Posts by Wonderment

28

What other ancient Greek Manuscripts contained the divine name?

by yaddayadda in

the society in appendix 1a of their 'kingdom interlinear translation of the christian greek scriptures' refers to nine other greek manuscripts as containing the divine name, and they quote from jerome as referring to certain 'greek volumes' containing the tetragrammaton.

can anyone shed any light on what these greek manuscripts and volumes are and their dates of writing?

here is what the society says in full: .

Wonderment

adamah said:

More disturbing is the deliberate mistranslation of words and phrases from the Hebrew Torah which significantly change the meaning of the Biblical accounts, in order to remove certain pesky details, eg their ignoring the Hebrew phrase (le haskil, 'to make one wise') from Genesis 3:6 (which is found in both the Masoretic and Samaritan Torah), which explains WHY Eve desired to eat the fruit.

The NWT is the only modern translation to 'cherry-pick' from the Septuagint (Hebrew to Greek) or Vulgate (Greek to Latin) specifically for this verse, probably because they wanted to ignore the element which explained Eve's motivation for eating the fruit : Eve wanted to be wise!

The NWT is not the only modern translation to render Gen. 3:6 as it did.

Check:

The Five Books of Moses; The Bible in Living English; Moffatt's Bible Translation; Lamsa's Translation; The Clear Word; Biblia Peshitta; The New English Bible.

It is not unusual for Bible translators to cherry-pick from the Septuagint and the Vulgate throughout the Old Testament, not only in Gen. 3:6.

9

The Name of God as Revealed in Exodus 3:14 - according to ...

by *lost* in

k j cronin.

a website dedicated to the interpretation of exodus 3v14.. .

'' exodus 3v14 is universally recognised as being amongst the greatest interpretive challenges in the bible.. .

Wonderment

To unstopableravens:

Actually Jesus made reference to "I am" on various occasions, however, he never stated he was "the" I am. That is quite different.

33

1/15 WT- Guilt, Guilt, and More Guilt ! Black & White Cult Reasoning !

by flipper in

jw
friends

this particular article was discussed or touched on a couple months ago regarding the wt society's statement concerning jw's putting " jehovah above everything else- including the family bond " .

so i won't address those points in this thread, but there are many other points to address where the wt society uses guilt and black & white cult reasoning to control jw's minds with this information from the article titled, " let nothing distance you from jehovah ".

first off in paragraph 5 the wt tries to make people feel guilty looking for work and insists that if you get any job that takes you away from family- it will distance you from jehovah !

Wonderment

The way I see it, if someone is going to make me feel guilty for the way I use my time, I'd say this:

If you don't help me pay my bills, shut the f*** up!

It's easy for WT writers come up with all these "godly" suggestions, but some of them have no idea what it is to live in the real world. We have to pay the rent, buy food, pay car expenses, clothing, and all the other little things we can't do without in the real world, like paying a phone bill, and feminine napkins for the ladies. Some of the WT leaders live in their own bubble, where everything is served to them in a golden platter. No wonder many of them live past their nineties, where the rest of us mortals are lucky if we hit 70's.

Wait, I forgot the WTBTS have to pay their bills too. And it is the millions of naive zombies all-ready to answer the Saturday call (Read: "shills"), that makes it all possible for them to greatly sustain their already generous coffers... while we struggle to buy underwear and toothpaste.

11

Is the NWT a translation or simply a rewording w/ edits ?

by mP in

did they really start from teh greek, hebrew and aramaic texts and translate or did freddy and the friends simply take other bibles and reword each and every sentence.

naturally during this exercise they would have altered the text to make it comptaible with their eschatology.

i think this best explains what really happen during those sessions as they had no literary skills they honestly couldnt read the originals.. .

Wonderment

james_woods: "I have absolutely no confidence that the NWT was actually a word by word translation from original language records - as the original poster says, they really did not have the scholarship available to accomplish such a thing."

Certainly, you have plenty of company who agree with you. However, some scholars say the opposite. My personal research have led me to side with those scholars that see scholarly value in the translation.

11

Is the NWT a translation or simply a rewording w/ edits ?

by mP in

did they really start from teh greek, hebrew and aramaic texts and translate or did freddy and the friends simply take other bibles and reword each and every sentence.

naturally during this exercise they would have altered the text to make it comptaible with their eschatology.

i think this best explains what really happen during those sessions as they had no literary skills they honestly couldnt read the originals.. .

Wonderment

slimboyfat: "Which translation starts "originally" in the gospel of John? Is it Goodspeed's translation?

"Originally" was used by Rotherham, and the early editions of the NWT, probably in answer to the question? ...How should we render the first two words of John 1:1 (en arche) lacking the article?

As I stated in another related post, I can see where some translators influenced the NWT translation choices in some places (such as Rotherham, ASV, Emphatic Diaglott, Concordant, Goodspeed and Moffatt), but overall, the NWT went their own way.

The NWT did not choose anyone version to go by verse by verse. A close comparison of the NWT with the original texts show that the NWT was made directly as they say, from the Hebrew and Greek Texts, and not from another version.

69

New World Translation

by MsD in

jw
friends

it may seem like a stupid question but who was responsible for translating their version of the bible?

i heard it was ray franz, several governing body members.

does anybody have any legitimate info that can prove who exactly translated it?

Wonderment

james_woods:

"Perhaps they "could have" done it in two years, Wonderment - but they didn't. How long they took proves nothing."

