Bible Translating updated 27-Dec-08
The effect that Christianity has on the world in
general is directly related to the manner in which God's words that Jesus Christ
had taught, have been translated. If the Holy Spirit is weak in the
interpreters of the original, what chance is there for translating and
transmitting God’s Holy Spirit to others.
Languages are by nature difficult to translate because of the spirit
behind, or embedded within the words themselves. Therefore, you be the judge as
to whether the Christian Church of today has that same power that Jesus
instilled in the first generation of Christians or not. There is no need for
anyone to possess any special investigating skills to be aware of the state of
the church today. Just look around you
and then look at the competition. Still not convinced? Please read on.
Legend: My words are in bold blue, [my entries],
Christ' words are in red, Words in
black are text lifted from reference material.
Caps, boldfaced type and/or underlining are my personal added emphasis.
Numbers, preceded with the letters "H" or "G", represent
the Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance reference numbers.
Many problems within Christianity can be attributed to the translation of scripture or even what is to be considered as Scripture.
Christ taught:
Not all present books in our OT part of the
bible qualify under this teaching; Ecclesiastes, Song of Songs, and
others. However, so that we do not cloud
the issue, this subject will be expounded on further down in this document.
In regards to bible
translating, the following are extracts from the Jerusalem Bible (Doubleday
& Company). From the book of Ecclesiasticus (Sirach); Translator's forward:
(written over 2000 years ago).
"But
it is not enough merely for those who read the scriptures to be learned in
them; students should also be able to be of use to people outside by what they
say or write."
"You
are therefore asked to read this book with good will and attention and to show
indulgence in those places where, not withstanding our efforts at
interpretation, we may seem to have failed to give an adequate rendering of
this or that expression; the fact is that you cannot find an equivalent for
things originally written in Hebrew when you come to translate them into
another language; what is more, you will find on examination that the Law
itself, the Prophets and the other books differ considerably in translation
from what appears in the original text".
["see under Biblical Contradictions"]
In my
opinion, the above statements should be inserted into every translation of every
bible. For these words hold true.
Even if the
book of Ecclesiasticus is not considered as canonical, it is frequently quoted
in the rabbinical writings. In the New Testament, the Epistle of St James
borrows many expressions from it, and it is, next to the psalms, the Old
Testament book most frequently quoted in the Christian liturgy. I want to
state, that in my humble opinion, compared to the book of Ecclesiastes, which
is considered canonical, Ecclesiasticus wins hands down. Any one who reads Ecclesiastes,
in the very beginning at Ch 1 verse 5, "The sun also ariseth, and the sun
goeth down, and hasteth to his place where he arose"; should be tipped of
as to the validity of this book. People before the time of Columbus may have
had an excuse but not in this day and age. And it would be absurd to say that
God made a mistake. The sun does not “hasteth to his place where he
arose", nor revolve around the earth. To brush this aside, we are told
that "that's the way the writer saw things in those days". This would
go to say that scripture then is nothing more than the author's
opinion/perspective and not God's word. How absurd! Another verse 10:19 states
", A feast is made for laughter, and wine maketh merry: but money
answereth all things. Is this God inspired? I think not. The
author of Ecclesiastes no doubt believes in a god/elohiym, but he is writing
human ideas and not necessarily godly wisdom. The book "Song of
songs" can go also. I recommend however, that you do not just throw these
books away. This would be equal to a foolish hungry person being given an apple
with a small speck in it so he throws the whole apple away rather than cutting
out the speck and eating the rest.
In spite of
all the honest efforts of "men of good intentions", Satan has his hands
in everything.
Here is an example: (taken
from the introduction to the
"The
value of a thought-for-thought translation can be illustrated by comparing
The use of the words "slept with his
fathers" may be in error with "lay down with his fathers" being
maybe more correct, however, this idea of suffering physical death and not
being dead is introduced during the time of Jacob when he was in Egypt with
Joseph, for he chose the word "shakab (lie)"(H7901) rather than
"muwth (died)":
Jesus
uses this term also as follows:
Even before
that, the idea of being able to live after one dies is the faith of Abraham:
The idea of
a state one enters after dying, therefore is not new in David's time. They are
not really dead, dead, but alive. This is the New Testament teaching of Christ.
