Prof. Jason BeDuhn letter on the NWT/KIT (part 1)

by bj 25 Replies latest jw friends

• 

  chasson

  Hi all,

  My little contribution:

  in this long thread, all you talk about the NWT, but NWT has different version (1961,1974,1985,1995 in french). I have in my possession a 1961 NWT, when you compare it with a 1995 NWT, you can see a deepest difference. The 1961'w version is bad french and some verses are very long comparing the 1995's NWT.

  perhaps at the beginning, Fred Franz and the others were not real translators and there was a lot of critics which were true about this works. Years after years, they have improving their knowledge on the greek and hebrew. Why must we blame them about it.

  Bye

  Charles
• 

  Liquidizer

  Good thoughts, you all. I have not personally had any particular problems with the NWT and this applies even now when Im an ex-JW. The NWT has its good sides and bad sides. Generally speaking it is an okay translation but it shouldnt be used alone. The best view of the Bible can be obtained by reading many different translations. Every translation has its merits and none of the translators are without some kind of religious biases. The reason why the WTS has not revealed the members of the NWT translation committee is that by doing it that way it creates an aura of the divine quidance of the translation team and makes it easier to be held as a superior or almost divine revelation even though it is in fact a human work of translation.

  L.
• 

  Moxy

  ah, the voice of reason. how refreshing.

  thanks for comments, alan, h_s and especially ginny. thanks for taking the trouble to format and post your correspondance. were there any replies after your last email?

  i felt that i had researched and understood the merits of NWT Jo1:1c fairly well as a JW. i never thought it was the very BEST wording, but certainly allowable, and definitely superior to KJ. my expanded research since then into non-jw/ex-jw sources has turned up enough bias and emotionally loaded verbiage to make me a bit sick. and none of it significantly altered my opinion of the wording of that particular passage.

  mox
• 

  GinnyTosken

  Hillary_Step,

  You said:
  

  Do you think that sometimes XJW’s do this also? In many ways being an XJW can be as dangerous to our thinking as being a JW. There is a strange relief in being able to live in a world of black and white, saints and sinner, friends and foes. The WTS has turned this thinking into an art form, crystallizing the mentality of its adherents to the point that they are prepared to die for other peoples lost causes.

  Yes, I do think that sometimes ex-JWs continue in black and white thinking--they simply switch sides. Old habits die hard.

  When I find myself reacting strongly and emotionally to something done by the Society, I ask myself, "Would I react as strongly if this had been done by Catholics, Mormons, or Pentecostals?" This usually helps me gauge how much of reaction comes from old wounds and how much is from moral indignation.

  Moxy,

  Jason BeDuhn and I did exchange a few more e-mails after the one I shared here. He has not given me permission to quote from those e-mails.

  Ginny
• 

  hillary_step

  Moxy,

  You said :

  I felt that i had researched and understood the merits of NWT Jo1:1c fairly well as a JW. i never thought it was the very BEST wording, but certainly allowable, and definitely superior to KJ. my expanded research since then into non-jw/ex-jw sources has turned up enough bias and emotionally loaded verbiage to make me a bit sick. and none of it significantly altered my opinion of the wording of that particular passage.

  The point you make is significant. The development of opposing arguments can very quickly lay down battle plans for personal agendas during which JW's, ex JW's and even scholars can quickly lose their objectivity.

  Maximus wisely remided us recently of of the words of Neitzche, - 'Those who fight monsters must not become monsters themselves'.

  Thank you again for your comment.

  Ginny,

  You said:

  When I find myself reacting strongly and emotionally to something done by the Society, I ask myself, "Would I react as strongly if this had been done by Catholics, Mormons, or Pentecostals?" This usually helps me gauge how much of reaction comes from old wounds and how much is from moral indignation.

  Your comment is to my way of thinking one of the wisest that I have read on the Board in recent weeks.