It may not "prove" anything, notwithstanding, any major Bible translation project takes more than 5 years. The NIV project had a cost of millions of dollars and many years of work to accomplish what they did. But the 6 simple steps suggested by a poster here is not realistic with what we know of the time the NWT project took. Even for a corporation of the magnitude of the WTBTS, projects requiring a long time and resources are weighted carefully.

69

New World Translation

by MsD in

jw
friends

it may seem like a stupid question but who was responsible for translating their version of the bible?

i heard it was ray franz, several governing body members.

does anybody have any legitimate info that can prove who exactly translated it?

Wonderment

Pterist:

I ask of you:

Can you or someone else here show me just one scripture in the Bible where it says:

"God himself took this human flesh upon him." (William Barclay; Many Witnesses, One Lord, p27 )

69

New World Translation

by MsD in

jw
friends

it may seem like a stupid question but who was responsible for translating their version of the bible?

i heard it was ray franz, several governing body members.

does anybody have any legitimate info that can prove who exactly translated it?

Wonderment

Jeffro:

How to 'translate' the Bible, Watch Tower Society style:

Start with the text of the King James Version.
Perform a search-and-replace of archaic terms with modern words (e.g. moveth --> moving; shambles --> meat market, lest ye --> for fear you may)
Change awkward Old English word order (e.g. he commanded them not --> he had not proscribed for them)
Replace regular verbs with progressive verbs (e.g. he rested --> proceeded to rest; God called --> God went on to say)
Change passages where required for doctrinal bias. (e.g. for Babylon --> at Babylon; the angels of God worship him --> And let all God's angels do obeisance to him)
Proof-read and send to press.

If the NWT Committe had done what you are suggesting, they could have done their version in two years, not fourteen, which is the time they took to do their original version. Besides, had you done a thorough comparison of the NWT version with the Hebrew and Greek Texts, you would have found out that there are thousands of particulars which cannot be answered by your six suggestions. Thus, I cannot take your suggestions seriously.

I don't agree with all the translation choices of the NWT, just as I do not agree with other Bible versions translation choices all the time. But overall, most translators are sincere, and do a pretty good job at it, the NWT included. All translations fall short somewhere, because they are done by imperfect humans with limited knowledge.

69

New World Translation

by MsD in

jw
friends

it may seem like a stupid question but who was responsible for translating their version of the bible?

i heard it was ray franz, several governing body members.

does anybody have any legitimate info that can prove who exactly translated it?

Wonderment

It is not the NWT alone who translate proskyneo as

"obeisance," or other, as for example in Heb. 1.6, where

Christ is spoken of:

“ And let them bow before him --all messengers of

God” (Young's Literal Translation)

‘ Now let all messengers of God honour him ’ (Ferrar

Fenton Translation)

“ And let all the angels of God pay him homage”

(George R. Noyes New Testament)

“ And all of God's messengers should bow down to

him.” (A Non-Ecclesiastical NT, Frank Daniel)

“ And prostrate yourselves to him all God's angels” (21 st Century New Testament)

“ And let do obeisance to him all angels of God”

(The Apostolic Bible Polyglot)

“ and let all God's angels do him reverence ” (The

Bible in Living English , Steven T. Byington)

“ Let all the angels of God bow down before him .”

(Open English Bible)

“ And let all the angels of God bow down to him ”

(Riverside New Testament , William G. Ballantine)

“ Dénle homenaje [ Give him homage ] todos los

ángeles de Dios [all angels of God] ” (Pablo

Besson)

“ Let all the messengers of God bow low before

him.”(2001 Translation - An American English

Bible)

“ And let all the messengers of God bow down in

deference to him.” (CGV, Joseph Morovich)

“ Let all the angels of God bow down before him ”

(Twentieth Century New Testament)

“ Let all God’s angels kneel before him.” (Cotton

Patch Version, Clarence Jordan)

“ And let all God's angels bow before him ” (Edgar J.

Goodspeed New Testament)

“ Et que tous les anges de Dieu lui rendent

hommage [And let all angels of God pay him

homage]” (French Darby Bible)

“ And let all God's angels pay him homage” (The

Authentic New Testament , Hugh J. Schonfield)

“ Before him shall bow all messengers of God”

(Andy Gaus New Testament)

“ Let all God's angels pay him homage ” (Revised

English Bible)

“ And may all the angels pay homage to him”

(Heinz W. Cassirer's New Testament)

“ Let all the angels of God pay him homage ” (New

Jerusalem Bible)

Quotes taken from :

http://www.scribd.com/doc/48234022/Did-the-New-World-Translation-Committee-Know-Any-Greek

69

New World Translation

by MsD in

jw
friends

it may seem like a stupid question but who was responsible for translating their version of the bible?

i heard it was ray franz, several governing body members.

does anybody have any legitimate info that can prove who exactly translated it?

Wonderment

jgnat: "Except, Wonderment, where the translator of the NWT chose to use ‘worship’ or ‘obeisance’. Wonder of wonders, ‘obeisance’ was used every time Jesus was worshipped. It was a pattern of selection based on doctrine, not the context of the text itself."

And how is this different from using red letters exclusively for Jesus Christ and not for the Father in some Bible versions? Didn't Jesus say,"the Father is greater than I am"? Was not the glorified Christ subject to the "head" (God) according to 1 Cor. 11:3?

It is odd to read on occasions in these versions where God the Father is speaking to Christ, and the ‘lesser’ Christ gets special attention by having red letters when Christs speaks, but not God who is above him. This red lettering convention seems to be "a pattern based on doctrine, not the context of the text itself."