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IV. BL104 - Bible Composition and Translations Bobby Long 1737-805 Thursday, April 05, 2007

The Bible is one of the most well documented and preserved collection of literature known to man. This paper will explore 3 major sections: 1) the languages used in the manuscripts, 2) the materials used in the production of the manuscripts through the ages, and 3) a brief history of the translations.

Languages The books of the Bible were originally written in three languages: 1) Hebrew, 2) Aramaic, and 3) Greek. Hebrew is the majority type of the Old Testament, with the exceptions of
Daniel 2:4b-7:28; Ezra 4:8-6:18; 7:12-26 which were written in Aramaic. Aramaic was the

common language of the Babylonian Empire during which time, Daniel and Ezra wrote. It is interesting that the Old Testament view of history is through the eyes of Israel. The book of Daniel is written in Hebrew (the language of the Jew) with the exception of chapters 2 7 which was written in the language of the Gentiles being Aramaic. Dr. Chuck Missler points out that in these Aramaic chapters, Daniel gives the detail of all Gentile history. These chapters 2 7, describe the times of the Gentiles, which start with Nebuchdnezzar and end with the final world leader who will dealt with by Jesus Christ at His Second Coming.1 Hebrew Hebrew flows from left to right and is comprised of an alphabet of twenty-two consonants with the vowels being passed on orally. It wasnt until the 9th century that a series of vowel points were introduced by the Masoretes as a means of vowel notation. This was accomplished by a system of points that were injected either at the top or bottom of the script.

Hebrew words are comprised of a three letter root with verbs formed by adding prefixes and suffixes to add clarity and description. Although the consonants give the Hebrew language a very strong foundation, the verb uses are not precisely defined and are very depended on the context in which they are used. This can sometimes lead to difficulty in translation. The origins of the Hebrew language can be traced back to Abraham as Barry E. Horner points out, Hebrew is a semantic (Shemitic, cf. Gen. 9:18-19) and oriental language that is believed to be rooted in the arrival of Abraham in Canaan. It was well developed by the time that Israel was redeemed out of Egypt.2 The language is not a phonetic but semantic. In English, if one knows the sounds of the letters, the words can be sounded out. With Hebrew, if you know the meaning behind the letters, a picture can be painted by putting together the different meanings. Hebrew is written without spaces between the letters; it is self-parsing. There are five letters in the alphabet that are written differently if they are the last letters of a word. This allows Hebrew to be read without spaces between the words by attention to the changing of the letters.

The Hebrew language is very vivid and visual on one hand, but extremely complex on the other. Due to the picturesque quality and deep meaning of the text, it can take two to three sentences to properly translate a Hebrew word into another language. Today, Hebrew has been reinstated as the official language of Israel since 1948 and is used by over seven million people in Israel, Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Canada, France, Germany, Palestinian West Bank and Gaza, Panama, the UK and USA.3

Aramaic Aramaic was much like Hebrew in that it is semantic. It shares the consonantal design with and the direction of script. Classical or Imperial Aramaic was the main language of the Persian, Babylonian and Assyrian empires and spread as far as Greece and the Indus valley.4 When the Jewish captives were released from Babylonian captivity, more people spoke Aramaic than Hebrew. Thus the Old Testament was translated into Aramaic called the Targum.5

Aramaic ceased to be a major language when the territories were overtaken by Alexander the Great and Greek was instituted as the official language. It remains today as more of a cerimonial language used mostly in areas such as Syria, Iraq, and Turkey. We know that Jesus spoke Aramaic and Greek. For example, after the ressurection, when Mary was at the tomb, she didnt recongnized who it was until Jesus addressed her in Aramaic.

Greek Greek is the language of the New Testament and the first to use vowels.6 There were two types of Greek language at its zenith; the common Greek or Koine Greek, and the high Greek or Attic Greek which was the language of the higher learned. Ancient or Attic Greek was the
high dialect of the philosophers, Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle, as well as Athens during its time of cultural supremacy, c. 500-300 B.C.7 The alphabet consisted of twenty-four letters. Every Greek verb has a person, a mood, a tense, a voice, and a number. So with just one verb the reader can gather who is performing that action, how many is doing it, is it a one time event or a process, or is it an actual event or something that is just wished for. It tells whether or not the verb is active or passive or both. Up until the 9th century, the manuscripts called uncials were written in capital letters in order to save on space and materials. After the 9th century, lower case letters were employed which were called minuscules.

Due to the official language of Alexanders empire being Greek, less and less people spoke the language and desired the scripture in their own language. Greek became the language of most of the known world which led to the providential ease of disbursement of the scriptures. This did not change even after Rome conquered the Alexandrian empire and split it in two. It was this desire that led Ptolemy to commission the translation of the Hebrew text into Greek. This is known today as the Septuagint or the LXX meaning seventy. This work was started in 285 B.C. and completed in 270 B.C. thereby outdating the Masoretic text of 900 A.D. by over 1000 years.

Writing Materials Many different materials were used throughout the thousands of years of recorded history. Clay tablets were used such as those found in Elba in Mesopotamia which note the five cities of the plains which where Sodom, Gomorrah, Admah, Zeboiim, and Zoar. However, the main materials used to record scripture prior to the printing press were leather, papyrus, and vellum.

Leather It would not seem right to exclude the fact that God wrote the law in stone on Mt. Sinai with His own finger, however, the majority of the manuscripts we have today are fragments of leather, papyrus and vellum. We do know that leather was used as early as 4,000 B.C. with extant remains dating to 2,000 B.C. Since tradition specified that the law must be written on the skins of animals, it is noted the scrolls sent to Alexandria in 285 B.C. from which the Septuagint was translated, were on leather. This also indicates that it was the material used in formal reproductions of the law used in synagogues which could date back to the time of the prophets.8 Another Biblical reference is a quote from Jeremiah. In the passage below, we find that Jehudi cut the roll with a knife leading some to believe that the roll was comprised of a material more durable and ridged that papyrus. And it came to pass, [that] when Jehudi had read three or four leaves, he cut it with the penknife, and cast [it] into the fire that [was] on the hearth, until all the roll was consumed in the fire that [was] on the hearth.(Jer. 36:23 KJV) Kenyon adds, Ctesias, the Greek historian of Persia, refers to royal chronicles written on leather, but does not specify their precise dates. They may include those to which reference is made in Ezra vi.1, 2 and Esther vi.1. Herodotus records that once, when papyrus was scarce, the Ionian Greeks used sheepskins and goatskins in its place; and he adds that many of the "barbarians" still did so in his day.9 Papyus Papyrus is a green stalk like plant that grows mainly in the delta of Nile River in Egypt. The highest quality of paper was made from the center of the plant and was initially called hieratic because of its exclusive use for religious books. Later the name given to this

highest quality of papyrus was Augustus, the next was Livia, and then hieratic was became the third.10
Papyrus is made by laying long strips of the plant vertically on a board using the muddy water of the Nile as a kind of glue. After the vertical strips were laid out and cropped off, another layer was added horizontally. Then both layers were pressed and sun dried. The different sections were then joined together from best to worse quality. A roll of papyrus hardly ever exceeded 20 sheets. Most are about ten inches long and are approximately thirty-five feet long. There are instances were one scroll was over 130 feet long. A single scroll might contain one full Gospel. Papyrus was universally used until vellum eventually overtook it in the forth century. Today, there are ninety-two papyri cataloged.11

Vellum Pliny quotes an earlier writer Varro which attributes the invention of Vellum to Eumenes of

Pergamum due to an imposed embargo of papyrus by Ptolemy between 192 and 187 B.C.12 Although vellum was in production, the main source of writing material was papyrus until the fourth century when use vellum superceded that of papyrus.
Vellum is a material that is made from the skins of cattle, sheep, and sometime deer. It is limed, then stretched and dried in room temperature. The most expensive type was made from uterus of animals. Vellum was not foreign to the writers. When Paul asks Timothy to bring him his cloak and books in 2 Timothy 4:13, he especially asks for his parchments. The Greek word here is membrana or membrane. From this, it can be gathered that He is asking for his writings made of the membrane of an animal or vellum.

