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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: Kerygmania: NIV - too biased in its translation?
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ptarmigan
Shipmate
# 138
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Posted
Some translations have "righteousness" where others have "justice".
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All shall be well. And all shall be well. And all manner of things shall be well. (Julian of Norwich)
Posts: 1080 | From: UK - Midlands | Registered: May 2001
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theMadFarmer
SOCKPUPPET
# 4252
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Posted
So do we have reccomendations as to what a decent translation might be?
Posts: 32 | Registered: Mar 2003
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Og: Thread Killer
Ship's token CN Mennonite
# 3200
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Posted
Somebody raised the question of what makes for a good pew bible:
Apart from the practical idea of using what the preacher uses, I would suggest getting a bible version aimed at the primary purposes for pew bibles: - Personal reflection if the sermon is boring you or your kids have distracted you too much
OR
- Following along during the public reading
Both of these uses are, IMHO, primarily times for quick introspection and contemplation, not in depth slogging. Thus, I suggest a pew bible that sings to you in a language you can understand but remains true to the text. I find the NIV doesn't fit this bill (the NIV sings like a repentent accountant) and would prefer the NRSV but that's just IMHO.
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I wish I was seeking justice loving mercy and walking humbly but... "Cease to lament for that thou canst not help, And study help for that which thou lament'st."
Posts: 5025 | From: Toronto | Registered: Aug 2002
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Oscar the Grouch
Adopted Cascadian
# 1916
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Posted
We don't have pew Bibles - we have simple readings sheets which have the texts of the readings (including the psalm) for the Sunday.
I find that this has the following advantages:
a) It doesn't tie us to any particular version. At the moment we use the NRSV, but we could conceivably change (for one week or for every week) if we so desired.
b) People don't have to grapple with chunky bible books in the middle of a service. This is especially good for the elderly and for visitors who may not be comfortable finding readings in a bible.
c) We can encourage the congregations to take the sheets home with them, to go back over the readings again at their leisure.
d) I find that people are far more likely to keep the reading in front of them during the sermon.
With any halfway decent PC, creating such sheets is a doddle. I create a month's worth at a time and I reckon that the actual creation takes about 30 minutes, and then just needs photocopying.
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Faradiu, dundeibáwa weyu lárigi weyu
Posts: 3871 | From: Gamma Quadrant, just to the left of Galifrey | Registered: Dec 2001
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Chapelhead*
Ship’s Photographer
# 1143
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by OgtheDim:
the NIV sings like a repentant accountant.
What's wrong with my singing? ![[Frown]](frown.gif)
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Benedikt Gott Geschickt!
Posts: 7082 | From: Turbolift Control. | Registered: Aug 2001
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Calvin
Shipmate
# 271
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Smart Alex:
We don't have pew Bibles - we have simple readings sheets which have the texts of the readings (including the psalm) for the Sunday.
This does have the disadvantage that you can not establish the context of the passages if you think that the preacher has got it wrong/reading more into it than is there etc. There is also a cost issue (depending on the size of the congo) photocopying 200 sheets a week will soon be more expensive than 200 church issue bibles (which would last for several years).
Calvin.
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A crash reduces
Your expensive computer
To a simple stone.
Posts: 305 | From: Here and Now | Registered: May 2001
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Elephenor
Shipmate
# 4026
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Posted
For pew bibles could I put in a word (remembering my childhood) for the importance of interesting maps; coloured if at all possible. ![[Smile]](smile.gif)
I grew up with Good News Bibles in the pews, which I, er, wouldn't particularly recommend for the job; indeed some sick individual had even removed their chief redeeming feature - the line art - from the pew editions.
Fortunately, I discovered it was possible to bring along my own bible (with lots of beatiful coloured maps) instead (later still I discovered how to plait Prayer Book ribbons, but that's another story). But is it any wonder other young people have abandoned our churches? I ask you! ![[Devil]](graemlins/devil.gif)
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"Man is...a `eucharistic' animal." (Kallistos Ware)
Posts: 214 | From: UK | Registered: Jan 2003
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Thurible
Shipmate
# 3206
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Posted
At our somewhat spikey Carthlick parish at home, the parish priest has decided to invest in several copies of the E.S.V. Now, for one thing, it doesn't have the whole Bible in (as our church has always understood it), and it's famously evangelical. Am I alone in thinking this odd? Fr. P. just says "It's a sound translation - and according to my letter from them they're translating the Deutero-canonical books next year."
Thurible
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"I've been baptised not lobotomised."
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Nicole Smith
Shipmate
# 1234
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Posted
Anyone familiar with Peterson's The Message? It's a paraphrase, immediate in terms of American culture, and an interesting interpretation.
