WHICH BIBLE TO USE?
07/03/24 18:14
Many people have their favorite Bibles and they have different reasons for using that particular Bible. The most common question I get is, "Which Bible should I use? Which one is the best?"
Around the fifth century, a man by the name of Jerome translated the Bible into Latin. Later, John Wycliffe took the Latin version and translated it into Middle English. Wycliffe suffered persecution and death duo to his translation; as well as anyone who had possession of the translation. William Tyndale took the Hebrew and Greek text and wrote the first English translation. Because there were not good English words to convey the meaning of the original words, Tyndale is accredited with creating many English words used today. Tyndale competed the New Testament but was burned at the stake before completing the Old Testament. His assistant, John Rogers, completed the work and was killed also.
The Bible that we hold is a result of many men and woman who laid down their lives to get this Word to the people. Far be it from us to leave this Book on a shelf or table and not dive into it; and see what these men gave their lives for. We do have a treasure in our hands; and it’s called the Bible. It’s worth giving our lives to study.
In order to determine the translation, and for you to understand why a certain translation would be better than another, we must determine the process behind the translation.
First, we have a Divine Author (YHWH). This is why 66 books written over a period of 1,500 years by many different authors and still read like a full novel. Then we have the human authors of each book or letter. From there we have the original scrolls written in Hebrew, Aramaic, and Latin or Greek. Then we have the organized text that were put together called the Masoretic text, which is the Hebrew text of the Bible; and the Septuagint (Greek Text). There were many copies of these different text so men would gather the text and created a Critical text. What they would do is examine the copies and determine which were more valid to the context of the Bible and God as a whole. There are many different critical text but the most common are the Alexandrian Text, used for the Catholic Bible; the Received Text, used for the Geneva and King James Versions; and the Westcott and Hort Text, used for all Bibles after the year 1900. The translations of the Bible takes place with a translation team who determine the best words of the translated language to use for the critical text. The context of the contemporary reader finals out the translation process (we will look at this more in future sections)
There are some people who believe that the King James is the only text someone should read. They think the other text is of satan. This is base upon the critical text to which the translations come from. What’s the difference in the critical text?
No one knows when and where the Alexandrian text came from. They claim it’s a 4th century text but I don’t know how they could know that since the name of the text is derived from a note on the text written in the 13th century. The Alexandrian text is the primary text used for the Catholic Bibles.
The Received Text was written by Erasmus in the 16th century. During the fall of Constantinople, the university scholars fled to England with the ancient Biblical text. There, Erasmus saw such great error in the Latin Text that he decided to write an entire new text. He created a parallel text of the original text and his Latin text so that critics could compare and know that he did not change anything in his translation.
This does not make the KJV or Geneva any more superior. In efforts to convert pagans to Christian, the Catholic religion co-mingled much of the pagan beliefs into Christianity and much of this co-mingling translated over into many of the critical texts and Bible translations known today, not withstanding the KJV. The KJV also has some difficulty points of translation for our understanding today. For example, John 3:36 reads:
He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life: and he that believeth not the Son shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth on him. John 3:36
I was recently asking a class to read this text out of their Bibles. Everyone with this text read it like, "He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life; and he that believeth not [IN/ON] the Son shall not see life…". They add the "in" or "on" which changes the meaning of the statement. Even if they do not read it that way they will put their understanding in it that way. The actual Greek word for the second "believeth" is apeitheō and it means to "obey". Once we see this, we understand that believing results in obedience and it defines what we are reading in John 3:16.
The Westcott and Hort text came from the Codex Vaticanus, found by the vatican in the vatican library, and the codex sinaiticus found by Constantine Tischendorf. There was a three year battle over the validity of the sinaiticus by a man named Constantine Simonaties.
Simonaties was the foremost expert in Greek paleography and claims to have written the text in the 19th century. There were writings included in the text that only Simonaties had; and his challenge was never met by Tischindorf.
One problem with the sinaiticus text is that it has around 15 thousand errors in text. Tischendorf, who is accredited for the text, said that it’s useless; and because of the large number of errors, it’s used by critics of the Bible as a type of proof of how the Bible is not real or not dependable.
Westcott and Hort decided to make a new critical text from the vaticanus and sinaiticus. The problem is that a book released with copies of letters they wrote back and forth, and to other people assisting in the process, showed that they supported mary worship, pergatory, darwinism, and reject creationism and the deity of Christ.
