Featured You're kidding! The Conservative Bible Project

Yeah, I guess that was a slip of the tongue/keyboard. Since it's a translation rather than inspired in Greek, I suppose that guided my error, but it's not entirely wrong to refer to the LXX as extra-biblical in the sense that it is not the Hebrew OT. That's my excuse and I'm stickin' to it!

 

The website says, "the expression 'harden not your hearts' (3x by KJV) is better translated for liberals today as 'close not your minds,' as the original Greek also means 'stubbornness of mind' which is common among university-indoctrinated liberals;"

This is puzzling. "Harden not your hearts" is an exact translation of the three times this phrase occurs in Hebrews, something the writer does not seem to realize. Again, he does not seem to realize the theology of the statement. "Hearts" and "minds" are different, whether you are a trichotomist (me) or a dichotomist: the heart is the seat of the emotions, while the mind is the cognitive part of the soul. So translating "minds" instead of "hearts" is theologically wrong.

And what is his source for saying that the phrase means "close not your minds"? It may mean that, but how does he know? He seems to have many opinions about the NT, but is not a linguist himself, so he must have sources who are linguists and translators to be convincing.

Then, once again he injects politics into the text. It matters not in the slightest to the translation that a 2023 "university-indoctrinated liberal" may have a closed mind. What matters is the text and its meaning.

 

God prepared me by having me teach Greek in two different Japanese Bible schools. Started in about 2001 on the NT, finished the base translation for the entire NT after a few years. In the meanwhile, God lead "Uncle Miya" Miyakawa to the effort as my Japanese partner; other team members came and went. He and I finished the second draft before I moved back to the States to teach in 2014. We first printed a Gospel of John in 2011. Various tweaks and proofreading occurred until we published last year. Since then I've been working on the OT.

 

The website says, "liberals (sic; lower case) have been erasing references to Hell in translating the Bible. See Disappearing Hell;"

As probably all here know, the Greek word here is hades (ἁδης). It is usually described as "the place of the dead," but there are places in the New Testament where it clearly means "Hell," and we should translate it that way. And there are modern translations that do not render it that way sometimes, as he points out. Instead they transliterate with "Hades," which is actually literal.

But the website seems to think that to transliterate that way is a sign of liberalism. It gives no proof of that, and doesn't say if he means theological or political liberals. So that's a huge problem. I really doubt if there were any liberals on the translation team of the ESV, NASB, etc., though there might have been on the NLT team or the NRSV team or the Message team--maybe.... So, the website author's unsupported opinion reigns supreme.

 

I was going to quit this today--plenty of work to do. But I just couldn't let this one pass by. On a link (Disputed Biblical Translations - Conservapedia) it says, "Modern translations have been eliminating references to the Devil:." Then it gives some very inaccurate statistics.

Apparently the writer did not include plurals in his search--very careless. The KJV actually has the term "devil" or "devils" in 101 verses in both testaments. However, it never renders "demon" or "demons."

There are two different Greek words both translated by "devil" in the KJV--diabolos (διάβολος), meaning "slanderer," and often used for Satan. The other word is daimonion (δαιμόνιον), meaning "demon" but also translated "devil" in the KJV.

So the Conservative Bible Project (CBS) writer does not understand basic Greek and cannot be trusted in the statistics given. What is needed when comparing with the modern versions is further data about the renderings of the two words.

There are also be textual criticism issues. Id not do a thorough check, but the UBS and thus most modern translations omit "Satan" in Luke 4:8. That's a third word the CBS doesn't deal with, occurring in 34 verse in the KJV.

 

I do plan to get back to this, but we're having our Bible conference this week. See you next week here, hopefully.

 

Maybe just one more for now. The website says, "a few verses were inserted into the Bible as vandalism, and they are easily identified by how liberals over-quote them, such as....Luke 23:34 (purporting that God forgives unrepentant people "for they do not know what they are doing”)."

What the writer has done is excluded a statement from Jesus simply on the basis of his own opinion of liberalism. And he does not give any sources for saying that "liberals over-quote" the statement. Personally, I've never heard of that before.

The problem here is that all Greek NTs I have include this statement: Westcott and Hort (in brackets), UBS 4 (in brackets), Hodges and Farstad (no brackets), my old Nestles 16 (in brackets), Robinson and Pierpont (no brackets), Solid Rock (no brackets), Scrivener. (Brackets? Are you kidding?) Those are the ones I have here at the office. I'm sure the ones I have at home are the same.

The sentence is in brackets in the eclectic Greek NTs because some early Alexandrian mss do not include it. Byzantine mss do include it. Why keep it in there if there are mss without it? Well, we certainly should not take it out simply because we think it is a liberal gloss!!

 

If I remember correctly, the Western non-interpolations were just in the book of Acts, and are limited to Western mss, and would not be in Byz. or Ant. mss. But I'm at a coffee shop and don't have access to my library, so maybe someone can help.

P.S. Just looked at Wikipedia, and they have a totally different story than what I just wrote. But I don't trust Wiki on such matters, so I'll check it out in my office on Monday--or someone else can chime in.

 

Okay, I had this totally wrong. The Western non-interpolations are shorter readings in the Western as compared to the Alexandrian, a friend wrote me. But then as Conan wrote, the verse in question is not one of them.

 

Deacon's post is very helpful for this study of the CBV. For one thing, Metzger is somewhat of a liberal. So the CBV website is agreeing with Metzger about the verse instead of the theological conservatives who edited Greek NTs, such as Maurice Robinson and William Pierpoint, or Zane Hodges & Arthur Farstad.

Now, either he is conflating theological and political conservatism, or he simply doesn't get it.

Now, concerning the sentence's worthiness to be in the text, I could not disagree with the CBV and Metzger more! In the first place, I believe it was aimed at the Roman soldiers doing the actual crucifying. They certainly did not know what they were doing, crucifying the Lord of Glory. The centurion even came around to say, "Truly this man was the son of God" (Matt. 27:54).

Let's say it was aimed at the Jewish leaders, though. The destruction of Jerusalem took place around 40 years later. That is certainly enough of a gap to God the Father coming around to punish them, not for the cross, but for everything else.

Furthermore, Christ taught, "Love your enemies," (Matt. 5:44). So why would He not show love towards his enemies, even as they crucified Him? That prayer on the cross is entirely consistent with the teachings of Jesus.