Which Bible translation is the best?

[historia]

Which English translation of the Bible do you like the best?

Why do you like it better than other translations?

And which one do you like second best?

[JehovahsWitness]

[Replying to post 90 by brianbbs67]

Is there a difference between a name and the pronunciation of a name?

[Difflugia]

Our best guess is Yehuah...

Do you have a reference or personal reason for why you think that guess is best and does "best" mean "most likely"?

[RightReason]

[Replying to historia]

Which English translation of the Bible do you like the best?

One that is in most keeping with that which was given to us by Christ’s Church.

***************

Some people mistakenly think the King James Version of the Bible (KJV), with its eloquent thee’s and thou’s, is the original version.[1] But the Bible was not written in seventeenth-century Old English. More than 1,500 years earlier, the New Testament was written in ancient Greek; and long before that the Old Testament was written in ancient Hebrew, along with some Aramaic and Greek.

Sometimes a translator’s theology will cause him to mistranslate a text in order to justify his beliefs. This is evident in the New World Translation of the Bible that Jehovah’s Witnesses use. The first verse of John’s Gospel does not say, as it does in the RSV, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.� Instead it says, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was agod.� That’s because Jehovah’s Witnesses deny the deity of Christ and think he is just “a god� or a glorious creation of the one almighty God Jehovah.

https://www.catholic.com/magazine/onlin ... s-the-best

[tigger2]

[Replying to historia]

Which English translation of the Bible do you like the best?

One that is in most keeping with that which was given to us by Christ’s Church.

***************

Some people mistakenly think the King James Version of the Bible (KJV), with its eloquent thee’s and thou’s, is the original version.[1] But the Bible was not written in seventeenth-century Old English. More than 1,500 years earlier, the New Testament was written in ancient Greek; and long before that the Old Testament was written in ancient Hebrew, along with some Aramaic and Greek.

Sometimes a translator’s theology will cause him to mistranslate a text in order to justify his beliefs. This is evident in the New World Translation of the Bible that Jehovah’s Witnesses use. The first verse of John’s Gospel does not say, as it does in the RSV, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.� Instead it says, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was agod.� That’s because Jehovah’s Witnesses deny the deity of Christ and think he is just “a god� or a glorious creation of the one almighty God Jehovah.

https://www.catholic.com/magazine/onlin ... s-the-best

Incorrect.

The grammar and usage of the writer of the 4th Gospel clearly show that he intended 'a god' at John 1:1c. Only a very few Trinitarian NT Grammarians will agree for obvious reasons.

Anyone truly interested in the truth of this matter would be willing to fully examine John's grammar concerning this clause and all the clauses by John which are parallel to it. https://debatingchristianity.com/forum ... p?t=33432

[RightReason]

[Replying to post 94 by tigger2]

Incorrect.

Nope. Correct.

The grammar and usage of the writer of the 4th Gospel clearly show that he intended 'a god' at John 1:1c. Only a very few Trinitarian NT Grammarians will agree for obvious reasons.

The exact opposite is demonstrated and was what was believed and taught by all of Christendom from the beginning . . .

*****************


The New World Translation has added the word "a" to the verse so that it says, " . . . and the Word was a god." The correct translation of this verse is "In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God." This is how it is rendered in the NASB, NIV, KJV, NKJV, ASV, RSV, etc.

John 1:1 in a literal translation reads thus: "In beginning was the word, and the word was with the God, and God was the word." Notice that it says "God was the word." This is the actual word-for-word translation. It is not saying that "a god was the word." That wouldn't make sense. Let me break it down into three statements.

"In beginning was the word . . . "
(en arche en ho logos)

A very simple statement that the Word was in the beginning.

"and the word was with the God . . . "
(kai ho logos en pros ton theon)

This same Word was with God.

"and God was the word."--Properly translated as "and the Word was God."
(kai theos en ho logos)

This same Word was God.

Regarding statement 3 above, the correct English translation is " . . . and the Word was God" and not "and God was the word." This is because if there is only one definite article ("ho"="the") in a clause where two nouns are in the nominative ("subject") form ("theos" and "logos"), then the noun with the definite article ("ho"="the") is the subject. In this case "ho logos" means that "the word" is the subject of the clause. Therefore, " . . . the Word was God" is the correct translation and not "God was the Word."1 But this does not negate the idea that John is speaking of only one God, not two, even though the Jehovah's Witnesses maintain that Jesus is "a god" or the "mighty god" as was addressed above.

Is there suddenly a new god in the text of John 1:1? It is the same God that is being spoken of in part 2 as in part 3. How do the Jehovah's Witnesses maintain that the word had somehow become a god in this context since there is only one God mentioned? Remember, the Jehovah's Witnesses teach that Jesus was Michael the Archangel. Therefore, is there any place in the Bible where an angel is called "a god" besides Satan being called the god of this world in 2 Cor. 4:3-4?

In the Greek in John 20:28 Thomas said to Jesus, "ho kurios mou, kai ho theos mou," "The Lord of me, and the God of me." If Jesus was not God, but "a" god, then shouldn't Jesus have corrected Thomas? Shouldn't Jesus have said, "No, Thomas, I am not the God. I am a god."? But Jesus did not. To do so would have been ludicrous. Nevertheless, the Jehovah's Witness will say that Thomas was so stunned by Jesus' appearance that he swore. This is ridiculous because it means that Thomas, a devout man of God, swore in front of Jesus and used the Lord's name in vain in violation of Exodus 20:7. This is hardly the case since we find no New Testament equivalent of a disciple of Christ using God's name in vain.

