Featured Why is the New International Version Bible translation so popular? What are your thoughts on that?

To follow up on this briefly, I want to add the following. While we cannot make free to call a commentator’s translational disagreements the condemnation of an version – as in “I don’t think you should use the X version of the Bible” – we are free to decide that the multiplication of poor translational choices is a reason we don’t want to use the X version of the Bible. So when Fee, Morris, Motyer, and others freely point these problems out re the NIV, it is natural that some people will take it as a good reason to look for some other version to use. Here, then, is the possibility that the NIV becomes victim to its own popularity – since it is the Bible being referenced, it is the Bible whose translational decision is being criticized.

 

Can someone help me, just what did the fanboys at this John MacArthur convention find oh so funny about this pronouncement of his? :

GraceToYou Youtube account, unlisted video, @39:25

transcript:

MacArthur: "Does anybody who reads the NIV care what it means?"
[moderator Phil Johnson giggles, hearty laughter from the audience]
MacArthur: "Obviously you get the question, you know what I'm saying."

 

*sigh* this is taken a bit out of context don't you think?

 

No.

What exactly was being insinuated by the "Does anybody who reads the NIV care what it means?"

 

Don't think so. I went back a couple of minutes and found where the subject matter switches to a MacArthur NIV study Bible. It's at the 38:35 time marker.

 

That people who only read the NIV, not in all cases but many cases, don't really care what the text actually means. It goes to the feud over functional vs formal equivalence. But it is also true that a lot of people who read functional equivalent never actually research the underlying texts for themselves.

 

People that make the effort of reading the Bible don't care what it says? Ridiculous.

And your statement is another example of mind reading.

Sent from my Pixel 2 XL using Tapatalk

 

Think that the gist of that statement was that anyone who reads the Niv would not really be that interested in knowing what the Bible really states! Kind of a back hand slap at it as a translation.

 

For the record, Zondervan is not the company that put the NIV together. They are a distributor of the NIV. The producer of the NIV is Biblica.

 

Interesting part of this history is that neither Biblica nor Zondervan were involved in the origin of this translation, but an independent Committee on Bible Translation. A couple years later Biblica came in (then called the New York Bible Society) and I guess Zondervan when a publisher was needed in the 1970s.

Nevertheless, if Zondervan's marketing misrepresents the NIV as something it is not, they should change that and be more honest. Alexander, are you talking about the type of translation issue, or something else? I may have missed that earlier.

 

The NIV originated in the Christian Reformed Church!

This was divulged several years ago by the chairman of the 'independent Committee on Bible Translation', Douglas Moo:

Calvin Seminary and the NIV

"Moo said the Christian Reformed Church and the seminary played a crucial role in creation of the NIV. A CRC layman first came up with the idea....The CRC synod then ultimately approved translating the Bible and sought the help of evangelical scholars....'There is no more appropriate place to celebrate the anniversary than Calvin Seminary. The NIV was conceived by the CRC and seminary...seminary professors gave it birth,' he said."

 

There is nothing unbalanced or hyperbolic about the Introduction page of the NIV, It is quite descriptive of what the translation is all about.

 

Thanks. Still recovering but much better.

 

In the spectrum between the NLT (that I enjoy reading when you want to see the ‘forest from the trees’) and the NASB (that I like to read when I care about some of the leaves), the NIV really does offer a balance between formal equivalence and dynamic equivalence. That balance of detail and readability appeals to many.

 

I wouldn't use the word "divulged." You make it sound like it was a well-kept secret that was recently unearthed. In the 1990s Kenneth Bark publish a book about the NIV. I forget the title. Then, in 2003 one of favorite books "The Challenge Of Bible Translation" came out. There was a chapter by John H. Stek called "The New International Version : How It Came To Be." Howard Long was the layman who had a passion for souls. "The Bible that had long nourished his faith was the King James Version. It felt comfortable in his hands, sounded familiar and sweet in his ears, and much of it was 'written on his heart.' But when he opened it to show others the Way, he met with incomprehension --or worse. The Bible he read to them and urged them to read was to them sometimes quite unintelligible, generally rather strange and quaint, and occasionally even hilarious." (p.235)

Finally, in 1956 ,the CRC met at a General Synod to propose to "endeavor to join with other conservative churches in sponsoring or facilitating the early production of a faithful translation of the Scriptures in the common language of the American people." (p.236)

 

Do you pepper any other translations in the spectrum?