Translations (285 B.C. 900 A.D.) Translation and transmission are two distinct ideas which carry two distinct meaning. To transmit means to take a message and broadcast it or spread it out. The translation of that message means to reproduce that message in another language. In the case of the Bible, oral transmission led to reproducing that message in written form. That written form was translated to other languages as needed. It is in the translation of the original text that

breakdown can occur. Some words are very difficult to translate from one language to another. This discussion will start with the creation of the Septuagint.

Septuagint (LXX) The Old Testament text we have today formed down two distinct lines. As the knowledge of Hebrew diminished, Ptolemy commissioned the translation of the Hebrew scripture into common Greek. Seventy (or seventy two) of the worlds best Jewish scholars converged in Alexandria Egypt for the sole purpose of translating the best Hebrew text into Greek. This work started in 285 B.C. and was completed in 270 B.C. Some have the total completion date at 242 B.C. The initial work translated the first five books of Moses called the Law or the Pentateuch. This took only seventy-two days to complete.

After the law was translated into Greek, the remaining books were translated. The fact still remains that this work was completed almost three centuries before the birth of Christ. Jewish scholars translating their own scriptures had no hidden motive to change the text because the birth of Jesus was still almost three hundred years away, thus giving no controversy over Jesus as Messiah. The following is an excerpt from the letter of Aristeas. In this letter, we read that the High Priest Eleazar, who chose the translators, also approved of the work. A curse was declared on anyone who changed the wording due to the extreme accuracy of the product. This is an excerpt of that letter: 308 When the work was completed, Demetrius collected together the Jewish population in the place where the translation had been made, and read it over to all, in the presence of the translators, who met with a great reception also from the people, because of the great benefits which they had 309 conferred upon them. They bestowed warm praise upon Demetrius, too, and urged him to have the whole law transcribed and present a copy to their leaders. 310 After the books had been read, the priests and the elders of the translators and the Jewish community and the leaders of the people stood up and said, that since so excellent and sacred and accurate a translation had been made, it was only right that it should remain as it was and no 311 alteration should be made in it. And when the whole company expressed their approval, they bade them pronounce a curse in accordance with their custom upon any one who should make any alteration either by adding anything or changing in any way whatever any of the words which had been written or making any omission. This was a very wise precaution to ensure that the book might be preserved for all the future time unchanged.13

During and after the ministry of Jesus, the Jewish leadership became enraged that the Christian community has not only taken their scriptures as their own, but were using them to prove that Jesus is the Messiah. By the middle of the second century, this battle was raging. The Jewish community was proclaiming that the Christians had changed the text of Septuagint resulting in an attack of Jeromes Old Latin Vulgate because its initial basis was the Septuagint. An example of such attach was the translation of Isaiah 7:14 which declares that a virgin will give birth and his name will be called Emmanuel or God with us. The Jewish community said that the Septuagint word parthenos or virgin, should really be almah or young maiden. However, logically that did not make sense. How could a young maiden giving birth be a Messianic sign? There were babies being born to young maidens all the time. The issue was that the Edomite Jew did not believe that Jesus was the Messiah and they wanted not only to destroy the Septuagint, but Christianity as a whole.

The Talmudist, who later to change their name to the Masoretes, began collecting all the Hebrew manuscripts they could find. Because the Christian community continued to use the Septuagint as their Bible, this was not a hard task to complete and did not cause any alarm. The Talmudist started revising the text to meet there own religious doctrines and beliefs and by the sixth century, were well underway to producing a revised Hebrew text that would differ greatly from the Septuagint.

During the second and third century, other renditions appeared such as Aquillas version produced in 126 A.D. which was venerated by the Jewish community. Brenton states that His version is said to have been executed for the express purpose of opposing the authority of the Septuagint: his version was in consequence upheld by the Jews.14 Theodotion produced a version in 182-190 AD and Symmachus put forth his paraphrase during this time based on Theodotions and Aquillas work.

The period from 200 A.D. to 900 A.D. is very crucial. The Septuagint was the Bible of Christians. Origen saw the glaring discrepancies between the Christian Septuagint and the Jewish texts and started compiling a work that laid several renditions side by side. In 240 A.D., Origen produced the Hexapla which was a comparison compilation text of six versions

of that day including the original Hebrew, Greek rendering of the Hebrew text, the versions of Aquilla, Sammachus, and Theodotion, and lastly, the Septuagint.

It was also during this era that the truth of scripture was being distorted by groups such as the Gnostics. This was not an organized religion but more a way of thinking that started twisting scripture even while the original manuscripts of the New Testament were being written. The first epistle of John and the second chapter of 2 Peter dealt with this very movement. But there were false prophets also among the people, even as there shall be false teachers among you, who privily shall bring in damnable heresies, even denying the Lord that bought them, and bring upon themselves swift destruction. (2Peter 2:1 KJV) Who is a liar but he that denieth that Jesus is the Christ? He is antichrist, that denieth the Father and the Son. (1John 2:22 KJV) This group, who headquartered in Alexandria, had a reputation of mutilating the scripture by distorting the meanings and shortening the text in order to fit their beliefs. Origen and Eusebius were strongly influenced by Greek philosophy and teachings. Irenaeus wrote several volumes called Against Heresies to combat this false teaching, known as Gnosticism, brought about by the Greek traditions. An expert of Against Heresies, Book 1, chapters 1 and 2 can be found at the end of this essay which details the teaching of this group. This teaching denied essential doctrines of Jesus Christ including His humanity, it taught that creation and all material as evil, and its view of God was extremely distorted. It was during middle of the 4th century that the Alexandrian texts were written in the epicenter of all this Gnostic influence. The two most famous of these is Codex Vaticanus and Codex Siniaticus. Said to have been one of the fifty copies Constantine order for his new city, these text were, and are noted by their omissions and sometimes substantial sectional text deletions. These two texts will become the source documents of the Westcott and Hort translation for the Revised Standard Version in the mid 1800s.

In 383 A.D., Jerome finishes the Latin Vulgate meaning, belonging to the people. The Vulgates initial original text was the Septuagint but switched to the Hebrew bias after becoming entangled with Jewish leaders that presented him with a Masoretic reading of the

Hebrew Scriptures. These influences pulled Jerome away from the Septuagint and toward the Jewish rendering of scripture.