In conclusion, John 1:1 is best translated without the "a" inserted into the text. "The Word was God" is the best translation. This way, we do not run into the danger of polytheism with Jesus being "a god." We do not have Thomas the disciple swearing and using God's name in vain; and, we do not have the problem of Jesus being a "mighty god" and yet not the God--even though God Himself is called the Mighty God (Jeremiah 32:18; Isaiah 10:21).

https://carm.org/john-1-1-word-was-god

[tigger2]

[Replying to post 95 by RightReason]

It's a shame that you, like many others, are unwilling to actually study John's grammar and usage which show that John 1:1c should have "a god."

One of your first lessons should be that NT Greek does not use an indefinite article ('a,'/'an') and English translations must 'add' them where they are needed: before anarthrous non-'prepositional' count nouns. Some examples are:

1. John 4:9 (a) - indefinite (“a Jew�) - all translations
2. John 4:19 - indefinite (“a prophet�) - all
3. John 6:70 - indefinite (“a devil�/“a slanderer�) - all
4. John 8:44 (a) - indefinite (“a murderer�/“a manslayer�) - all
5. John 8:48 - indefinite (“a Samaritan�) - all
6. John 9:24 - indefinite (“a sinner�) - all
7. John 10:1 - indefinite (“a thief and a plunderer�) - all
8. John 10:33 - indefinite (“a man�) - all
9. John 18:35 - indefinite (“a Jew�) - all
10. John 18:37 (a) - indefinite (“a king�) - all

If you would take the great, overwhelming effort of merely looking these up in an interlinear, you will see that they are NT Greek nouns which have no article (anarthrous) just like theos in John 1:1c. You will also find most other anarthrous (without the article) non-'prepositional' count nouns have "a' added in English translations.

If you would expend the effort needed to examine these two links of my personal studies of John's grammar and usage, you would see the flaws in unquestioningly accepting CARM and other anti-JW arguments:

http://examiningthetrinity.blogspot.com ... er_21.html

http://examiningthetrinity.blogspot.com ... 11c-a.html

[RightReason]

[Replying to tigger2]

It's a shame that you, like many others, are unwilling to actually study John's grammar and usage

Right back at ya.

One of your first lessons should be that NT Greek does not use an indefinite article ('a,'/'an')

The article I linked did a good job of explaining where/why JW’s get it wrong.

It might also be beneficial to ask who was Charles Taze Russell?

Charles personally found Biblical teaching about hell not to his liking. So, he spent several years looking for a way to maintain his Christian beliefs with the existence of hell as it had been taught by Christ’s Church from the beginning and throughout the ages. During this same period of time he began to teach end times had begun in 1799 and that Christ had invisibly returned in 1874 and that 1914 would be Armageddon and mark the end of the world. But when these dates came and went without any of his predictions coming to fruition he was forced to re-examine his beliefs.

Unlike many other false teachers Charles didn’t claim to have visions or experience miracles rather he simply interpreted and misinterpreted the Bible. He denied key Christian doctrines including hell, the Trinity, the deity of Christ, and the Holy Spirit. I guess I find it fascinating that he actually felt he had the authority to reinterpret Sacred Scripture. He had his pre existing thoughts that he set out to demonstrate and translated Scripture in order to support his own personal theology. Of course, as often happens when we tell one lie we end up having to tell other lies otherwise our first lie will be found out. The end result was a new religion very different from Christ’s original teachings.

[Difflugia]

Sometimes a translator’s theology will cause him to mistranslate a text in order to justify his beliefs. This is evident in the New World Translation of the Bible that Jehovah’s Witnesses use. The first verse of John’s Gospel does not say, as it does in the RSV, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.� Instead it says, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was agod.� That’s because Jehovah’s Witnesses deny the deity of Christ and think he is just “a god� or a glorious creation of the one almighty God Jehovah.

While in this instance I agree with the NWT's translation (though I still haven't figured out what John's christology actually is), it's still a bit hamhanded about harmonizing the text with JW theology.

The NWT's John 10:38 reads "the Father is in union with me and I am in union with the Father" where most translations match the Greek with "the Father is in me and I am in the Father." The NWT claims to not be a paraphrase and indeed says that a "reliable translation must ... [t]ranslate expressions literally when the wording and structure of the target language allow for such renderings of the original-language text." Since theologians have been arguing about what John means here since before English was even a thing, I'm pretty sure that's not some clear Greek idiom that's somehow obscured by a literal rendering into English.

One that I find particularly funny is that the text of 1 Samuel 28 contradicts the JW doctrine of the unconscious dead, so when the Witch of Endor summons Samuel's spirit, the NWT puts scare quotes around Samuel's name so that it becomes "Samuel's" spirit that was summoned.

[brianbbs67]

Our best guess is Yehuah...

Do you have a reference or personal reason for why you think that guess is best and does "best" mean "most likely"?

There are only a certain number of ancient Hebrew vowels and a certain number of pronunciation rules for them following certain other letters. So, the best guesses in my opinion are Yehuah or Yahweh/Yahveh. But, these are only hypothesized. Jehovah is a conflation with English vowel sounds of Adonai and the YHVH(with a 13th century Catholic monk origen). Is it possible to be correct? Yes. Is it probable, no. That doesn't mean I think people who use it are wrong to do so, because all of us have forgotten His name. I address the Lord as Lord, God of All creation. Heavenly Father as Yeshua instructed.