New guy here. Just reading through some of the threads concerning Bible versions, translation methodologies ... and opinions on which are the "better" versions.

I find it interesting through my travels electronically that there seems to be a consistency in these opinions coming out of the brotherhood. Specifically the accuracy of the ASV 1901, NASB(/rev), NKJV, etc. which typically make the "approved" or "short" list of those approved. Most of this seems to stem from our brotherhood "schools" and/or "seminaries."

With this in mind, I have a few questions for those opinionated in this manner which hopefully will strike up a good discussion on the topic of textual criticism (both traditional and modern).

1) For those of the short list mentioned above, does anyone supporting this position care to explain the influence of Bishop Ellicott and the 1881 revision committee on these modern day translations?

2) Has anyone holding this position dared to study the origins of the works of Nestle-Aland, Black, Geisler, Karavidopoulos, Greisbach & Metzger? If so, what is their relation to the work of the 1881 revision dictated by the quartet ... Wescott and Hort, Codex B, and Codex Aleph?

3) What is the Traditional Text? Is it the same as the Textus Receptus, the Received Text or the Majority Text? If so how, if not why?

4) Why is your opinion formulated in this way towards these versions/translations? ... i.e. what evidence have you found, beyond what professor umty-scrunch taught you in school, that supports your position? If you believe the prof, then let's discuss the details from his lecture notes one by one.

Such questions were posed to me long ago by the Dean of Chichester ... leading to new enlightenment.

v/r

B.G.

I have opinions only about the KJV, the NKJV, the NIV, and The Living Bible.

My opinion about the KJV and the NIV are mostly based on the fact that I have them in parallel, with Nestle's Greek, on one volume. The NIV seems to take more liberties with the original than the KJV does, although both of them commit their share of mistakes. I am persuaded by this that the NIV translators, more frequently than the KJV translators, succumbed to the temptation to interpret, as opposed to simply translating.

Since the KJV is in many passages meticulously faithful to the original, the vast differences between it and The Living Bible lead me to regard the latter as more of a commentary than a translation.

I preach out of the King James because it is the most widely used where I am. I study from the KJV NKJV, ASV, NAS, ESV, as well as many others. My preferences are my own and have nothing to do with any professor, as I have yet to take any courses of a religious nature at an institute of higher learning.

I have not yet found a perfect translation. However as John has said I put more weight into a translation based on the philosophy of the translators.

Perhaps you would like to share with us your considered opinion?

*EDIT - I meant to say this in my original posting. Welcome to the forum! We are glad that you are here. Would you explain for everyone the meaning of your name? I have a good idea but just to let everyone know where you are coming from. Thanks!

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John 6:67-68: "Jesus said therefore unto the twelve, 'Would ye also go away?' Simon Peter answered him, 'Lord, to whom shall we go? thou hast the words of eternal life.'"

Neil Lightfoot's "How We Got The Bible" addresses the issues that have been raised. It is a good read that will lead to some good stuy on an individual's part. Also, F.F. Bruce's "The New Testament Documents Are They Reliable" is good as well.

Ghost, I learned a long time ago not to bring my professors notes into a study on an internet site. If you want to share, share what you have learned, not what someone has told you. I have found myself over the years disagreeing more and more with that I was "taught in school".

I assume (you did not say so) you are making reference to the Elliott who headed up (I think he headed it up) the "New Testament Revision Committee". There is some interesting material on this and worthy of time to study.

POST EDIT: Though often neglected, most study Bibles have a pretty good history ( of how the translation, revision, and texts used, regarding that translation) in the introduction section of the Bible.

Kindly,
Don

__________________
Don Gelles,
Preacher, Church of Christ in Hyde Park
Austin, Texas
www.hydeparkcoc.org

BG,

The best Bible is one that is well studied, dog-eared, marked in. Unless it is a grossly mis-written version, I can save a soul with it.

I do however, refuse to support any version that doesn't properly record the virgin birth or the deity of our Lord.