By 500 A.D. the scriptures had been translated into five hundred plus languages. The majority of the texts we have today originated in Byzantium and have their roots in Antioch Syria. This text type is called Byzantine and is represent in todays Textus Receptus. This text will be revisited later. With Latin being the official language of the Roman Empire, a decree was issued in 600A.D. that all should be written in Latin including scripture.

In 680 A.D. we have the first accounts of translation by a herdsman named Caedmon who turned Bible stories into songs that could be sung in the Anglo-Saxon tongue. Bebe notes in Chapter 24 of Book 4 in Historia Ecclesiastica that Caedmon, due to his inability to sing, left the dinner table early one night. While sleeping with the animals, someone came to him in a dream and told him to sing a song about the beginning of all created things. He finally produced a poem that praised God for His creation. The next morning, he reported what had happened to the leaders and after some deliberation; they instructed that Caedmon be taught doctrine and history so that he could put it in song and poem for posterity. The following is an excerpt from Historia Ecclesiastica expanding on the depth and breath of Caedmons song, He sang the creation of the world, the origin of man, and all the history of Genesis : and made many verses on the departure of the children of Israel out of Egypt, and their entering into the land of promise, with many other histories from holy writ; the incarnation, passion, resurrection of our Lord, and his ascension into heaven; the coming of the Holy Ghost, and the preaching of the apostles ; also the terror of future judgment, the horror of the pains of hell, and the delights of heaven; besides many more about the Divine benefits and judgments, by which he endeavoured to turn away all men from the love of vice, and to excite in them the love of, and application to, good actions; for he was a very religious man, humbly submissive to regular discipline, but full of zeal against those who behaved themselves otherwise; for which reason he ended his life happily.15 Many other Biblical texts were being translated at this time. Around 995, King Alfred had the Ten Commandments translated into Anglo-Saxon as well as the Pentateuch. It is said that he also ordered the Psalms into Old English as well.

In the 10th century, the Masoretes, formally known as Talmudist, completed the revision of the Hebrew Text and destroyed the originals. This text is known today as the Masoretic Text and is the Old Testament backbone of most English translations. Because the task of the rabbis from the sixth century onward was no longer to establish a consensus but to clarify and preserve the traditions which had already been agreed in the academies, they are usually referred to as Masoretes (traditionalists. The English form can equally be written as Masoretes).16 The rise of the Roman Catholic Church brought a unique set of problems. Through the years of persecution the church grew, but overnight the church moved from a position of persecution to a place of tolerance, then to a place of prominence. Popes began to gain more and more power and by 12th century, the Catholic Church was a machine bent on retaining power and control over the laity via religious fears and superstitions. The laity was forbidden to have or read scripture. Only the priests could read the Latin scriptures and then explain the scripture to the people.

During the dark ages, centers of learning were havened in Monastic orders, and the gospel would have country side preachers from time to time, but one of notice would be Valdes. He was a business man from Lyons whose convictions led him to throw his money in the street and lead a life of poverty. In 1176, he began his career as a preacher after running a soup kitchen for two years. By 1198, the church had imposed the death penalty on those that would not recant their position and return to the church. This group came to be known as the Waldensians. This group emphasized the priesthood of the believer, They rejected prayers for the dead, regarded indulgences as benefiting greedy priests and challenged the doctrine of purgatory.17 Paying an indulgence was a means by which the living could pay the dead relative out of purgatory where the believing dead were, in effect, being purged from their sins so they could enter heaven undefiled; the more unpaid sin, the longer in purgatory.

(1380 1600) Wycliffe John Wycliffe was born in 1382 in Hipswell, England. His tenure at Oxford cumulating in a Doctorate of Theology in 1372 was not his mark on history. As an opponent of

transubstantiation (the blood and bread actually becoming the real body and the real blood of Christ), he disagreed with many teachings of the Roman Catholic Church. During this era, the only church was the Holy Roman Catholic Church, which, as David Guzik points out is neither holy nor Roman. Kings and Popes were at odds; the Church was the most powerful religious and political machine in existence. Political alliances were being formed; Church offices were being bought and sold as a means of attaining wealth. Popes were excommunicating each other and all who opposed the doctrines of the Church which were the seat of their power and immense wealth.

As a result of an alliance with the King of France, the Papacy headquarters was moved to Avignon France in 1305. At one time there were three Popes; one in France, Rome, and Spain. In 1414, These popes all made war on each other, excommunicated each other, called each other antichrist, and demanded absolute authority over all the earth.18 Wycliffe writes, it is not necessary to go either to Rome or to Avignon in order to seek a decision from the pope, since the triune God is everywhere. Our pope is Christ.

Wycliffes academic chair was his forum for expressing his views and disagreements. This, however, was no longer sufficient for him so he started writing tracts; he attacked the temporal rule of the clergy--in temporal things the king is above the pope, and the collection of annates and indulgences is simony.19 Wycliffes views on Church authority were simple. He writes, "Even though there were a hundred popes and though every mendicant monk were a cardinal, they would be entitled to confidence only in so far as they accorded with the Bible."20

Out of a belief that the Bible should be available for the ordinary person, he translated Jeromes Vulgate by hand in his native language. He completed the New Testament in 1380 and the Old Testament soon followed in 1382. His opponents declared that the Jewel of the clergy had become the toy of the laity.21 In 1388, John Purvey, a pupil of Wycliffe, revised the entire Bible at Wycliffes request, reinforcing its clarity and beauty from the prior rendition which was a direct translation from the Vulgate.

The followers of Wycliffe became known as the Lollards. This name was given to them by Greggory XI by a Papal Bull. What was meant to be a disgrace was a badge of honor to the traveling preachers that spread the word of God throughout England. The Popes had been fighting movements such as these for centuries with the likes of Valdes and the Lollards.

John Wycliffe died on December 31, 1384 from a stroke he had three days prior. Several years later, on May 4, 1415, the Council of Constance declared that Wycliffe was, a stiffnecked heretic and under the ban of the Church. It was decreed that his books be burned and his remains be exhumed.22 His body stayed in the ground until twelve years later when Pope Martin V dug up Wycliffes bones, burned them to ashes, and threw them in the river.

Jan Huss Interestingly, it was also at this council in 1414 that Jan Huss was tricked into attending by an offer of safe passage by the Emperor. Once there, He was tried without ever being able to speak in his defense. He was burned at the stake on July 6, 1415. A prayer for the boldness of Jan Hus says, O Almighty God, who didst give to thy servant Jan Huss Boldness to confess the Name of our Savior Jesus Christ before the rulers of this world, and courage to die for this faith: Grant that we may always be ready to give a reason for the hope that is in us, and to suffer gladly for the sake of the same our Lord Jesus Christ; who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.23 Hus was a generation before Luther. Some say that Hus laid the egg of the reformation and Luther hatched it.

Gutenberg Gutenberg was born around 1400 in Mainz Germany during a time when block printing was accessible. The printer would cut a piece of wood the size of the paper. Then he would carve the letters out of the wood, ink the raised letters, and press the paper to the block. One block would print one page. Even though this seems time consuming, it was still faster for multiple publications than the traditional handwriting.

Due to the wealth of Gutenbergs family, he was able to enjoy the books of his family and their acquaintances. As he grew older, Gutenberg approach a business man named Fust with the idea of mass producing books cheaply. Fust funded Gutenbergs work but became frustrated with the lack of progress and after a court ruling, all of Gutenbergs tools were owned by Fust.