The story of Saul and the woman of Endor gives us an example of the idea of
life continuing after one lies down at physical death. (1 Sam 28:7-19)."
Therefore,
in an attempt to make this scripture easier to be understood, they
exchanged/translated one word with a word (died) that does not appear in the
Hebrew text for
Here is
another example of slight differences in Scripture readings:
It is a well known fact,
among the serious bible readers, that Bibles do contain errors, contradictions,
and gross mistakes in their interpretations plus a bunch of other problems that
cause the weak to stumble. [see under
"Biblical Contradictions"] Some of these problems have existed
from the very beginning and caused great misery to the leaders who had to
answer to the flock. In order to combat this problem, many leaders in the past
tried to force their opinions into dogma with politics and brute force. When
that didn't work, they (the leaders) excommunicated those who held different
opinions, or in some cases had the so-called "heretic” killed. Whereas
they should have encouraged dialog among Christians, which helps to build ones
faith and spiritual strength, rather than restrict this freedom which tends to
destroy the brotherhood of saints. It
should be obvious that Satan has his hand in this matter. Here offered is an
example of this type of scripture interpretation/ changes: John
1:18
(
(NIV)
No one has ever seen God, but God the One and Only, who is at the
Father's side, has made him known.
(NAB)
No one has ever seen God. The only Son, God, who is at the Father's
side, has revealed him.
John 6:46 (KJV) Not that any man hath seen the
Father, save he which is of God, he hath seen the Father.
IMHO, the solution to this error is tangled up
in the misunderstanding about who exactly is Yahuah God.
In regards to Jn 1:18 above, the NIV and the NAB
present Jesus as God in error, along with the misinterpretation of all three
bibles for the Hebrew term “yachiyd/H3173/beloved as “only son” for Ishmael was
Abraham’s son also. Ref: Gen22:2 A
better translation might be “beloved” or maybe something like “God loved”.
The key to sorting out many of these errors lie
in the understanding of the following verse.
Our church
leaders of today are not much different than those that went before them. They
are being led by traditions that were not necessarily founded on the Holy
Spirit. In some cases, they respond to social pressures in direct contradiction
to scripture just to please their members. Women preachers for example, I am
sure Paul would object to. Homosexuals as ordained Ministers ??? This shortage
of preachers should give you a hint as to just how healthy Christianity of
today truly is. We must reunite under the spirit and go back to basics.
Languages in general are imperfect by nature and are constantly changing. To
rely on them to bring out the truth of the matter without the help of the Holy
Spirit is highly unreliable. I sometimes wonder just how much
"doctoring" of Scripture has been done in order to make them agree
with church doctrine or popular opinion.
It would seem to me, only a natural process, for most translations made
after the first council at Nicaea, to be biased towards the doctrine of the
Holy Trinity, considering that the majority of Christianity have accepted this
mystery as truth. Therefore most
participants, even among the Christians themselves, are debating using
questionable text in many cases, resulting in fighting a loosing battle because
they are arguing with text that may not agree with the original Hebrew
text. If scripture is interpreted or
tampered with by one who is not spirit filled, the truth may have gotten lost
in the translation. Here is a couple of
examples related to this particular topic:
Matthew 28:19 (KJV) Go ye therefore, and teach all nations,
baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost: [The part “in the name of etc.” does not appear to have
been in the earliest NT text prior to the Trinity invention. Authoritative sources like Eusebius of
Caesarea, a Palestinian theologian, who wrote some history up to the year
preceding the council of Nicaea of 325AD, refers to the string “in my name”
referring to Jesus and not “in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit,
which are not even names at all. This
type interpolation in scripture had led to the three submersions during the
Baptism ritual, one for each person of the trinity. Many Churches still pour
water on the baptism subject three times in spite of the fact that scripture
states that there is only one baptism, not three. Another famous reference of this nature is
found with 1 John 5:7 which reads “For there are three that bear record in
heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost: and these three are one.” Another apparent
interpolation. Could it be that some early
Church fathers had never read this next verse: Proverbs
30:5 - 6 (KJV) “Every
word of God/elowahh/H433 is pure: he is a
shield unto them that put their trust in him. Add thou not unto his words, lest he
reprove thee, and thou be found a liar.”