The sinaiticus text is considered to be the oldest text but there is one that is older, not mentioned yet, the AENT text. The AENT text is about 200 years older than the sinaiticus text. It's primarily Aramaic text of the New Testament and reveals a more streamline understanding of Scripture, cutting out supposed contradictions in the text.
No Bible is perfect in its translation but most are perfect in their purpose. No matter the translation, the purpose of Scripture is the same and most Bibles can bring a person to a better knowing of God despite their possible errors.
There are errors all the way around. All versions of the Bible used today make use of the Latin Vulgate, including the King James Version: the Geneva does not use the Vulgate. The more modern Bibles introduce large amounts of paganism and work towards a removal of the deity of Messiah Y’shua. There's text added and text taken away. The 1611 King James, while keeping the power and deity of the Messiah intact, also introduced paganism into Christianity. The 1611 introduced the term “easter” into text (a pagan holiday forbid by YHWH(See Easter in the Bible))(Acts 12:4), and it co-mingled the god “zeus” with the prophet Elijah by naming him Elizeus (Luke 4:27 of the 1611 KJV). This is not surprising since the original Septuagint commingled the god “zeus” with the name of the Messiah “Yeshua” coming up with the name “Ieosus”, pronounced “Yee-zeus”. From this name came the name we know today: “Jesus”, which was originally pronounced the same as the Greek vernacular. Just because there are errors in the translations, that does not make the Bible any less “divine” and from God. I believe that God purposely caused the errors. As with the reason Christ spoke parables was to confuse so that only those who sought after Him would see the truth (Parables), I believe God created the Bible in the same way.
When looking at Bibles, you will see the term “Authorized” used. While there is an “Authorized” version of the Bible, an authorized Bible means it was authorized by a government or religion. It means, they support the writings. The Vulgate, New American, and New Jerusalem Bibles are authorized by the vatican (roman catholic). The Authorized and American Standard versions are authorized by the Jehovah Witness’. The King James is authorized by England’s king, king James I; and is claimed to been authorized because of the Geneva Bible; which took authority from the king and gave it to Christ. The Geneva Bible is the only unauthorized Bible version that is accepted today.
With the Translations, you have a continuum.
NASB - New American Standard AMP - Amplified
ESV - English Standard Version KJV - King James Version
NKJV - New King James Version RSV - Revised Standard Version
HCSB - Holman Christian Standard NAB - New American Bible
NIV - New International Version TNIV - Today’s NIV
NJB - New Jerusalem Bible NCV - New Century Version
REB - Revised English Bible GNT - Good News Translation
CEB - Contemporary English NLT - New Living Translation
GW - God’s Word LB - Living Bible
TM - The Message
As seen in the scale above, there’s a word for word approach of translation and that flows through to a paraphrase approach. The word for word is a literal translation to which they take the word from the critical text and directly translate that word to the desired language. Any added words, for understanding, are italicized in good translations. Examples of the word for word approach are the KJV, NKJV, Geneva, and New American Standard. On the other end of the scale is a paraphrase approach. These Bibles are not word for word and they don’t even employ the thought for thought. Example of these Bibles are the Message and Living Bible. In the middle of the scale is the thought for thought approach. This is where the translators take a sentence or paragraph and translate the thought of the text into the desired language. The thought for thought is on a continuum all its own. One end of the scale you have a more of a word for word approach and as you work to the other end of the scale it goes into more of a paraphrase approach. I recommend choosing a Bible that is located more in the middle, like the NIV or NLT, and moving towards the word for word. You want to stay away from the paraphrased books.
We will be looking at word studies in this tips section. While I recommend the center of the thought for thought continuum for daily Bible reading, you want to have a word for word Bible for word studies; and as a parallel to the thought for though Bible of your choice. I would also recommend a good Strongs Concordance.
What Bible would I recommend? I use John 3:36 above as a litmus test for what versions I recommend, especially to new readers. When looking at a translation, go straight to John 3:36 and see if the verse is translated to "obey" rather than believe. I especially avoid translations that translated the Greek apeitheō to "rejects" as the NIV does.
"What do you use?" is the second question usually asked when talking on this subject. I use a variety of translations. I use the Geneva, NKJV (both of which translate to "believe" but I'm seasoned in study), ESV, and Aramaic translations.