In 1455, Johan Gutenberg printed the first Bible which was Jeromes Vulgate. This was the first scripture ever printed on a printing press. Using metal moveable lettering, the 2 volume set containing three hundred pages each with every page consisted of forty-two lines. News of the printed Bible spread through out Europe, and by his death in 1468, the books were being printed all over Europe.

Gutenberg never reaped any monetary reward for his invention. He died in poverty. Today, if one of his books were to become available, it would fetch over $100,000.00 dollars.24

Desiderius Erasmus born Gerrit Gerritszoon After his parents died of the Black Plague in 1483, Erasmus became a student in the best Monastic schools of his time. He attended the University of Paris in 1495 with the Bishops approval and stiffens payment. Reluctantly, he took the vows of an Augustinian monk at age twenty-five. Although he vocally objected the churches ways, he remained in the Roman Catholic Church all his life. As a scholar, he edited and published the works of Jerome, Cyprian, Pseudo-Arnobius, Hilarius, Irenaeus, Ambrose, Augustine, Chrysostom, Basil and Origen. In doing so, he became extremely familiar with their New Testament quotations and the variant readings of each.

In 1515, Erasmus became aware of a publication known as the Polyglot. This work began in 1502 under the commission and funding by Cardinal Cisneros of Spain. The Polyglot New Testament was completed and printed in 1514 but the publication was delayed awaiting completion of the Old Testament and Pope Leo Xs approval.25

Erasmus was eager to produce and publish the work before the Polyglot was released. With five to six of the best manuscripts available to him, his work was completed in 1516 and published by Forben of Basil. This was the first non-Latin translation in over 1000 years. The source text was Byzantine type which represented the majority of all manuscripts then and even today. Due to the rushed work, this first edition had several typographical errors.

The manuscripts used were the following: Manuscripts

1eap and Family 2e 2ap
ap

Date of Mss.
11th Century 15th Century 12 14th Century
th

Books Contained in the Manuscripts

Gospels, Act, and the Pauline Epistles. This was not heavily relied upon due to Alexandrian influences. Gospels (used heavily due to accuracy) Acts and the Epistles. (used heavily due to accuracy)

15 Century

Revelation.

26

It is a falsity to say that Erasmus did not have access to Vaticanus or any Alexandrian readings while working on Textus Receptus.27 Erasmus, a noted scholar, was personal friend of Leo X and had access to every library in Europe including the Vatican. Having been supplied over 365 readings of Vaticanus28, Erasmus rejected them as corrupt as he did Codex D and Codex Bezae. Charles Elicott quoting David Cloud says that, "The manuscripts which Erasmus used differ, for the most part, only in small and insignificant details from the bulk of the cursive manuscripts. The general character of their text is the same. By this observation the pedigree of the Received Text is carried up beyond the individual manuscripts used by Erasmus29 The Erasmus product went through several editions. Martin Luther used the 1519 edition to produce his translation and the 1522 edition was probably the one used by Tyndale. Bruce Metzger cites how the work became known as Textus Receptus when he writes, It came to be known as the Textus Receptus because of the claim made in the preface of the Greek NT published by the Elzevir printers of Leiden in 1633 that this was the text received by all. It was essentially the text that had become a kind of standard in Antioch of Syria in the fourth century. For that reason, is it also known as the Anthiochian or Syrian text. And since this text became common in the Eastern church with its seat at Byzantium, it is also called the Byzantine text.30

Martin Luther This brings us to Martin Luther. Born the son of a miner in 1483, Luther attended University and was poised to be a successful lawyer until a string of life changing events led him to take the vows of as an Augustinian monk in Erfurt Germany. After his ordination in 1507 he was assigned to studies and lecture in Wittenburg.

Martin Luther was a monk of monks. He is quoted as saying, I was a good monk, and I kept to the rule of my order so strictly that I may say that if ever a monk got to heaven by his monkery it was I. All my brothers in the monastery who knew me will bear me out. If I had kept on any longer, I should have killed myself with vigils, prayers, reading, and other work.31 Having been trained in Law and due process, he was obsessed with the payment for sin and being justified before a Holy God. His studies in Galatians and Habakkuk finally led him to the knowledge that men are not justified by anything they themselves can do, but only by grace through faith in Jesus Christ. The just shall live by faith. He became increasingly opposed to the teaching of the Roman Catholic Church and after a trip to the holy city of Rome he said that if there is a hell, Rome is built on it.

After seeing his parishioners extorted by Johann Tetzel by means of indulgences in order raise money to build a Cathedral, Luther posted his 95 Thesis on the door of Whittenburg on October 31, 1517. This was not an act of sedition, but what any good scholar would do. He posted his beliefs and invited debate on the items listed.

These thesis spread like wildfire throughout the land and sparked the movement known as the Protestant Reformation. The egg that Jan Huss has laid, Martin Luther just hatched. After being excommunicated in 1521, he was summoned to appear before Charles V in April of that same year. After refusing to recant his position, he was kidnapped for his own protection by political sympathizers and taken to the castle at Wartburg. In addition to writing such great hymns as A Mighty Fortress Is Our God, it was here that he translated the New Testament into German. Although Luthers work was not the first Biblical text in German, it was by far the greatest and most influential. In 1522, he produced the New

Testament followed by the German Pentateuch in 1523, and in 1529 he completed the entire Bible.

William Tyndale Tyndale was a strong supporter of the Reformation of the Church and was a learned scholar attending both Cambridge and Oxford. In 1522 he was charged with heresy due to his out spoken sarcasm toward the policies of the church and left for London.32 Prior to this, he had already determined to translate the Bible into English so that it would be available even to a boy that driveth the plough.

In London, the clergy did not approve of the Bible being in a language the people could read for themselves so he left for Hamburg. In 1525 26, with the help of Martin Luther, William Tyndale completed the first English Bible which consisted of the New Testament based on Erasmuss Textus Receptus. Colleges of Tyndale began to talk about the printing of the new Bible and the production was stopped by the Church. Tyndale escaped to the city of Worms with only a few sheets of the printing.

The work was continued in Worms and was successfully completed and printed, with copies arriving in England in 1526. While in exile in Hamburg, he revised the New Testament and started working on the translation of the Old Testament. Prior to completion, Tyndales location was leaked leading to his arrest in 1535. He was later condemned to be burned at the stake where he was strangled prior to the fire being lit as an act of mercy.

Myles Coverdale Myles Coverdale continued Tyndales work and in 1535 became the first to publish an entire Bible in English known as the Coverdale Bible. This printing contained the Old and New Testament and the Apocrypha. He used Luthers German translation and the Latin as sources, but still relying heavily on Tyndales prior work. Coverdales work can be noticed in later versions of the Bible such as the Matthew-Tyndale Bible (1537) and as superintendent over the printing of the Great Bible of 1538.

Coverdale went into exile after the execution of Thomas Cromwell in 1539. Cromwell was a friend of Coverdale and Tyndale. Tyndale was executed even after Cromwell pleaded his case to try and save his life.

