Craig, How have you studied linguistics for years and hold the position you do? I seriously don't understand that. I am not trying to put you down or anything, it is just amazing to me that you say the things you do. I typically here those kinds of arguments from people who don't know one word of a foreign language ... KJVOs. Every single language professor I have ever had has preferred the NIV primarily because of its clarity and accuracy. These are men who have spent their lives in the study of the original languages.
To say that the NIV grossly distorts the NT message is unbelievable ... it is so beyond the pale that I wonder if you are being serious.
NT Greek is not as complex as you make it out to be. I have translated over half of the NT and have very little trouble with it. It just isn't that complex. It is simply a different language from a different time when communication was very different. But it is simple Greek, especially compared to classical Greek.
As ffor Robycop's statement, that is irrelevant. I have shared this example before, but I will do it again. I was in Brazil for three months one time, stumbling through some beginning portuguese. In my best FE manner, I asked a teenager, "How old are you?" ... I translated it word for word. I have never gotten a more confused look for anything I have ever said. So I repeated it again word for word. The missionary was standing nearby so I called him over and asked him. He started laughing. He said I wasn't making any sense. The literal translation meant nothing to a Brazilian. What I needed to ask was "How many years do you have?" When I said that, the brazilian started laughing. We had a good laugh about it. And it indicated very clearly that FE just doesn't work all the time. It is impossible translate without DE. Translating my own words into Portuguese meant that authorial intent was never compromised. But it didn't make any sense whatsoever. You get the same thing with idioms. Tell a foreigner it is a raining cats and dogs and they don't know quite what to say in most cases. On this same trip, I was in a service where a South AFrican preaching in English was being translated into Portuguese. Because of his accent, the portuguese clarified somethings for me that I couldn't understand. But he used the word "diaper," which the translator translated as "diaper." It made no sense to the Brazilians because "diaper" South Africa is a napkin; it is not baby's underpants. Again, you see from common sense that FE simply doesn't work all the time.
DE is not only a proper method of translation. It is a necessary method of translation. That's not psychoanalysis in the least. It is communication. Authorial intent is derived from understanding the language and idioms of the parent language, and the language and idioms of the receptor language. The translator of the South African understand the langugae, but not the idioms. He messed up. I, trying to talk in Portuguese, understood the language but not the idioms. I messed up. In neither case was word for word functional equivalency in the least bit communicative of the authorial intent.
Personally, the NIV is more dynamic than I like. But I certainly wouldn't call it a "gross mistranslation" or whatever the words you used were. That is simply inaccurate and overstated.
NE is questioning the occasional use of DE in translating idioms in FE translations such as the KJV. The NIV, however, is primarily a DE translation with a very strong theological bias—all of the committee members that selected the translators (who admittedly represented many different denominations) and made the final decisions for the translation were members of the Reformed persuasion.
