May They Just As Well Condemn The Bible To The Skip?

Author: Stephen 2 years ago

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Stephen

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Stephen

01.09.2022 11:49AM

Is the Bible written in English worth the paper it is written on? I personally wouldn’t want to see this ancient work destroyed.

I think it is well known of me by now that on the surface I find the Bible (New Testament in particular) to be a book of contradictory, ambiguous, anomalous, vague, enigmatic and problematic half stories surrounding a man that believed or was led to believe he was a rightful king and heir to the throne of Jerusalem and the power struggle that he had to endure in the times of ancient Palestine under Roman occupation and between the many other factions and sects that existed at the time. And not to be taken literally at all times. i.e. a man didn’t rises from a physical death to be alive again after being physically dead for three days.

Others think to the contrary. For instance, there are those that I have met that believe the Bible to be clear and concise in its presentation and self evidently true and without any ambiguity whatsoever in the way it has come down to us. Until of course they are posed a few simple questions which usually arise not just frequently from the Bible but just as frequent from their own commentary, and when pressed on such it appears that these very same people will resort to the default that one must understand Greek or Hebrew to even begin to understand a Bible that is written in English! But by saying so they do not seem to understand that they have, in just a few words, rendered the Bible written in English redundant, pointless and unreliable as any kind of “witness” source to the life and times of the Christ.

So is there at all any point to reading, never mind studying the Bible written in English? A Bible that those who have said that is clear and concise but suddenly insist that the Bible is fathomable and understandable only when one is tutored, trained and learned in the ancient Greek or Hebrew languages?

Wylted

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Wylted

01.09.2022 07:39PM

I would suggest reading it in English and studying the words it was translated from when something catches your attention. It's also worth studying Jewish culture and the culture of the time as well as understanding the period of history where Israel was under Roman occupation.

Yes any Greek work translated to English will lose something in translation.

Nietzsche has been translated to English even more recently, and people familiar with German usually remind us that a lot is loss in translation. It doesn't mean that nietzches work, ancient Greek works or the Bible is useless.

Just read the emerald tablets of thoth or what remains of them. They are great works and a little pain in the ass to understand without the use of Google and the opinions of some scholars.

These things have value, but you Don't want to read to deep into them. So the general stories just like in the oddysey would be accurate as to the intended meaning when they were written, whether true or not. However when you start really digging into it, it might be hard to differentiate between actual inconsistencies and inconsistencies that are a result of how limited translations can be at showing the original meaning.

zedvictor4

Debates: 22

Posts: 11,255

zedvictor4

01.10.2022 06:59AM

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@Stephen

The Bible is what it is, and is what it has become.

It is a collection of Middle Eastern folk tales and creation myths.

And along with other similar compilations,

Have become the basis of worldwide cultural, social and political ideologies.

Daft but true.

Yet probably an evolutionary certainty.

Popular religions and all fanciful creation hypotheses are analogies for something that a group of sentient organisms don't understand.

Best just leave them with their books and their ignorance.

Put yours in a skip if you wish.

Mine went into a metaphorical skip long ago.

Still makes for entertaining discussion though.

And not that I purport to understand the meaning and potential purpose of creation.

I just understand that religious books are what they are, and are what they have become.

GOD principle sound,

Floaty about blokes not so.

Amen.

Topic's author

Stephen

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Stephen

01.10.2022 08:45AM

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@Wylted

Is the Bible written in English worth the paper it is written on?

I would suggest reading it in English and studying the words it was translated from when something catches your attention.

So that's no, then.

but you Don't want to read to deep into them.

So why suggest "studying the words it was translated from" ?

Yes any Greek work translated to English will lose something in translation.

So do you agree then that this loss renders the bible in English redundant, pointless and unreliable as any kind of “witness” source to the life and times of the Christ?

a result of how limited translations can be at showing the original meaning.

Interesting. Do the meanings and definitions of words translated from Greek to English change? And can you give us an example from the New Testamant where certain words change their meaning and definition once translated from Greek into English?

Topic's author

Stephen

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Stephen

01.12.2022 09:17AM

Relative to the Priesthood I hold, it is not a matter of what I consider. I am an ordained High Priest.
#36
https://www.debateart.com/forum/topics/6136-alcohol?page=2&post_number=36

The same "High Priest" that is also versed " in Greek" then brings the "integrity" of the English Bible into doubt with this comment;

" Frankly, I'm shocked the book[bible] managed to have enough integrity left in it when monks and such finished their agenda and still managed to give us an inkling of truth"#79
https://www.debateart.com/forum/topics/5681-how-does-jesus-expect-to-get-away-with-blatant-lies?page=4&post_number=79

So when we have figures of such high status telling us that they are "shocked" that there is any remaining integrity at all in the Bible and only just enough to leave only an "inkling" of truth, does this not add to the pointlessness of the ancient scriptures written in English?