John Rogers alias Thomas Matthews John Rogers, under the alias of Thomas Matthews, published his version called the MatthewTyndale Bible in 1537. It is a composite made up of Tyndale's Pentateuch and New Testament (1534-1535 edition) and Coverdale's Bible and some of Roger's own translation of the text.33

The Great Bible After the Pope refused to allow the King to divorce his wife and marry his mistress, Henry VIII broke from the Pope, denounced Catholicism, and declared himself as supreme ruler of both the State and the Church. This non Catholic, non Protestant Church became what is known as the Anglican Church or Church of England. As the first act of rebellion against the Pope, the King issued the printing of an English Bible. The Great Bible was produced in 1539.

King Henry VIII requested Thomas Cranmer as the Arch Bishop of Canterbury, to hire Coverdale to print this Bible. It was called the Great Bible mainly due to the extreme size of the work. These Bibles were chained to the pulpit and some even had readers that were positioned with them so that everyone could hear the Bible read in English. This publication was a revision of the Coverdale Bible.

Geneva Bible John Rogers and Cranmer were later burned for being protestant. Many of the early reformers fled to Switzerland as a means of escaping persecution from the brutal reign of Queen Mary; better known as Bloody Mary. Here, they produced the Geneva Bible; the New Testament in 1557 followed by the Old Testament in 1560, which was the first English Bible to introduce numbered verses and chapter divisions from Stephanuss Greek New

Testament of 1551.34 This Bible had several study notes that shed bad light on Papal rule and was very Calvinistic in its explanations and notes.

This revision of the 1539 Great Bible was the one used by John Calvin and John Foxe who later chronicled the death of the martyrs in his work, Foxes Book of Martyrs. William Shakespeare, John Bunyan, John Milton, the Pilgrims who landed on Plymouth Rock in 1620, and other luminaries of that era used the Geneva Bible exclusively.35 This Bible is also known as the breeches Bible because of the discrete way it handled passage in Genesis 3:7 pertaining to the clothing of Adam and Eve.

The Geneva Bible was the choice of English speaking people for over one hundred years and, Examination of the 1611 King James Bible shows clearly that its translators were influenced much more by the Geneva Bible, than by any other source. The Geneva Bible itself retains over 90% of William Tyndale's original English translation.36 By the 1600s, the Puritans and Pilgrims were under extreme persecution from England and left to come to America. They brought with them, the Geneva Bible.

The Bishops Bible Sometimes called the rough draft of the King James Bible, the Bishops Bible was published in 1568 with hopes of being an authorized version that would replace the Geneva Bible. Queen Elizabeth commissioned eight Bishops and other scholars under the watchful eye of the Arch Bishop William Parker, to produce this revision of the Great Bible. Upon the death of William Parker and the succession of Queen Elizabeth to the throne, the Geneva Bible was allowed to be printed in England. The Bishops Bible never achieved its goal of replacing the Geneva Bible.

Douai-Rheims Bible Catholic refugees migrated to France due to political troubles and thought necessary to create a version that would be the universal Bible of the Catholic. Because of the lack of money, the publication was delayed. In 1582, the New Testament was completed in Rheims, and the

Old Testament was completed in Douai in 1609-10. The Old Testament has been revised two times and the New Testament has been revised and corrected a total of eight.37

Douai-Rheims is the first English version to break away from Textus Receptus and use the Clementine Vulgate of 1550 as the source text. Just as the Geneva Bible was anti-Roman Catholic as seen in the study notes, the Douai Rheims version would be just as tenacious toward the Protestants in its notes. The following is the preface of the Douai Rheims Bible: "Now since Luther and his followers have pretended that the Catholic Roman faith and doctrine should be contrary to God's written word, and that the Scriptures were not suffered in vulgar languages, lest the people should see the truth, and withal these new masters corruptly turning the Scriptures into diverse tongues, as might best serve their own opinions, against this false suggestion and practice, Catholic pastors have, for one especial remedy, set forth true and sincere translations in most languages of the Latin Church."38 The preface of the New Testament was just as strong as seen by this excerpt. We, therefore, having compassion to see our beloved countrymen, with extreme danger of their souls, to use only such profane translations and erroneous men's mere fantasies, for the pure and blessed word of truth, much also moved thereunto by the desires of many devout persons, have set forth for you, benign readers, the New Testament to begin withal, trusting that it may give occasion to you, after diligent perusal thereof, to lay away at least such their impure versions as hitherto you have been forced to occupy."39 (1611 - 1885) The King James Bible While at the Hampton Court in 1604, the Puritan Leader Dr. Reynolds, suggested the idea that a new version be made. All marginal notes and bias party study helps would be eliminated and the work should be done by the Universities. By order of James of Scotland who took the name of King James I, of the Anglican Church of England, over fifty scholars were commissioned to produce what will become the best selling Bible of all time.

Broken up into six companies, two at Cambridge, two at Oxford, and two in London, the work began in 1607. Two years later, the different works from the different groups were compiled and in 1610 the work went to press. The printed issue of the King James Bible was produced in 1611. Created to compete with the Geneva Bible, the King James Bible did not

meet with the acceptance it had hoped for at first. Over time, the King James Bible did over take the Geneva Bible as it did every thing else. Kenyon says, Though revisions had been so frequent previously, no one proposed to revise the version of 1611 for two hundred and seventy years. Though the Geneva Bible was pre-eminently the Bible of the Puritans, and the Puritans were in ascendancy until 1660, the Authorized Version drove it out of the field by sheer merit.40 The King James Bible was the third authorized version of its time. The first was the Great Bible, followed by the Bishops Bible. It was comprised of the Old Testament with the Apocrypha, and the New Testament. The source text was mainly Textus Receptus along with, the Great Bible and portions of the Clementine Vulgate. Some scholars differ on which version of Textus Receptus was used, Stephanus or Beza, but most would agree that it was Byzantine in script and carried readings from the Great Bible and the minimal portions of the Vulgate.

John Eliot After Charles I took the throne in 1625 from his father King James, religious tensions grew among the Church of England and the Puritans who, unlike the Pilgrims who settled in Massachusetts in 1620, did not want to separate from the Church of England, just reform it and purify it.

By 1630, it was impossible for a Puritan to hold any office in the Church of England. One of these pastors was John Eliot. Eliot left for the New World in 1631 and arrived at the Massachusetts Bay Colony in July of that year. After being well received as a preacher, he was offered a position at First Church of Boston but took a position in Roxbury instead.

The purpose of the Puritan was two fold: 1) to purify the Church of the corruption of the Church of England, and 2) to take the gospel to the natives. After several years of learning the Algonquin language which some have declared to be the most difficult language in the world, John Eliot completed the Algonquin translation in 1659.

When Eliot informed The Society of Propagation of the Gospel in New England of the work, they sent printer Marmaduke Johnson with paper and a press to begin production. By 1661, fifteen hundred New Testaments had been printed and in 1663, the entire Bible, Old and New Testaments, were bound together in the native language of the Algonquin Indian.

Other Translations Several over translations would follow; each having their place in history. The English version produced by Robert Aitken in 1782 is the only Bible to be authorized by the United States Congress and the first U.S. printing to exclude the Apocrypha. 1791 saw the Family Bible produced by Isaac Collins and Noah Webster, who produced the dictionary, published the Websters version of the King James Bible in 1833.

