do you suggest that it is wrong for Christian bookstores to sell commentaries and for believers to read them?
I disagree with a lot of what Eugene Nida wrote, but about paraphrasing, here is something he wrote that is on target:
“The translator should not, however, consider that in translating the Bible he is writing a commentary on it. This has frequently been the case. As a result, the substituted words and the paraphrasing have not been careful and faithful renderings of the text. For example, one translator, in an effort to interpret the first chapter of the Gospel of John to his constituency, translated, ‘In the beginning was Christ, and Christ…’ (John 1:1). This is an unjustified rendering of the original text, and though the immediate gain in understandability may seem great, the ultimate loss to the reader of the Bible is much greater.”
Eugene Nida, Bible Translating, revised ed. (London: United Bible Societies, 1961), 20.
“The translator should not, however, consider that in translating the Bible he is writing a commentary on it. This has frequently been the case. As a result, the substituted words and the paraphrasing have not been careful and faithful renderings of the text. For example, one translator, in an effort to interpret the first chapter of the Gospel of John to his constituency, translated, ‘In the beginning was Christ, and Christ…’ (John 1:1). This is an unjustified rendering of the original text, and though the immediate gain in understandability may seem great, the ultimate loss to the reader of the Bible is much greater.”
Eugene Nida, Bible Translating, revised ed. (London: United Bible Societies, 1961), 20.
I'm going to have do disagree with this last statement, my brother. When you read a commentary, you know it is a commentary because it says so. When you read a paraphrase, it claims to be a Bible, but it is not.
I did not suggest that a paraphrase should be read as being a Bible translation, which it is not. Neither should it be promoted or as being a Bible translation in ads or in bookstores. I clearly noted that it would be wrong to read and treat a paraphrase as being a Bible translation.
Many are informed enough that they know that a paraphrase is similar to a commentary so that they could read it as being in effect a commentary.
Many are informed enough that they know that a paraphrase is similar to a commentary so that they could read it as being in effect a commentary.
Many secular translation studies scholars oppose paraphrase, because it is transformative. In other words, paraphrase changes the meaning of the original.
1. According to one scholar, “Paraphrase falls short of maintaining a semantic correspondence and is actually transformative.”
Lawrence Venuti, ed., The Translation Studies Reader, 2nd ed., (New York and London: Routledge, 2004), 18.
What he means is that a paraphrase "translation" changes the meaning of the original text to fit the subjective opinion of the writer or translator.
2. “Highly paraphrastic translations result from a theory of interlingual communication which justifies the addition of extraneous material or the need to ‘improve’ on the original by rewriting it.”
Jin Di and Eugene Nida, On Translation, 2nd ed. (Hong Kong: City University of Hong Kong, 2006), 8.
3. “It is when the translator sets out to render the ‘spirit’—not the textual sense—that he begins to traduce his author. The clumsiest literal translation is a thousand times more useful than the prettiest paraphrase.”
Vladimir Nabokov, “Problems of Translation: Onegin in English,” in The Translation Studies Reader, 2nd ed., ed. Lawrence Venuti (New York and London: Routledge, 2004), 115.
1. According to one scholar, “Paraphrase falls short of maintaining a semantic correspondence and is actually transformative.”
Lawrence Venuti, ed., The Translation Studies Reader, 2nd ed., (New York and London: Routledge, 2004), 18.
What he means is that a paraphrase "translation" changes the meaning of the original text to fit the subjective opinion of the writer or translator.
2. “Highly paraphrastic translations result from a theory of interlingual communication which justifies the addition of extraneous material or the need to ‘improve’ on the original by rewriting it.”
Jin Di and Eugene Nida, On Translation, 2nd ed. (Hong Kong: City University of Hong Kong, 2006), 8.
3. “It is when the translator sets out to render the ‘spirit’—not the textual sense—that he begins to traduce his author. The clumsiest literal translation is a thousand times more useful than the prettiest paraphrase.”
Vladimir Nabokov, “Problems of Translation: Onegin in English,” in The Translation Studies Reader, 2nd ed., ed. Lawrence Venuti (New York and London: Routledge, 2004), 115.
Well said.
My position is that okay, a paraphrased "Bible" is really a commentary, not a Bible. Having said that, the typical commentary is much more helpful, because the author knows he is writing a commentary, whereas the "translator" of a paraphrase presents his work as a "Bible." To me that is intellectually dishonest. So I never read paraphrases unless to critique, and recommend against it.
More than that, an actual commentary deals with the problems of the text, whereas a paraphrase doesn't do that.
Edited in: In other words, to me, reading a paraphrase is a waste of time. The typical commentary is a much greater help.
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Commentary on POINT #1 above.
It depends on who your authority is, I guess. One person of authority suggested that he grades sins.
John 19:11
Jesus answered, Thou couldest have no power at all against me, except it were given thee from above: therefore he that delivered me unto thee hath the greater sin.
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