Topic's author

Stephen

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Stephen

01.13.2022 09:03AM

Another, he is himself educated in Greek that also makes the claim that for one to understand the NT Bible in English one has have been schooled in the Greek language while also telling us that:

“no one takes the Bible as“100% accurate”.

https://www.debateart.com/forum/topics/5745-anointing-of-jesus?page=1&post_number=11

And have made comments such as :

"I would have translated the Greek words differently before putting them in the bible so as not to confuse people like you. You see the Greek language is highly contextual".

https://www.debateart.com/forum/topics/5681-how-does-jesus-expect-to-get-away-with-blatant-lies?page=1&post_number=4

So when we consider that both the above mentioned - the High Priest & Bringerofrain are qualified in the field of scripture and ancient Greek language, does not their learned and experienced opinion seriously damage the reliability and the credibility of this so called holy scripture?

Topic's author

Stephen

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Stephen

01.16.2022 08:54AM

Then there are people such as Preterists, those that believe that the Second Coming of the Christ has already taken place and had happened way back in AD 69-70 as written about in Revelation.

So doesn’t this completely do away with the whole last book of the Bible? What is the purpose of this last book if the event had already happened over 2050 years ago. Can it simply be that Revelation only now serves as an `historical` record of an event that is alleged to have occurred all that time ago?

218 days later

Shila

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Shila

08.22.2022 10:29PM

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@Stephen

Is the Bible written in English worth the paper it is written on? I personally wouldn’t want to see this ancient work destroyed.

I think it is well known of me by now that on the surface I find the Bible (New Testament in particular) to be a book of contradictory, ambiguous, anomalous, vague, enigmatic and problematic half stories surrounding a man that believed or was led to believe he was a rightful king and heir to the throne of Jerusalem and the power struggle that he had to endure in the times of ancient Palestine under Roman occupation and between the many other factions and sects that existed at the time. And not to be taken literally at all times. i.e. a man didn’t rises from a physical death to be alive again after being physically dead for three days.

Others think to the contrary. For instance, there are those that I have met that believe the Bible to be clear and concise in its presentation and self evidently true and without any ambiguity whatsoever in the way it has come down to us. Until of course they are posed a few simple questions which usually arise not just frequently from the Bible but just as frequent from their own commentary, and when pressed on such it appears that these very same people will resort to the default that one must understand Greek or Hebrew to even begin to understand a Bible that is written in English! But by saying so they do not seem to understand that they have, in just a few words, rendered the Bible written in English redundant, pointless and unreliable as any kind of “witness” source to the life and times of the Christ.

So is there at all any point to reading, never mind studying the Bible written in English? A Bible that those who have said that is clear and concise but suddenly insist that the Bible is fathomable and understandable only when one is tutored, trained and learned in the ancient Greek or Hebrew languages?

The problem with the English translation of the Bible is the many ways English can be translated which have given rise to some 33,000 denominations of Christians.

The Jews are united behind their Hebrew Bible which makes up the Old Testament.

The Romans were united behind the Greek translation of the Gospels and books in The New Testament. The Roman Catholic Church made Christianity a universal religion based on their Greek and Latin translation of the New Testament.

But the problem started with Tyndale’s Bible.

A translation by William Tyndale of portions of the Bible from the original Greek and Hebrew texts.

The Tyndale Bible usually refers to the translations of various books of the Bible by William Tyndale in the 1500s. His work is credited with being the first English translation from the original Hebrew and Greek texts and the first English biblical translation that was mass-produced as a result of new advances in the art of printing. Tyndale never published a complete Bible prior to his execution, as he only finished translating the New Testament and roughly half of the Old Testament. However, Tyndale's translations have greatly influenced nearly every modern English translation of Scripture.

English is unique in that one can say anything in English which can mean the same thing to any other language translators but the meaning quite easily gets lost in translation.

Topic's author

Stephen

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Stephen

08.23.2022 05:44AM

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@Shila

English is unique in that one can say anything in English which can mean the same thing to any other language translators but the meaning quite easily gets lost in translation.

As I have already written above:

Stephen wrote; when [Christians are] pressed on such it appears that these very same people will resort to the default that one must understand Greek or Hebrew to even begin to understand a Bible that is written in English! But by saying so they do not seem to understand that they have, in just a few words, rendered the Bible written in English redundant, pointless and unreliable as any kind of “witness” source to the life and times of the Christ.#1

My point is that when Christians are pressed on matters biblical and posed awkward and or embarrassing questions about what is written in the bible, their default is along the lines of " your question is redundant because you can't read or understand the context of ancient Greek of ancient Hebrew". And by using this default they don't seem to realise that they, themselves, have just condemned all bibles written in English to the trash pile. Hence my question: