"But you do not have His word abiding in you, because whom He sent, Him you do not believe. You search the scriptures, for in them you think you have eternal life; and these are they which testify of Me."
John 5: 38 - 39 NKJV
There has been a debate going on in our circle concerning the importance of bible translations. That is, which translation we choose to use in our daily readings. For my preference, I've used the New King James Version for some time now. I find the wording to be more user friendly. However, apparently that isn't all we're supposed to consider when we choose a translation to read. We cannot forget that we need to seek a translation that closely resembles the Greek, Latin or whatever dialect people spoke back then. Only then, they say, can one truly understand what the authors of the texts were trying to get across. I agree, to a point. One thing I do understand is that each and every bible that we will ever come across has at some point been looked at and translated by man. Now, take this into consideration, what do we know about the translators of the bible we're reading? Were they God fearing men? Did they believe as we do? How is it that we can trust their translation to be trustworthy? Anyone who knows biblical history knows that there are precious few original manuscripts that have ever been found containing the original writings of James, or John or whoever. We have had the discovery of the Dead Sea scrolls, which at the time was a ground breaking event as far as biblical translations go. However, precious few other original manuscripts have been located. So it is that we must rely upon the integrity of the original writers of the biblical texts. I'm sorry, but I cannot place that amount of trust in a human translation. You will never hear from me that we should get rid of the bible because of a faulty translation. What I will say is that we should choose our biblical translations wisely. For it does seem that, at times, there is indeed a translation to fit any occasion. We have study bibles. We have children's bibles. We even have bibles geared towards drug addiction recovery. Which of these translations is the most accurate to the original text? As I said, we must be careful.
These were more fair minded than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all readiness, and searched the scriptures daily to find out whether these things were so. Therefore many of them believed, and also not a few of the Greeks, prominent women as well as man.
Acts 17: 11 - 12 NKJV
One thing I'm assured of is that when I have needed to look at a scripture in my own translation, I trust that it is the Spirit who leads me to the understanding of that passage. Although I agree that different people looking at the very same scripture will somehow come up with a totally different meaning, I also agree that looking a the scripture through the eyes of Jesus will help us a lot in our understanding. How do we find the perspective of Jesus? The apostle Paul leads us into this understanding in Galatians. It is here where Paul speaks to the reality of Christ in us {Galatians 2:20}. If indeed Christ Jesus is in us, can we continue to look upon scriptures the same way? Will Jesus not speak to us the meaning of the words? I believe so. Although we may have different translations, the story is the same. I recall a bible translation not so long ago that was geared towards the Island people of Hawaii. This "Pidgeon bible" translation used a lot of the heavy dialect and words of the people of the Islands, so I found it a bit difficult to read. Yet what I didn't find that hard to understand was the story of Christ Jesus. The Pidgeon bible had one purpose, to introduce the Island people to Christ Jesus. In that I feel it was successful. So what of the other translations that we see? The drug addiction bible, the children's bible or the study bible? I won't argue that they have their place. However, I will mention that the overall importance is not found in the translation of the book, but in the truth of the message it speaks to.
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
John 1:1 NKJV
~Scott~
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