Bottomline for me on translations is try not to get stuck on any one of them, check out a variety and don't get too hung up on their inevitable limitations, and keep working on your Greek till I can read more of the original... eventually I'd like to get the Hebrew too but that's a long-term project.
Be well,
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Under the Mercy,
nicole
Gloria in excelsis deo...
Posts: 204 | From: Montreal, Canada | Registered: Aug 2001
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Alan Cresswell
Mad Scientist 先生
# 31
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Nicole Smith:
Anyone familiar with Peterson's The Message?
We recently had a thread on the Message, here in Purgatory
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Don't cling to a mistake just because you spent a lot of time making it.
Posts: 32413 | From: East Kilbride (Scotland) or 福島 | Registered: May 2001
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Nicole Smith
Shipmate
# 1234
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Posted
Thanks our angel Alan! ![[Big Grin]](biggrin.gif)
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Under the Mercy,
nicole
Gloria in excelsis deo...
Posts: 204 | From: Montreal, Canada | Registered: Aug 2001
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Merseymike
Shipmate
# 3022
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Posted
Isn't the best thing to have a number of translations available, and to not get too bound up with the exact meaning of every word? Given that we are talking not about literal truth, but a work of men
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Christianity is not a problem to be solved, but a mystery to be experienced
Posts: 3360 | From: Walked the plank | Registered: Jul 2002
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Sean D
Cheery barman
# 2271
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Posted
Even thought I disagree to an extent with your second sentence Mike, I entirely agree with your 1st! Having two or three versions all of a slightly different style/emphasis/tradition has helped me a lot, especially with confusing passages. I have not purchased any of these, incidentally, but use the freeeeee online bibles. (sale spiel over ![[Wink]](wink.gif) ).
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postpostevangelical
http://www.stmellitus.org/
Posts: 2126 | From: North and South Kensington | Registered: Feb 2002
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Esmeralda
Ship's token UK Mennonite
# 582
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Merseymike:
Isn't the best thing to have a number of translations available, and to not get too bound up with the exact meaning of every word? Given that we are talking not about literal truth, but a work of men
Exactly - it seems most translations are indeed the work of men. ![[Mad]](angryfire.gif) That is why I'm with Mrs Tubbs on hating the Non-Inclusive Version - especially since the loathsome James Dobson successfully campaigned against the inclusivised revision some years ago, because it was supposedly 'anti-family' (how can acknowledging that women and girls are present be anti-family??). I was a signatory to the letter of complaint from the UK charity Men, Women and God, objecting to the withdrawal of the inclusive NIV from the market. Now, over ten years later, the TNIV has come out. I haven't seen it yet, but look forward to it.
I don't want people to think inclusive language is my only criterion for a translation, but if translators can't even give this courtesy to half the human race, it bodes ill for the rest of what they do (and arguing that what Paul said meant 'brothers' is pointless, he clearly didn't mean to address only the men, which is what using it means nowadays - anyway I was always told 'adelphoi' means 'born from the same womb' which surely implies 'siblings' rather than 'male siblings).
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I can take the despair. It's the hope I can't stand.
http://reversedstandard.wordpress.com/
Posts: 17415 | From: A small island nobody pays any attention to | Registered: Jun 2001
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Caver
Shipmate
# 4392
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Posted
Whilst on the one hand I would agree with you about not excluding people by the words we use, this does have some problems. The main one being that it isn't an accurate translation. If a translator changes one word to make it more acceptable, what are they doing elsewhere?
Glenn raised an interesting question about the Septuagint. I should imagine that the justification would be along the lines of knowing that LXX was widely used in the 1st Century and that this is probably the one that most people were familiar with, but a dangerous position.
I used the NIV quite happily for many years until I started learning Greek and now I'm never sure how much I trust it. To the passages Sean D mentions I would add Philemon 6 which compared with any other translation I have seen is obviously biased. I suspect the same is also true of parts of Isaiah 35, but I don't know Hebrew.
Mrs Tubbs is quite right in pointing out the bias in the translation of diakonos in relation to Phoebe. I think this is bias creeping in, however in their slight defence the word is hard to translate accurately, especially in Paul's writings. The JB in using deaconess is just as bad.
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Quote from Annie Day "Could be interested, picking people up on the way down." Now that never happens to me underground :-(
Posts: 104 | From: Leeds, UK | Registered: Apr 2003
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Conrad
Shipmate
# 4644
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Posted
Hey folks, you know that the NIV Translation Committee decided to take on the Dobson Crew after all? The TNIV (Today's New International Version, Zondervan in the USA and Hodder in the UK) is an inclusive version with lots of changes from the original NIV. And be nice about it when you post here, because I was one of the consultants in the translation of Acts.