Manuscripts It is here that a divergence will be taken as an opportunity to expound on manuscripts for it is with the English Standard Version of 1885, that differing schools of thought found its way the pages of the English Bible in a way that would impact future translations. After reading the endless pages of commentary on the differing families of text, multiple pros and cons of each, it can easily overwhelm and, if not careful, cast a degree of doubt on any translation.

However, the sovereignty of God cannot be over looked as Kenyon states, We may indeed believe that He would not allow His Word to be seriously corrupted, or any part of it essential to man's salvation to be lost or obscured;41

Dabney states that, If all the debated readings were surrendered by us, no fact or doctrine of Christianity would thereby be invalidated, and least of all would the doctrine of Christ's proper divinity be deprived of adequate scriptural support. Hence the interests of orthodoxy are entirely secure from and above the reach of all movements of modern criticism of the text whether made in a correct or incorrect method, and all such discussions in future are to the church of subordinate importance.42 Most scholars will side toward the point that no particular harm is done to critical doctrines of scripture. This is both true and false depending on what is deemed critical. As long as the

points of contention are well established and realized up front, I would agree. However, most Christians, including myself, are not proficient in Greek and Hebrew and the manuscript differences.

Below are some of the differences between the two texts families. The King James Version will represent Textus Receptus and the NIV will represent Alexandrian text of Westcott and Hort or Nestle/Aland: Mark 1:1 The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. -KJV The beginning of the gospel about Jesus Christ, the Son of God.- NIV (cast doubt on the inspiration and source of the Word of God) Luke 4:4 And Jesus answered him, saying, It is written, That man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word of God. - KJV Jesus answered, "It is written: Man does not live on bread alone. NIV (casts doubt on the infallibility and authority of scripture) Acts 2:30 Therefore being a prophet, and knowing that God had sworn with an oath to him, that of the fruit of his loins, according to the flesh, he would raise up Christ to sit on his throne. KJV But he was a prophet and knew that God had promised him on oath that he would place one of his descendants on his throne. NIV (denies the coming Kingship of Christ) Eph. 3:9 And to make all men see what is the fellowship of the mystery, which from the beginning of the world hath been hid in God, who created all things by Jesus Christ. KJV ..and to make plain to everyone the administration of this mystery, which for ages past was kept hidden in God, who created all things. NIV (denies the creative agency of Christ) I Tim. 3:16 And without controversy great is the mystery of godliness: God was manifest in the flesh, justified in the Spirit, seen of angels, preached unto the Gentiles, believed on in the world, received up into glory. KJV Beyond all question, the mystery of godliness is great: He appeared in a body, was vindicated by the Spirit, was seen by angels, was preached among the nations, was believed

on in the world, was taken up in glory. NIV (The substitution of He for God is an assault on the deity of Christ and supports Gnostic beliefs.) The next two hundred years would bring about findings that would change the way Biblical text was viewed. Two of the major finds that have caused the majority of differentiation is Codex Sinaiticus and Codex Vaticanus. These Codices are from the 4th century and were significantly older than those used in the production of Textus Receptus. However, older does not mean better. They represent a type known as Alexandrian where Textus Receptus are of Byzantine type which represents 95% of remaining manuscripts.

Vaticanus was said to have been highly protected by the Vatican in Rome and was not available to any scholar. This is only partially true. Paulus Bombasius discovered Codex B in 1512 who regularly forwarded readings of Vaticanus to Erasmus who rejected the Codex B due to corruption of text. Tischendorf released his edition of the text in 1867. Its veneration was due mostly to the mystic that surrounded it and the age of the document. The text is missing most of Genesis, Hebrews after 9:14, all the Pastoral Epistles, and the book of Revelation.

In 1859, G.F.C. Tischendorf found Codex Sinaiticus in the trash can in a monastery of St. Catherines at the base of Mt. Sinai. It was of Alexandrian Type and dated back to the 4th century. Although written over and corrected by several hands, it contained the entire Greek Bible, the Epistle of Barnabus, and most of The Shepard of Hermas. The manuscripts were first published in 1862 with later editions that followed. How odd it is that texts that were deemed useless by the monks and apparently of no value due to corruption of text, were taken from the trash can and used as a main source Codex of Westcott and Hort.

Some would argue that older is better. That is not necessarily correct. Dr. Schriver states that the worst corruption of the scriptures occurred during the day of the Apostles and the 2nd century. This corruption was both accidental and purposeful.43 It wasnt until 3rd century that alterations to the text were virtually not possible.44 The logic would follow that the Alexandrian texts are in much better shape because they were rarely used. Some argue that the true text was reproduced time and time again while the more corrupt texts were

discarded. This can be illustrated due to the fact that the Byzantine text out numbers the Alexandrian text as much as 10 to 1.

Westcott and Hort In translation of scripture, one cannot separate religious beliefs from the translation of the Word of God. The scripture is clear that saved men should be the ones dividing the Word. Paul speaking to Pastor Timothy says, Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth. (2 Tim. 2:15)

It is important to know the views and the biases that a translator could have on the text. Are their words the words of saved men? That your faith should not stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God.(1Cor. 2:5). The Bible says, But those things which proceed out of the mouth come forth from the heart; and they defile the man.(Matt. 15:18) The true picture of the heart can be heard from the words of the mouth. The two most prolific champions of the move against Textus Receptus were Brooke Foss Westcott (1825-1901) and Fenton J. A. Hort (18281892).

Both were Anglican Scholars attending Cambridge University. Horts vindictive spirit toward Textus Receptus can be seen as early as age twenty-three when he referred to Textus Receptus as that vile text. Codex Vaticanus and Codex Sinaiticus were the two texts that these men would work venomously to replace Textus Receptus. Seeing the signs that a revision of the New Testament would be coming, the two worked for nearly twenty years, beginning as early as 1853, to produce The New Testament in Original Greek which relied solely on Vaticanus and Sinaiticus.

Both Westcott and Hort were friends with Charles Darwin, Sigmund Freud, and Carl Jung; all enemies of Christ. This can be seen in the attitudes of their writing as illustrated in the following quotes. Westcott saw the worship of Mary as having much in common with worshiping Jesus. He writes, "I never read an account of a miracle (in Scripture?) but I seem instinctively to feel its improbability, and discover some want of evidence in the account of it."45 His Darwinian influences are apparent when he writes,

"No one now, I suppose, holds that the first three chapters of Genesis, for example, give a literal history - I could never understand how any one reading them with open eyes could think they did - yet they disclose to us a Gospel. So it is probably elsewhere."46 In 1860, Hort wrote a letter to Reverend John Ellerton stating that the book that has engaged him the most is Darwin and he was proud to be a contemporary of such a man. Hort also wrote, I am inclined to think that no such state as 'Eden' (I mean the popular notion) ever existed, and that Adam's fall in no degree differed from the fall of each of his descendants"47 He did not believe in the Bible or its authority as seen when he writes, There are, I fear, still more serious differences between us on the subject of authority, and especially the authority of the Bible"48

The truth of the matter is that these men were not Christians, they did not believe in the infallibility of scripture, they, by their own admission did not believe in miracles which would include the resurrection of Jesus. They did not believe in the Biblical account of the fall of Adam, they rejected the inspiration of scripture, and denied the deity of Christ. Their effect on the revision committee was scared with deceit and coercion. Yet, their influence in modern translation and revision is still evident today beginning with the English Revised Version and filtering into the American Versions through the eclectic renderings of Nestle and Aland.