__________________
Butch Adams
Blue Ridge, VA
http://daleridgechurchofchrist.net
http://mydailypause.org

I totally agree with your assessment of the NIV and Living Bible translations and can provide factual evidence for such.

Concerning the share of mistakes in the KJV, I agree that some passages (e.g. John 3) have had Greek-English translational errors (corrected in the Modern KJV and others), however I am much more curious as to your implied common root from which the KJV and the NIV originate ... relative to liberties taken with the original ... what NT Greek text do you infer is the original? KJV and NIV come from two totally diametrically opposed approaches to textual criticism ... and the later from a totally rewritten Greek-NT which originated in 1881. I assume you address the Nestle-Aland Greek NT as the origin text from which both translations stem? Which then leads us to the inevitable questions ... how accurate is the Nestle-Aland Greek NT to the original autographs and what factual proof do we have of such?

For a parallel discussion, it should also be noted that the MT(majority text) which generated the KJV and the MT ("majority text" revised by Hodges and Farstad in the spirit of Baron von Soden) which generated the NKJV are vastly different. The NKJV being based upon the Codex Vaticanus (Codex B) to 90% and to the rest of the testimony by merely 10%. Combined with the O.T Hebrew text of Kittel(Biblia Hebraica translated by Kittel), the NKJV provides a path back toward textual chaos, versus the improvement(i.e. correcting the issues with KJV) which it was originally supposed to do. Thus the KJV and NKJV have no common NT Greek textual ancestor. What a shame.

v/r

B.G.

You seem to be making the same arguments that John William Burgon made (hence your screen name).
You are basically saying that we can not trust the Westcott and Hort Greek and thus those translations based upon it are flawed.

For those who want to read his works and his arguments you can google his name and get plenty of info on the web.

Kindly,
Don

__________________
Don Gelles,
Preacher, Church of Christ in Hyde Park
Austin, Texas
www.hydeparkcoc.org

It has been suggested by other teachers that this thread be unlocked. It is now open for posting. Feel free to post away.

Kindly,
Don

__________________
Don Gelles,
Preacher, Church of Christ in Hyde Park
Austin, Texas
www.hydeparkcoc.org

Ghost made the point that it would be better for one to go to the library to study the material written by Burgon on the issue of Textual Criticism. Since his materiel is quite dated, some of it is available in PDF format. But the point is well made about making use of the library. One advantage of a library, is that you can get a broad perspective on textual criticism because of the selection of book that will be available to you.

I think it was Bruce Terry that had a pretty good Bibliography regarding textual criticism. This may save you some time in searching for books. I have his book (thick) which lists the textual variants in the N.T. I have found it to be useful- though not exhaustive by any means.

Kindly,
Don

__________________
Don Gelles,
Preacher, Church of Christ in Hyde Park
Austin, Texas
www.hydeparkcoc.org

I am afraid I am not understanding all the efforts to discredit the word of God. We are promised that "heaven and earth shall pass away but My words will not pass away." Thiis is recorded 3 times in the NT....Matt.24.35;Mark 13.31 and Luke 21.33. I believe those scriptures, and trust that God has seen that His promise has always been true, and always will be. I am not proposing that the KJV is the only version to use, but it has been the only one available to the vast majority of Christians for a very long time.
I, myself, used the NASB for most of my Christian life. Only recently I bought the NKJV since so many use it. I am aware that a lot of the KJV is obsolete language now, but it contains the truth that God wants us to know, and so do the newer translations that I mentioned.
I am very leary of the NIV. I see no reason for the church to adopt it, but I see some of our preachers are using it, in the pulpits and in bible classes. I am thinking this may not be the word of God that He promised??

I know we need to be wise in what we believe, but I also believe we need to have more faith that God's promise is good, and always has been.