One of the interesting things I learned when I took up that role was that my job was sometimes to render things ambiguously in English. This is one of the big differences between a paraphrase like GoodNews or TheMessage and a translation: If the Greek text could be taken This Way or That Way, a paraphraser will decide and make the English clearly This Way or That Way; but translators like us at TNIV worked hard at trying to construct English that could similarly be taken This Way or That Way.
I'm certain that there are still biases, but that wasn't and isn't usually the agenda.
Conrad
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Posts: 15 | From: London | Registered: Jun 2003
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ken
Ship's Roundhead
# 2460
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Conrad:
If the Greek text could be taken This Way or That Way, a paraphraser will decide and make the English clearly This Way or That Way; but translators like us at TNIV worked hard at trying to construct English that could similarly be taken This Way or That Way.
Any examples?
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Ken
L’amor che move il sole e l’altre stelle.
Posts: 39579 | From: London | Registered: Mar 2002
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Eutychus
From the edge
# 3081
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Posted
I know exactly what Conrad means (though my expertise is not in translating Greek!).
I think one example would be John 7:38 where Jesus says "he who believes in me, streams of living water will flow from him" . I think this is ambiguous in the original (ie it is not immediately clear if Jesus is referring to himself or to the person who believes in him). At least one translation here firmly comes down on the former side because of its non-charismatic bias; others remain neutral.
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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy
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Conrad
Shipmate
# 4644
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Posted
WARNING: LONG POST, but Ken asked for it.....
Hi Ken. It was like 4 or 5 years ago that I did this work, so I don't have all the specifics in my brain, and none of them are huge matters of doctrine in any case (at least none of the ones I dealt with in Acts). But here's a few examples that have come up for different reasons since....
-------------example one---
Acts 5:9 NIV
"Look! The feet of the men who buried your husband are at the door, and they will carry you out also."
The Translation Committee was proposing changing this to something simpler like "Look! The men who buried your husband are at the door, and they will carry you out also."
BUT... the text clearly talks about the "feet" of the graveyard crew, and the whole of 4:32 - 5:10 positively stinks of mentions of feet, including (twice) the tradition that people who sold their property would lay the money at the feet of the apostles (probably to indicate it was of very little worth).
Even though we don't understand, then, what the "feet" are doing in the verse in question, I argued that it was best to keep them in.
My suggestion was something like:
"Listen: the footsteps at the door are the men who buried your husband...."
The compromise in the final TNIV included my "Listen!" (the Greek word is literally "Behold!"), but played it more conservative, keeping the feet rather than the footsteps;
"Listen! The feet of the men who buried your husband are at the door..."
Not exactly preserving ambiguity, but a case where we avoided streamlining the reading according to our own understanding... preserving the text just in case it meant more than we translators realized at the time.
-------------example one---
Another example is Acts 20:30. The verse before talks about dangerous people who will attack the church from outside. But then sexist NIV reads:
"Even from your own number men will arise and distort the truth..." apparently without realizing that women can distort the truth too!
The suggestion among the committee was to "clarify" the meaning with, as I recall:
"Even some of your own people will distort the truth."
This clearly makes the insiders/outsiders distinction that we all thought 20:29-30 was about.
BUT "some of your own people" can only refer to the congregation of these leaders, whereas the older "from your own number" might mean either from your congregation or from the ranks of the leaders standing here. The latter seems to me to be unlikely in the context of the book, but was not an option that I thought we had the right to cut off, so the TNIV partially reverts (without the exclusivist language):
"Even from your own number some will arise and distort the truth..."
These are minor examples, I know, but they illustrate the point that I was surprised to find that even evangelical translators see their job not as making the original texts clearly teach what we know that they teach, but as using contemporary language to reproduce precisely the conundrums we find in the text.
One or two other examples come to mind, but these things take so long to explain. But here's a sort of non-example
In that same chapter, clearing up the "theological inaccuracy" of 20:28 wasn't even on the table:
"Be shepherds of the church of God, which he bought with his own blood...."
That last phrase is more literally "bought with the blood of his own" and you'd think that the temptation would be strong to provide the missing word "Son".... "the church of God which he bought with the blood of his own Son"
BUT rather than supply the missing word, the more responsible position is to take "with the blood" and "of his own" as a sort of parallelism Greek construction and collapse them even though it looks as though Luke's Paul was saying it was the Father's blood somehow.
I'm sure biases creep in to translations, but it's not only not the agenda, it's something that we're constantly thinking about: keeping interpretative possibilities alive rather than closing them down.
Conrad
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Posts: 15 | From: London | Registered: Jun 2003
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ken
Ship's Roundhead
# 2460
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Posted
Thanks!
Looks like I'll have to add a TNIV to my ever-growing pile of not-that-different-really ( ) translations!
Posts: 39579 | From: London | Registered: Mar 2002
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