[This is
quite clear to me for the above two NT references.]
IMHO, one of
the biggest mistakes made by some critics regarding Biblical accuracy lies in
the misunderstanding of this following verse:
Psalms 119:89 (KJV) For ever, O LORD, thy word is settled in heaven.
[Some infer from these and other Scriptures that God had
promised that He would preserve His Word, according to the heavenly pattern, in
the Greek Received Text. Wherein it is
surely true that his word is settled/secured in Heaven, it is very doubtful
that it is preserved in written/printed form for our edification. Many
Christian interpreters/translators have overlooked Romans 3:1-2 which states: What advantage then hath the Jew? or what profit is
there of circumcision? 2Much every way: chiefly,
because that unto them were committed the oracles of God. The church then chose the Septuagint over the Hebrew text
for communicating God’s oracles.
The idea of classifying certain books/writings
as Holy Scripture is another huge problem and goes back to the pre Christian
period. However, only those with the gift of "discerning spirits" can
detect these errors or problems in interpreting/translating writings. It must
be understood that the "Jews" were not always devout followers of
Yahuah God, but throughout their history they had fallen into following
"false gods", often translated from elohiym (H430) by mistake.
Therefore, it may be virtually impossible to know what state of mind/spirit
some writers were in when composing their works. However, it is clear to me
that modern translations are not all that reliable either. Here is another huge
problem: Take the word that I just mentioned above "elohiym" for
example. There are at least three Hebrew words that are translated simply as
"God, or gods by the Greek and Latin interpreters. These words "el or
elim (plural), elohiym, and elowahh, have been translated using one or two,
singular or plural words without regards to the proper translation of these
most important words used for “God”. The un-spiritual/carnal minds of some
translators did not recognize any distinction among these three words as did
the Hebrew writers. Consequently, when we read a verse like this following, it
is very easy to get led astray.
The Aramaic word used here is equivalent to the
Hebrew "elohiym". Therefore, Jesus was "elohiym" to Thomas:
hence Jesus is God for the reader of English translations of the bible. But the
original texts of the OT use this same word for Moses as being
"elohiym" to Pharaoh, and all nations had their "elohiym"
(mistranslated to mean God, god or gods in the English language. But if there
is only one true God, The Father, then there would be no such thing as Gods.
Ref Proverbs 30:5 as mentioned above. In
short, the words “el” and “elohiym” of the Hebrew language should be understood
as generic terms, and not as the proper name for God, The Father. See the document titled "God", for a clear explanation and more info on this topic.
One must understand that many Hebrew words like
"elohiym" do not have an exact equivalent in other languages. In this case, IMHO, this Hebrew word should
be adopted directly, along with it’s interpretation, by every receptor language
that the bible is to be translated into.
But this is not the only problem. There are
words like "soul", "spirit", "mind",
"heart", "life", self", etc. that are seeming used
interchangeably at times due to an improper understanding of the Hebrew
scriptures, even by the Jews themselves. The Hebrew word "nephesh"
translated "soul" has been translated using
roughly 45 other words; even as "fish" on one incident. In the
roughly 750 occasions that this word is employed in the original Hebrew OT
texts of the
The problems, in my way of seeing them, comes
from the apparent lack of the Holy Spirit in our "able
ministers" of God's words in our scripture. Therefore, before things can
change or get better in the Christian Church, our ministers need a spiritual
healing themselves. It's my humble opinion that the Christian leaders must get
back to first century Christianity and first century scripture.
