looks like Ben took his blog down. And from what I have seen has made an apology about what he wrote..
I am not trying to argue. hope you do not think so.. I personally think every translation has flaws.. I grew up on KJV, and have used the NKJV since. I know where the problem area's are.. and have no problem myself. But those in my church ues other translations. In fact my church uses NLV to teach now ( I hate that version I have seen more errors in this in the little I have read than all the others.) And was looking for a neutral version to teach from.. Thought ESV would help.. So if there is a problem.. would like to know before I get to deep iunto the ESV. I can just keep using the NASB..
Jacob Hantla:Begin somewhere because so far I have simply seen character defamation of the ESV and no arguments
And so it begins...
Jacob I suggest you READ my posts and then come back an apologise. I have not defamed the ESV I have shared my frustration at some supporters the ESV who criticise the TNIV - And, I said it in jest. I have no problem with the ESV and people who want to read it. Personally I don't like it. But hey, I dont like the KJV or the NIV or the Good News either! Futhermore, I said that I did not want to discuss translation philiosophy for thsi very reason.
Thanks for nothing and getting me worked up, I appreciate it a lot! No, honestly, I really I like this sort of thing so please keep it coming. I love being accused of character defamation...AND IF YOU ARE WONDERING I AM BEING SARCASTIC!
Russ Quinn:The NRSV was theologically controversial for reasons beyond gender inclusiveness. Most famously it replaced "virgin" with "young woman" in Isaiah 7:14. This is something that went beyond the other gender inclusive translations. TNIV and NLT both use "virgin".
Actually, the 1971 RSV has 'young woman' too, which is, as a matter of fact, a more precise translation of the original language (that is the Hebrew) behind the text in Isaiah.
Help links: WIKI; Logos 6 FAQ. (Phil. 2:14, NIV)
Bryan Brodess:I am not trying to argue. hope you do not think so..
Not at all Bryan. I went through a similar process a few months back...I really like the ESV Study Bible and am kind of jealous that my preffered translations have not invested in this sort of study bible.
Thanks for the info Richard. I didn't know it was the alternative to the NRSV and can understand why people feel uncomfortable with the NRSV.
Russ Quinn:Rendering adelphos as "believers" instead of "brothers" skews search results on many levels.
Russ, I really don't understand this... Why would you search on the English text and not on the Greek itself?
Damian McGrath: Russ Quinn:Rendering adelphos as "believers" instead of "brothers" skews search results on many levels. Russ, I really don't understand this... Why would you search on the English text and not on the Greek itself?
Well, not everyone knows Greek or uses Logos.
Wiki Links: Enabling Logging / Detailed Search Help - MacBook Pro (2014), ThinkPad E570
No problem Mark.. I also grew up a scofield guy. so I am sure I could get some remarks about that also.. Although I love most of his notes and cross refrenses.
That is one thing I like about LOGOS. I have so many resources to check what anyone is saying. I learned along time ago not to take anyone's word as Gospel.. even if they belong to the same church I do..
Richard DeRuiter: Russ Quinn:The NRSV was theologically controversial for reasons beyond gender inclusiveness. Most famously it replaced "virgin" with "young woman" in Isaiah 7:14. This is something that went beyond the other gender inclusive translations. TNIV and NLT both use "virgin". Actually, the 1971 RSV has 'young woman' too, which is, as a matter of fact, a more precise translation of the original language behind the text in Isaiah.
Actually, the 1971 RSV has 'young woman' too, which is, as a matter of fact, a more precise translation of the original language behind the text in Isaiah.
The NET Bible, which is also a VERY conservative translation also translates עַלְמָה as "young woman." This is really a non-issue because that's what the Hebrew text says (and I write that fully believing in a virgin birth). The LXX used the very specific word παρθένος meaning virgin, and this is what was quoted in the NT.
RMansfield@mac.comhttp://thislamp.com youtube.com/user/rfmansfieldtwitter/thislampfacebook.com/rmansfield
R. Mansfield: Not to quibble too much, Russ, but technically the NIV & TNIV are not dynamic equivalent translations, but rather "median" translations, incorporating the best of both formal and dynamic equivalent methods. I personally favor median translations, especially for public use, over formal equivalent translations.
Not to quibble too much, Russ, but technically the NIV & TNIV are not dynamic equivalent translations, but rather "median" translations, incorporating the best of both formal and dynamic equivalent methods.
I personally favor median translations, especially for public use, over formal equivalent translations.
Welcome to the discussion, Rick. I defer to you on the technical details concerning the TNIV. You have spent much more time on the issues than I.
I'm not trying to be overly technical or attack or defend preferences or really even the advantages or disadvantages of a particular philosophy of translation.
I'm just trying to explain why Logos has preferred the ESV as the basis of its reverse interlinears.
The NIV as a reverse interlinear would render accurate search results in the passages cited above whereas the TNIV (or NLT or NRSV) would not.
I don't mean that statement to be a statement of preference of one version or another. It is simply an observation of how the reverse interlinears work in Logos.
Todd Phillips: Damian McGrath: Russ Quinn:Rendering adelphos as "believers" instead of "brothers" skews search results on many levels. Russ, I really don't understand this... Why would you search on the English text and not on the Greek itself? Well, not everyone knows Greek or uses Logos
Well, not everyone knows Greek or uses Logos
Thanks Todd, but surely when we're talking about skewed search results we're talking about doing something in Logos?
I know not everyone knows Greek but is there any bible which translates every instance of every Greek word with the same English word?