I agree with what brother Butch said. The plan of salvation can be taught from any version of the NT that I have, and I have several, including the Phillips, the NEB, and the Confraternity ( in parallel form). I have read the Jehovahs Witness' book, and it, too, contains the plan of salvation.

I hope I am not sounding contentious, but if I cannot believe the promise that I quoted is true, how can I believe that any of His promises are?

Your sister in Christ

Marian

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If we live in Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit. Gal. 5.25 NJKV

I must have spoken ambiguously; I did not intend to assert or imply that both the KJV and the NIV came from the same source text; I merely stated that I have a book which has the KJV, NIV, and Nestle text in parallel. I have a couple other Greek texts as well, and from them I can see that some of the differences between the KJV and NIV can be attributed to differences in the source texts.

Butch,

I am in total agreement with you in being well studied, dog eared and marked(notes). I have one question though ... how do you know if any translation is grossly mis-written? What then by brother is the standard NT Greek text for comparison to know a English translation deviant? This is the heart of the textual criticism debate between the traditionalist and modernists.

v/r

BG

I don't care for the additions of the Alexandrian manuscripts. The Vaticanus has entire sections ripped out. I think the missing sections have a suspicious coincidence with scripture that would prove some catholic doctrine wrong.

I prefer word for word translations.

Grossly mistranslated means that even I can show someone their error with my Strong's numbers. My previous statement about the virgin birth and the deity of my Lord applies here too.

...b

__________________
Butch Adams
Blue Ridge, VA
http://daleridgechurchofchrist.net
http://mydailypause.org

Hi Ghost,

The above is somewhat of a loaded question . I say this because there is not ONE standard Greek Text used. With the difference among scholars as to the "quality" of Greek texts available, this question is going to be answered based on what "group" you hang with.

I prefer the Novum Testamentum Graece (most just call it Nestle-Aland because of their work on it.) This as you know is the Greek Text used for the NASB. My NASB 95 update has the 26th edition of the Nestle but I think there has been one or perhaps two "updates" to that since then. I don't know if they are using 27th or 28th editions now. Why do I prefer this... bias . I'm just being honest bro!

Most of the work being done on translations today makes use of Nestle-Aland. Not only this, it is the text used by most schools of preaching and universities (I say most- but that is my opinion based on talking with those that took Greek). I still have my little blue edition of Novum Testamentum Graece sitting on my book shelf next to all my dusty Greek books and study aids. Of course, while in school all my memory work was used from this text as well. Since this was way back in 91 I would have to look to see what edition it was.

I think this version of the Greek Text is preferred for some good reasons.
1. It has had extensive scholarly review, revision, and critical debate done to it.
2. It is one of the best footnoted Greek Testaments for variant renderings. Excellent for a discussion on Textual Variants when they come up. (Again, I recommend Bruce Terry and his book on variants)
3. Metzger (you know he died last year-right?) likes it and I am appreciative of his work in the area of Textual Criticism.
4. We used Gordon Fee's book in class, so I was exposed to his work and he defended the use of this Greek Text.
5. My biggest reason- it makes use of the critical text. I want the most amount of texts gathered, considered, compared and then a decision made with relevant variants noted.

So I am the first to admit Ghost, that my liking of it as a "Standard Greek Text" is as you can see, slightly biased because of my background.

I do not use the NASB 95 Update exclusively, but have come to appreciate its English translation of the Greek Text (Nestle-Aland). I have been perplexed by their choice of some of the variants, but a study usually brings me to at least understand why it was chosen- even if I still disagree.

Thanks for the questions and I do hope that you feel welcomed to the site. Welcome!

Brotherly,
Don

__________________
Don Gelles,
Preacher, Church of Christ in Hyde Park
Austin, Texas
www.hydeparkcoc.org

For those with an interest in a short- I mean real short- introduction to Textual Criticism, I offer Bruce Terry's words. They give a brief intro to a very interesting field of study.