It is commonly taught that Greek is the language
of the New Testament. Therefore the OT Septuagint would be the
"authorized" or official source for the OT quotes. But IMHO this is
the main problem with our Bibles. They do not always agree with the Old
Testament Hebrew texts they are quoting. This Septuagint was simply the Greek
translation of the Hebrew text, of at least the first five books of the Hebrew
Scriptures, with other books added later to complete the OT. This was translated a couple hundred years
before Christ and contained a few notable errors, IMHO. The concept for
"Hell" in Greek for example, is a concept from their ancient
mythologies. The original Hebrew word "sheol" is an example of this type problem. “The Revised Standard
Version never uses "hell" to translate Sheol. It does use
"grave" one time as a translation of Sheol (Song of Sol. 8:6).
Sixty-four times it simply transliterates the word as Sheol.
Mat 11:14 And if ye will
receive it, this is Elias, which was for to come.]
Here is another problem with translating
scripture, demonstrated here, where different translations are employed for the
same verse. Ref:
Another seemingly small problem stems from the substitution of the
Holy name “Jehovah, Yahweh, Jahweh, Yahuah or variations thereof” with the word
“LORD”. This put the Jews of the first century in trouble, for early in the
Church history, they insisted that this title was to be reserved for
“God/Yahweh” only, and the Emperor could no longer use it. Even when the Greek definition is clear as to
it’s usage. G2962 = κύριος; kurios; koo'-ree-os:
From κῦρος kuros (supremacy); supreme
in authority, that is, (as noun) controller; by implication Mr.
(as a respectful title):—God, Lord, master, Sir. [I personally believe that
the Name for God should not have been tampered with and left as it was in the
original Hebrew text. Scripture makes it
clear that the name should be used and known by His followers; not hidden.]
Here is another small example of word confusion for the Christian
translators. The original Hebrew word
for “wind” is the
same word used for “spirit” which would be H7307 רוּחַ rûach. The Greek word for wind is "G417-anemos M, anima F”.,
which sounds like the same word "anima" in Latin, which translates to
"soul" as the Hebrew (nephesh) and Latin (anima,F, animus M.) This similarity between the Greek word
“anima/wind” and the Latin “anima/soul mixed up with the Hebrew word “nephesh”/soul,
adds confusion to the translators for the Greek texts. Therefore, the Greek word for wind and spirit
and soul should be understood as that offered by the Hebrew definition, IMHO;
for, to me, the Hebrew text and definitions, being the originals, have the higher
value regarding our Christian scripture.
How would it be possible for a translation to be more reliable than the
original, or in other words, why would the Greek translation of the OT be more
correct than the Hebrew text?
I would like to be involved in producing a completely
new translation of the bible using the Holy Spirit and the best Aramaic text
available as the base. However, it would or could not contradict the original
Hebrew text. However, unless this task
were conducted by a joint task force, representing all individual groups under
the umbrella of Christianity, with the end results being, that all of
Christianity should accept this text as the authorized text, and future
revisions allowed by the controlling office of this text. The problem here is, IMHO, that unless all of
the participants and representatives are baptized in the Holy Spirit, they
cannot be part of this force.
In conclusion, IHMO, it is imperative that one
understands the distinctions made with the words that are used in the original
Hebrew text of the Bible to indicate God's involvement, as well as those
seemingly unimportant words that do not agree with the original Hebrew meaning.
For without this understanding, Christianity will continue its journey
following the poor translations that they themselves have created. IMHO, this is all due to the apathy that our
creator has confined mankind under so we must be content with what we have or
else use the Holy Spirit at our disposal and change things for the better. Refer to Rom 11:30 – 32 and check out the
original Greek word translated to “unbelief” which is “apathy”. Please refer to the document titled “God” or “Jesus
Christ” for a better understanding of just who or what is God; and may Yahuah,
the Heavenly Father bless you.