In the introduction to the 24th edition of Nestles Greek New Testament, editors Erwin Nestle and Kurt Aland make the following admission: Thus the text, built up on the work of the 19th century, has remained as a whole unchanged, particularly since the research of recent years has not yet led to the establishment of a generally acknowledged N.T. text49 Below are examples of some of the more noticeable changes that Westcott and Hort deemed necessary to exclude. The verses will be using the New King James Version with the Revised Standard Version deletions struck through and the different wording in parenthesis.

Matt. 1:25: and did not know her till she had brought forth her firstborn Son. And he called His name JESUS. Matt. 9:13: But go and learn what this means: "I desire mercy and not sacrifice.' For I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners, to repentance." Matt. 23:14 This whole text is deleted. Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you devour widows' houses, and for a pretense make long prayers. Therefore you will receive greater condemnation. Mk. 15:28 So the Scripture was fulfilled which says, "And He was numbered with the transgressors." Mk. 16:9-20 The whole text is deleted. Jhn 3:15 that whoever believes in Him should not perish but (may) have eternal life. Jhn 16:16 "A little while, and you will not see Me; and again a little while, and you will see Me, because I go to the Father. Acts: 8:37 The whole text is deleted. Then Philip said, "If you believe with all your heart, you may." And he answered and said, "I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God. Rom. 11:6 And if by grace, then it is no longer of works; otherwise grace is no longer grace. But if it is of works, it is no longer grace; otherwise work is no longer work. Rom. 13:9 For the commandments, "You shall not commit adultery," "You shall not murder," "You shall not steal," "You shall not bear false witness," "You shall not covet," and if there is any other commandment, are all summed up in this saying, namely, "You shall love your neighbor as yourself." Gal. 3:1 O foolish Galatians! Who has bewitched you that you should not obey the truth, before whose eyes Jesus Christ was clearly portrayed among you as crucified? Col. 1:14 in whom we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins.

Heb. 1:3 and every spirit that does not confess that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is not of God. And this is the spirit of the Antichrist, which you have heard was coming, and is now already in the world. English Revised Version or Revised Version In 1870, twenty-five scholars were chosen to revise the English Bible. Westcott and Hort were among the group as was Lightfoot. With dominating presence, the trio buried any opposing view on text. This was a calculated attempt to control the process as indicated by Westcotts own words in a letter he wrote to Lightfoot which said, Ought we not to have a conference before the fist meeting for Revision? There are many points on which it is important that we should be agreed50

Sometimes by open assault and other times by indirect means, these men were successful in out voting such men as Dr. Scrivener who was the leading manuscript scholar of the day and changing the text in over 5,337 places.51 This version came to be known as the English Revised Version. From the onset, this version was to adapt the King James Version to present day English without changing the idiom, the vocabulary of the text and to make as few alterations as possible. However when completed, The English Revised New Testament,
differing from the King James Version in some 36,000 places,52 In 1881 -1885 the English Revised Version was printed with the variants the American committee desired appearing in the publishing of the American Standard Bible of 1901.

Selected Versions from 1901 The term eclectic means that the editors and translators have taken a blended approach to the translation of scriptural text. However, the majority of translations today rest on the Nestle-Aland text which is primarily based on Alexandrian text such as was used by Westcott and Hort. The later editions of Nestle and others, including the identical text of the current Nestle-Aland 26th-27th editions and UBS 3rd-4th editions fail to preserve the "pure" Alexandrian character of the text in as sharp a manner as did Westcott and Hort, who relied primarily on the joint testimony of Codex Sinaiticus (Aleph) and Codex Vaticanus (B) in contradistinction to the assimilation of readings from manuscripts of

other texttypes which is consistently practiced according to the eclectic principles espoused by the framers of the modern critical editions. The current text found in the Nestle-Aland 26-27 and UBS 3-4 editions is actually an "eclectic" text, which reflects editorial choice among variant readings found in ALL known manuscripts and texttypes. Even though the current critical texts stand primarily in alignment with the Alexandrian manuscripts and in opposition to the Textform (Byzantine/Majority) found in most Greek manuscripts of the New Testament, the modern critical editions at best represent a "halfway house" between two opposing document-based schools of New Testament Greek textual criticism.53 The American Standard Version of 1901 is basically a revision of the English Revised Version but with the preferences of the American revisers. This revision was deemed necessary because of the antiquated words retained in the English Revised Version.

In 1947, a Bedouin sheep herder come across seven manuscripts in clay jars while searching for a lost sheep near the caves of Qumran along the Northwest shore of the Dead Sea. The herder sold them to a dealer in antiquities named Kando who, in turn, sold three to Sukenik of Hebrew University, and the other four to Metropolitan Mar Athanasius Yeshue Samuel of the Syrian Orthodox monastery of St. Mark. Athanasius took his four to be studied at the American School for Oriental Research where they cause quite a clamor among American and European scholars.

Between 1949 and 1956, the remnants of over eight hundred manuscripts were found in eleven caves dating from between 200 B.C. to 68 A.D. Only cave one and eleven produced virtually intact manuscripts. Cave four provided the highest number of fragments totaling over 15,000. These findings have proven valuable in understanding Bible translation, customs, and the culture of that time. We do not know precisely who wrote those sectarian scrolls, but we can say that the authors seemed to be connected to the priesthood, were led by priests, disapproved of the Jerusalem priesthood, encouraged a strict and pious way of life, and expected an imminent confrontation between the forces of good and evil.54 Every book in the Hebrew Bible has been represented except for Ester. With nineteen copies of Isaiah, twenty-five copies of Deuteronomy, and thirty copies of Psalms, this was significant to say the least. These scrolls are the oldest manuscripts ever found. The Isaiah

scroll, for instance, is about nine hundred years older than any previous copy known. The significance is that between the copy found in Qumran and its most recent contemporary is that there are very few differences; none of which change any meaning to any of the passages.

In 1971, the American Standard Version was revised and named the New American Standard Version. Today, this version is heralded as being the most accurate word for word translation existing. It is the preferred text of most scholars and seminary students of today.

One noted draw back is its cumbersome reading because of its attention to accuracy.

In 1973, the New International Version was release which was supposed to be a cure for the hard reading of the New American Standards. Its goal was not be a word for word translation but more of a thought for thought. This type of effort is called a dynamic equivalent. Other versions that fall in this category would be The Good News Bible, The

New Century Bible, Contemporary English Bible, New International Readers Version, and the New Living Translation.

The New King James Version was presented in 1982 which was originally intended to be an update of King James Version removing just the antiquated thee and thou type of text. The text still remains somewhat loyal to the Textus Receptus.

In 2002, the English Standard Version was released in order to create a version that is as easy to read as the New International Version and still retain the accuracy of the New American Standard as being a word for word translation.

There are many more translations and revisions, each trying to find their own market niche. I have decided to exclude those translations that do, in my opinion, a severe injustice to the Word of God. They are not translations nor are they dynamic equivalents. They are the most dangerous of these; The Paraphrase. Such versions that could be classified as paraphrases

are The Message and The Living Bible.

