Add the 1984 NIV

I realize this is an oooooold topic/thread, but since it resurfaced this morning, thought I'd throw in a couple of comments.

1)  My reason for wanting the 1984 version is that it's the version most (all?) of my commentaries and other resources use when referring to the NIV, and I've often enough run across specific words or phrases from the 1984 NIV that are discussed by these resources, but have been changed in the 2011 NIV.  To me, it's very frustrating to invest in the resources that reference the 1984 NIV, yet NOT be able to see the same text the author saw and discusses in detail in his/her resource that references the NIV.

2) In an effort to overcome the frustration noted above, last April I purchased the 1984 Anglicised version of the NIV available in Logos.  Not a perfect solution, but in several cases I found it better than the 2011 version when the NIV is being referenced by other resources. 

I bought the NIV1984 as part of the SDA Collection and then a couple of days later it got removed from that collection since it wasn’t supposed to be sold at all. Since then, it has been removed from any package or collection that had it included in them.

It is not my favorite translation, but I find it useful for studying.

DAL

Michael Childs said:

This is a shame, and I cannot understand the logic.  The 1984 NIV was one of the most popular translations, and many of us (including me) still use it.  I still preach from it.

And so do I preach from it.  The NIV 84 was included with some of the older Logos packages that go way back.  The first time I remember getting it was with a Logos Library System package that ran on Windows 3.1.  It was included later with several of the Logos bundled packages for Libronix and the first versions of the newer Logos.

And like a previous reply stated, most of my NIV commentaries are based on the 84 version not the 2011 one.  You can still find paper copies of the 84 version if you shop around on eBay or several of the other websites that sell books and Bibles.

My paper copy was purchased at the Lifeway bookstore attached to the SWBTS seminary many years ago when I was attending.  Can't read the print on the cover any longer but the contents are still intact!

Merry Christmas everyone.

In Christ,

Charles

It appears that you can still get the Anglicised version of the 1984 NIV.  That's what I ended up getting to make up for the fact that the US 1984 version is unavailable.

My understanding is that it is mostly the same text just with Anglicised spellings.  I've found a blog post which highlights a few differences in words/phrases:  https://betterbibles.wordpress.com/2007/04/14/british-and-american-bible-version-differences/ 

One thing, though, is that it apparently does not include a reverse interlinear (a feature that I do not use or really understand the benefits of).

Keith Pang said:

But is the anglicized one a worthwhile purchase? How far off is it from NIV 84

It is the NIV84 - just with correct spelling! 😀🤣

I recall back when it was Libronix, I contacted FL about getting a copy (I was involved in a theological discussion with people who preferred it, and I wanted to be able to see the phrasing they were used to in order to avoid needless disputes over meaning). They told me that they couldn’t sell it to me directly, but they could sell me a CD-ROM package (I think it must have been remaindered) that included it. This would have been 2006 or 2007.

I never realized it would be such a sought after resource when I bought it.

The explanation for the NIV1984 saga reminds me of what happened with the original Star Wars trilogy.  No matter how many times fans asked for the rerelease of the original versions, which didn’t include the (sometimes ridiculous) “special edition” effects, Lucasfilm’s response was always “the special editions are the official versions now, and we’re not going to look back on the past by releasing the original ones again.”

Ronald Quick said:

Jon said:

The explanation for the NIV1984 saga reminds me of what happened with the original Star Wars trilogy.

I was thinking exactly the same thing.

I wouldn’t know! The only star wars related show I’ve watched was The Mandalorian, other than that, I don’t even know which star wars you need to watch first in order to understand it.  There are so many of them 🤓

DAL

It's a shame the NIV has lost some of it's popularity among evangelicals. It improves on the 1984 version in many ways, inclusive issues aside. One small example is the "tacash" skins of Exodus 25:5, where there are instructions on materials used for the roof of the tabernacle:

"ram skins dyed red and another type of durable leather"

"Durable leather", while not clear, is at least not as strange as 1984, which put "sealskins". Quite a few translations are just as strange as well, where they wrongly delve into the etymology of Arabic or some other non-Jewish culture and try to deduce the meaning of tacash through vague Semitic correlation. Some translations also just fabricate new meanings, like the RSV and ESV which has "goatskins". The KJV, which I still love, is just as strange and put "badger skins". Renaissance thinking believed that Hebrew was the first human language, and all other human languages had traces of it. So the Renaissance reasoning immediately jumped to thinking that "tacash" must mean "badger", simply because "dachs" in German meant badger, and "dachs" slightly resembles "tacash"!  

Anyways, one thing in common with all of these is that they ignore Jews. There is no possible way that the holiest structure in all of Judaism is going to be covered with non-kosher animals like badgers and seals. And at least the NIV 2011 acknowledges this much, and threw in the towel with a generic "durable leather". So gender issues aside (some of which I think are excessive, especially when it comes to pluralizing words), I think the NIV 2011 does little corrections like this well.

edit: On a sidenote, the Anchor commentary makes a compelling case that tacash meant "beaded skins". An ornamental craft, still used in the ME. Although I think it's safe to lean on tradition and use the LXX, which said it was a violet dye. If that was good enough for the early church, it's good enough for me.

Pathfinder said:

On a sidenote, the Anchor commentary makes a compelling case that tacash meant "beaded skins". An ornamental craft, still used in the ME. Although I think it's safe to lean on tradition and use the LXX, which said it was a violet dye. If that was good enough for the early church, it's good enough for me

Comes from 'non-jewish' sources and a 'vague correlation'.

Actually an excellent article is in Journal of Semitic Studies 45, 1-19 by Stephanie Dalley, concerning beadwork. Tawil in his Akkadian Lexical Companion for Biblical Hebrew, also discusses at length, tracing to Hurrian/Akkadian, with an almost exact match (red, madder-light leather for tenting) to Isin and Mari approx 2000-1800 bce.

On the contra, seals and porpoises were common in the Sinai Deserts, and thus the english assigned by the Lexham Hebrew Interlinear (sea cow) is correct. Smiling.