An Introduction To Textual Criticism

The original writings of the New Testament no longer exist. They have been destroyed by the processes of time. But the New Testament has been preserved in God's providence by copies being made, first of the originals and then later copies of the copies and so on through the centuries. The earliest complete copy of the New Testament that we have was made about 300 years after the New Testament was written, although manuscripts of some parts have been found that were copied less than 100 years after the originals were written. For the first fifteen hundred years of copying, copies had to be made by hand. This means that all the types of errors that can creep into handwritten copies can be found in the manuscripts of the New Testament. Fortunately we have enough copies to establish what the original read like with a good degree of certainty. This is the task of textual criticism: to examine the manuscripts and determine what is original text and what are copying errors.

One of the drawbacks of making copies is that once a mistake has been made, unless it is so obvious as to be corrected, it will appear in all the copies of that copy from now on. Because of this, consideration must be given to the age of the manuscripts that contain a particular reading as well as the number of manuscripts that contain it. If an error is made in an early manuscript, all the copies from it will contain that error. If it was an often copied manuscript, there will be many manuscripts that contain that error, so the true text cannot be arrived at by counting manuscripts.

Manuscripts that were copied from the same or similar manuscripts show similar readings and similar errors. These manuscripts are grouped together in what is sometimes called text families, or in this book, types of ancient text. In the second to fourth centuries four major types of ancient text appeared. They are commonly given the names Alexandrian, Western, Caesarean, and Byzantine.

The Alexandrian type of text is slightly shorter than the other kinds of text. It is the kind of text found in the three oldest manuscripts that contain most of the New Testament: Sinaiticus (manuscript S), Alexandrinus (manuscript A, Alexandrian not in the Gospels, but in the rest of the New Testament), and Vaticanus (manuscript B). Most textual critics today consider this to be the most reliable form of ancient text.

The Western type of ancient text is the longest of the four kinds. It shows a tendency to paraphrase readings, to add material, and sometimes omit material. The Latin translations, including the Vulgate, generally follow this kind of ancient text. It is probably the least trustworthy of the four kinds of ancient text. But it did arise very early in the copying of the New Testament, and so where it agrees with the Alexandrian type of ancient text, there is a strong possibility that this is the original reading.

The Caesarean type of ancient text has been identified only for the Gospels. Only a few manuscripts show this kind of text.

The Byzantine type of ancient text seems to be the most recent of the four. It was apparently produced in an attempt to produce a common type of text. It shows a tendency to combine readings of the other types of text. It became the standard Greek text for the church of the middle ages, and so is the text used in most later manuscripts. Some textual critics today prefer this kind of ancient text as being the closest to the original and refer to it as the Majority Text, since it is found in the majority of manuscripts. It is the type of ancient text found in the Gospels of manuscript Alexandrinus (manuscript A). The King James Version was based on this kind of text, although it sometimes follows the Latin Vulgate instead.

When textual critics begin to try to determine which reading is the original text, they do not merely count manuscripts; rather they consider the ages of the manuscripts that have a particular reading, the type of ancient text or texts that these manuscripts belong to, and the character of the copyists of these manuscripts. For this last, they ask questions such as: Was this a careful copyist? What kinds of mistakes did this copyist often (or occasionally) make? Where a reading is found in more than one kind of ancient text, it is more likely to be original than a reading found in only one kind of ancient text.

But textual criticism is not just a matter of looking at the manuscripts that contain the variant readings. The readings themselves must be examined. Sometimes the original reading will be found in only one type of ancient text. The clue to it is often found by asking what would have caused the error. It could have been accidental, due to a mistake of the eyes or ears. Or it could have been an intentional change. The textual critic must look for a reason for such a change. In general, copyists were more likely to change difficult readings to easier ones, so the more difficult readings are often the original ones. And they were more likely to add material than omit it, so the shorter reading is more likely than not to be original.