  Thankyou - HS
• 

  julien

  This thread is interesting to me. I have read quite a lot of criticism of the NWT in the past (including the book by Countess) and found a lot of it to be reasonable. Not to mention that there did seem to be a large number of Greek scholars who had made statements against the NWT, and the fact that the WTBTS's list of supporting scholars was pretty weak (in some cases misleading regarding their credentials). Now this one scholar pipes up and basically says that criticism is all wrong, those 20 people you mentioned are all wrong, really in fact there is no consensus against the NWT because scholars don't have time, in fact the NWT is fabulous, etc. Just seems very curious. I for one did not find Countess' book "mostly tendentious and disputable". Of course I am not a Greek scholar [tm].
  While I agree that the NWT is quite literally acurate in 99% of the verses, it is the 1% of tweaking that is an issue IMHO.
• 

  Pork Chop

  My sincerest compliments to bj, Ginny for sharing this information with us and to AlanF for your comments. It's very refreshing.
• 

  hillary_step

  Julien,

  Perhaps the issue is not whether the NWT or KIT are 'fabulous' translations but whether the translation contain any more of a bias than any other translation. My studies over the years have convinced me that apart from one or two obvious areas of bias it is not the monstrous translation that some have accused it of being.

  You must remember that it is not that easy to find a scholarly reaction to the NWT or KIT for the reason than many Greek Scholars are also committed Christians and already have a firm set of theological standards by which they make a judgment and remember, that their beliefs have often been ignorantly and arrogantly attacked by the WTS in its publications. Professor J. BuDuhn is a 'pure' historian, not a theologian, he has no ax to grind in the issue and as he correctly intimated if you wrote a book, would you try to sell it using negative feedback or positive feedback?

  To illustrate, if you were to ask Dr. John C. Whitcomb, Professor Of Theology and a committed 'young earth creationist' to review a book suggesting the possibility of a local flood, it would be difficult, despite his academic status to give an unbiased opinion. Now add to this situation that the authors of the ‘Local Flood Thesis’ had previously arrogantly attacked Whitcomb, what would be the result? Scholars are just people, translators are just people too. It is not possible for an unbiased translation to be achieved while humans translate.

  So the question is, if the KIT was to be graded as a work at your local University by historians, how would be graded. Prof. BuDuhn seems to give it an A-, I would perhaps give it a B++. I think if DuDuhn had been a JW for very long and subsequently realized HOW the translation was used, which is the real issue, he may not have thought seriously about a re-grading the KIT, but may have re-graded his opinion of the WTS.

  Best to you all - HS
• 

  AlanF

  I agree with your comments, HS.

  Julien, the fact that quite a few trinitarian scholars strongly criticize the NWT for "bias" is only to be expected. For many trinitarians, that doctrine is as emotionally strong as is the "faithful slave" doctrine for most JWs. It is simply beyond valid criticism in their view. For any trinitarian scholar to allow that the NWT's rendering has any support at all would be like a District Overseer allowing that perhaps JW leaders are not "the faithful slave" after all. For all of these people it would be political suicide and they'd lose their careers. This is especially true of scholars who are looked up to as bastions of trinitarianism.

  In my opinion, the best and most comprehensive discussion of John 1:1 is by Murray Harris in Jesus As God. He comes down solidly for a trinitarian interpretation of the Bible, but his comments about the usual "the Word was God" rendering are extremely interesting. In his view, using "God" here is wrong because that rendering equates "the Word" and "God" -- which is not what trinitarians generally teach. He rejects "a god" here but I find his arguments weak. The bottom line is that the Greek "theos" has no good English equivalent, because it comprehends a much broader range of meanings than "god" or "God", both denotationally and in the cultural context of koine Greek. So any terse English rendering is bound to lose something in the translation. Harris sort of favors something like "what God was the Word was", but even this is not completely accurate without a good deal of footnoting.

  AlanF
• 

  julien

  I am not all that concerned about John 1:1, my feeling has always been that "the word was divine" or as you said "what God was the Word was" was probably close to the author's intended meaning. There are a lot of other places where bias seems to be present; however I suppose you could say the NWT is no worse than other translations in this regard. Of course when you have the JWs all claiming it is the most perfect translation you are going to see some ruffled feathers.