MarkStevens: Jacob Hantla:Begin somewhere because so far I have simply seen character defamation of the ESV and no arguments And so it begins... Jacob I suggest you READ my posts and then come back an apologise. I have not defamed the ESV I have shared my frustration at some supporters the ESV who criticise the TNIV - And, I said it in jest. I have no problem with the ESV and people who want to read it. Personally I don't like it. But hey, I dont like the KJV or the NIV or the Good News either! Futhermore, I said that I did not want to discuss translation philiosophy for thsi very reason. Thanks for nothing and getting me worked up, I appreciate it a lot! No, honestly, I really I like this sort of thing so please keep it coming. I love being accused of character defamation...AND IF YOU ARE WONDERING I AM BEING SARCASTIC!
Upon re-reading my statement asking you to elaborate, I see that it does indeed sound very adversarial. That was not my intent. Please forgive me. I simply wanted to ask you to give example reasons for your dislike of the ESV. I see that you state you don't think its accurate, you like gender inclusiveness, you don't like ESVers who rag on TNIV, and you direct us to Ben Witherington. I was wanting some examples of what you view is incorrect.
Again, please forgive me for my terseness and unintenional adversarial language in asking for you to elaborate upon your answer to "what's wrong with the ESV."
Jacob HantlaPastor/Elder, Grace Bible Church gbcaz.org
I wouldn't. But isn't that the point of building Bible software around reverse interlinears?
"I know not everyone knows Greek but is there any bible which translates every instance of every Greek word with the same English word?"
I think this says it all. My previous version yuo could only do a KJV interliniar. So I am happy as heck we can use other versions now!! Your right.. No version is perfect..
By the way, both BDAG (second definition) and Louw & Nida (11.23) allow for believers as a translation of ἀδελφοί in certain contexts. I imagine Acts 15:36 would certainly fit these criteria. Really, this is a good example of why translations shouldn't be slaves to one word = one meaning.
R. Mansfield: Richard DeRuiter: Russ Quinn:The NRSV was theologically controversial for reasons beyond gender inclusiveness. Most famously it replaced "virgin" with "young woman" in Isaiah 7:14. This is something that went beyond the other gender inclusive translations. TNIV and NLT both use "virgin". Actually, the 1971 RSV has 'young woman' too, which is, as a matter of fact, a more precise translation of the original language behind the text in Isaiah. The NET Bible, which is also a VERY conservative translation also translates עַלְמָה as "young woman." This is really a non-issue because that's what the Hebrew text says (and I write that fully believing in a virgin birth). The LXX used the very specific word παρθένος meaning virgin, and this is what was quoted in the NT.
Thanks for the corrections, Richard and Rick.
Sorry for being sloppy and not giving full explanations.
My point really was more on the controversy surrounding those translations that explain why Logos would promote the ESV over the NRSV.
Primarily two reasons:
Russ Quinn:The NIV as a reverse interlinear would render accurate search results in the passages cited above whereas the TNIV (or NLT or NRSV) would not.
That depends on how you search. I have the NRSV open right now looking at Acts 15:36. I see the footnote in v.36 suggesting the literal. Looking down at the rev int data I see the greek word adelphous there. If I right click on the surface text of the NRSV I'm presented with the option to search the lemma of adelphous. I can then accurately search the NRSV for all occurrences of that word. By selecting "Aligned" to display my search results I can then see all the different ways adelphos is translated by the NRSV.
I can do the same thing with the ESV and see that twice it translates it as 'man' (Mk 12:19, Lk 20:28).
The NASB sometimes translates it 'brother' and sometimes 'brethren' (as does the NKJV, and the KJV).
It's true that if you search from the English text, you'll get different results than if you search from the Greek text. But few would, and none should, expect any reliable accuracy in searching from the English text.
With the rev int tools so readily available, one doesn't have to know Greek to be able to do original language searches and see the results in English, in a way that makes sense. (Which is really, really, cool. And really potentially dangerous, since it opens the door to all sorts of common translation errors.)
Russ Quinn: The NRSV as a reverse interlinear would not produce accurate results in several instances. From a marketing perspective, the NRSV (and RSV) would not be as widely received by Logos's intended customers because of some of those controversies.
I guess my main issue is with your use of the word accurate above. It's not really that the ESV is going to give more accurate results, but rather it's going to provide a greater number of results on the basis of word-for-word concordance than some translations. But if this is the goal, why not use the NASB which I imagine would gain even greater word-for-word concordance?
I don't personally use reverse interlinears, but it would seem to me that once the underlying Greek or Hebrew word was discovered, it would be better to run a search on the original language word in the reverse interlinear (I assume this can be done) to find the full number of results--regardless of how many English words there were.
Damian McGrath: I know not everyone knows Greek but is there any bible which translates every instance of every Greek word with the same English word?
Not arguing for or against perfection of any translation . . . just trying to explain some rationale for why the ESV is preferred over NRSV as a reverse interlinear in Logos.
Not being able to directly translate every single word is a categorically different issue than rendering adelphos as "believer" for the sake of gender inclusiveness.
Again, I'm not arguing the merits or problems with gender inclusiveness in these posts just observing the way the texts work in Logos.
If one wanted to be gender inclusive and produce accurate results in these verses, it would have been better for the NRSV and TNIV to have add "and sisters" (I'm not commenting on the appropriateness of that solution for the sake of this argument).
That way searching the NRSV text for "brother" in Logos would return accurate results.
What he (Richard D) said :-)
(I corrected the above).
Based on BDAG and Louw & Nida, I'm not convinced that the NRSV & TNIV translators were necessarily trying to be gender inclusive in Acts 15:36. However, based upon the translation philosophy of both, they may have been more open to using believers (which may be the exact intended meaning here) than other translation committees.