Everyone who has tried to copy something by hand has found out that it is easy to make mistakes accidentally, and the men who copied the New Testament were subject to these same kinds of mistakes. Early Greek manuscripts were written in all capital letters, without punctuation or accent marks, and with no spaces between words, like this:

Sometimes the eye of a copyist would jump back to similar letters and he would copy the same thing twice. Sometimes his eye would jump ahead to similar letters and he would omit the text between them. Sometimes he would mistake one letter for another and thus write a similarly spelled word. Sometimes when several manuscripts were being copied at once by having one man read the text to several copyists, a copyist would make a mistake of the ear and write down a word that sounded like the one that the reader spoke. All of these kinds of accidental mistakes are found in the New Testament manuscripts, and the textual critic must watch for them.

But there are also some intentional changes that are found in the manuscripts. Sometimes a copyist would omit or change material that he thought was superfluous, harsh, or contrary to his beliefs or practices. Copyists would often bring parallel passages into perfect agreement by changing one or the other of them to read like the other. This especially happened in the Gospels, where even whole verses were sometimes added to one Gospel from another. It also happened with Old Testament quotations, where copyists had a tendency to change quotations that the writer had paraphrased to read exactly like the Greek Old Testament. Copyists would sometimes replace rare or unfamiliar words with more familiar synonyms. Sometimes they would try to improve the grammar and smooth out the text to read easier. The textual critic must be on the lookout for all of these kinds of changes. He must always ask: Is there is any reason why copyists might have changed one reading to another? Often the reason for a change gives the clue to the original reading.

For the reader who wishes to find out more about the science of textual criticism, a good beginning text is Neil Lightfoot's How We Got the Bible and a more advanced text is Bruce Metzger's The Text of the New Testament: Its Transmission, Corruption and Restoration.

__________________
Don Gelles,
Preacher, Church of Christ in Hyde Park
Austin, Texas
www.hydeparkcoc.org

My dear sister,

Your quotes of scripture are dear to my heart and I too agree that God has not lied and has preserved his word.

The problem is not that I question the accuracy of the Bible, but that ungodly men in the 1800's mishandled the NT Greek text, by adding in variants from two highly corrupted Uncials (Codex B and Aleph). An adding in is to say the least .... they actually re-rewrote the traditional text that was handed down from generation to generation. I believe that God is true to his word and has never allowed the true vine to end or see corruption. Thus, like the church, we have the apostate branch(es) and the true vine.

I am sure this will be discussed in detail as Don has posted an enormous amount of modern text jargon for us to digest and discuss.

But to open the "can-o-worms" as they say we do not have to discuss Greek Uncials, cursives, papyri, etc ... please take all the English versions you mentioned or like (along with their various revisions if you have them) and turn to Mark 16:9-20. Tell me what the text says ... or does not say as the case may be??? Check all the Jots and Tiddles ;-) as Jesus did!

v/r

BG

Not only is Vaticanus missing sections, but it disagrees more with itself than it agrees. Yet Don posted quotes from modern "textual critics" which claim it to be the purist and most ancient which is ... a flat out lie to mankind. Codex Aleph is almost just as bad .. Tischendorf discovered and worshiped this one like Westcott & Hort did Codex B (Vaticanus). One cannot pull the traditional text from one Uncial! God was wise in that he created multiple lineages/vines of the traditional text(of the word) so that if any one became corrupt, the text could still be resolved from the mass of copies and other lines. Sound familiar? Seems He was all wise in His Word and Church.

Word for Word is what God demands. We must make sure His words are what is written in our hearts .. not some PhD's dissertation from Oxford on how the Bible should be treated like all other text books .. such could not pass 8th grade science fair via the scientific method for proof of or support of conclusion drawn.

v/r

BG

Sorry. I guess we can just cut all the conversation on Textual Criticism and just agree with you now that the KJV is the only version to be used. Is that better? Or did I use to much jargon for you?

DG

__________________
Don Gelles,
Preacher, Church of Christ in Hyde Park
Austin, Texas
www.hydeparkcoc.org