The best example of such is The Message. This is one mans opinion on what the Bible means. However, as the text below will indicate, this flippant handling of the Word of God boarders on blasphemy. The passage below is referring to the prophecy of our Lord Jesus and the wounds in His hand and the punishment that He took for the sins of mankind. Zec. 13:6 And one shall say unto him, What are these wounds in thine hands? Then he shall answer, Those with which I was wounded in the house of my friends. - KJV And if someone says, "And so where did you get that black eye?' they'll say, "I ran into a door at a friend's house.'- The Message Jesus did not run into a door for anyones sins. Nor did He just sustain a black eye. He was wounded for our transgression and bruised for our iniquities and by His strips we can be healed from eternal death brought by sin. He was marred beyond recognition and scourged for my wrongdoing. Such apparent lack of conscious could yield conclusions that heart breaking to say the least. Men of faith died so that the Bible could be accurately translated. It is my opinion that the reason there was no such thing as a dynamic equivalent is because no one was willing to die for such a rendering.

Summary The translation of the Bible through the centuries is an amazing story. It is one that is full of both mystery and providence. It is a collection of inspired books from the God of the

Universe. Men lived and died to sustain a posterity that we sometimes take so flippantly today. Men like Wycliffe, Luther, Coverdale, and Tyndale who literally died for the work of scripture translation are to be remembered with honor.

Today, it seems that revised versions appear virtually every day to meet the desires, marketing aspirations, and conviction of certain groups instead of letting the Word of God set the standard. I once heard that some of the most detrimental events to the Church were done by men with good intentions. For example, The Message may have been written with good intentions but the result was not a Bible, but a commentary on the Bible which as been mistaken as a Bible.

My prayer is that God would continue to watch over and protect the truth of His Word in the midst of a flood of depredating attempts to make the Bible more palatable. The Bible is the sword of the Spirit. It is the Jesus in written form and deserves respect and admiration. In it are the words of eternal life and the plan to redeem the universe from the ravaging of sin. It is well worth dying for.

The following was extracted from: http://www.gnosis.org/library/advh1.htm

IRENAEUS: AGAINST HERESIES BOOK ONE CHAP. I.--ABSURD IDEAS OF THE DISCIPLES OF VALENTINUS AS TO THE ORIGIN, NAME, ORDER, AND CONJUGAL PRODUCTIONS OF THEIR FANCIED AEONS, WITH THE PASSAGES OF SCRIPTURE WHICH THEY ADAPT TO THEIR OPINIONS. 1. THEY maintain, then, that in the invisible and ineffable heights above there exists a certain perfect, pre-existent AEon,(4) whom they call Proarche, Propator, and Bythus, and describe as being invisible and incomprehensible. Eternal and unbegotten, he remained throughout innumerable cycles of ages in profound serenity and quiescence. There existed along with him Ennoea, whom they also call Charis and Sige.(5) At last this Bythus determined to send forth from himself the beginning of all things, and deposited this production (which he had resolved to bring forth) in his contemporary Sige, even as seed is deposited in the womb. She then, having received this seed, and becoming pregnant, gave birth to Nous, who was both similar and equal to him who had produced him, and was alone capable of comprehending his father's greatness. This Nous they call also Monogenes, and Father, and the Beginning of all Things. Along with him was also produced Aletheia; and these four constituted the first and first-begotten Pythagorean Tetrad, which they also denominate the root of all things. For there are first Bythus and Sige, and then Nous and Aletheia. And Monogenes, perceiving for what purpose he had been produced, also himself sent forth Logos and Zoe, being the father of all those who were to come after him, and the beginning and fashioning of the entire Pleroma. By the conjunction of Logos and Zoo were brought forth Anthropos and Ecclesia; and thus was formed the first-begotten Ogdoad, the root and substance of all things, called among them by four names, viz., Bythus, and Nous, and Logos, and Anthropos. For each of these is masculo-feminine, as follows: Propator was united by a conjunction with his Ennoea; then Monogenes, that is Nous, with Aletheia; Logos with Zoe, and Anthropos with Ecclesia. 2. These AEons having been produced for the glory of the Father, and wishing, by their own efforts, to effect this object, sent forth emanations by means of conjunction. Logos and Zoe, after producing Anthropos and Ecclesia, sent forth other ten AEons, whose names are the following: Bythius and Mixis, Ageratos and Henosis, Autophyes and Hedone, Acinetos and Syncrasis, Monogenes and Macaria.(6) These are the ten AEons whom they declare to have been produced by Logos and Zoe. They then add that Anthropos himself, along with Ecclesia, produced twelve AEons, to whom they give the following names: Paracletus and Pistis, Patricos and Elpis, Metricos and Agape, Ainos and Synesis, Ecclesiasticus and Macariotes, Theletos and Sophia. 3. Such are the thirty AEons in the erroneous system of these men; and they are described as being wrapped up, so to speak, in silence, and known to none [except these professing teachers]. Moreover, they declare that this invisible and spiritual Pleroma of theirs is tripartite, being divided into an Ogdoad, a Decad, and a Duodecad. And for this reason they affirm it was that the "Saviour"--for they do not please to call Him "Lord"--did no work in public during the space of thirty years,(1) thus setting forth the mystery of these AEons. They maintain also, that these thirty AEons are most plainly indicated in the parable(2) of the labourers sent into the vineyard. For some are sent about the first hour, others about the third hour, others about the sixth hour, others about the ninth hour, and others about the eleventh hour. Now, if we add up the numbers of the hours here mentioned, the sum total will be thirty: for one, three, six, nine, and eleven, when added together, form thirty. And by the

hours, they hold that the AEons were pointed out; while they maintain that these are great, and wonderful, and hitherto unspeakable mysteries which it is their special function to develop; and so they proceed when they find anything in the multitude(3) of things contained in the Scriptures which they can adopt and accommodate to their baseless speculations. CHAP. II.--THE PROPATOR WAS KNOWN TO MONO-GENES ALONE. AMBITION, DISTURBANCE, AND DANGER INTO WHICH SOPHIA FELL; HER SHAPELESS OFFSPRING: SHE IS RESTORED BY HOROS. THE PRODUCTION OF CHRIST AND OF THE HOLY SPIRIT, IN ORDER TO THE COMPLETION OF THE AEONS. MANNER OF THE PRODUCTION OF JESUS. 1. They proceed to tell us that the Propator of their scheme was known only to Monogenes, who sprang from him; in other words, only to Nous, while to all the others he was invisible and incomprehensible. And, according to them, Nous alone took pleasure in contemplating the Father, and exulting in considering his immeasurable greatness; while he also meditated how he might communicate to the rest of the AEons the greatness of the Father, revealing to them how vast and mighty he was, and how he was without beginning,--beyond comprehension, and altogether incapable of being seen. But, in accordance with the will of the Father, Sige restrained him, because it was his design to lead them all to an acquaintance with the aforesaid Propator, and to create within them a desire of investigating his nature. In like manner, the rest of the AEons also, in a kind of quiet way, had a wish to behold the Author of their being, and to contemplate that First Cause which had no beginning. 2. But there rushed forth in advance of the rest that AEon who was much the latest of them, and was the youngest of the Duodecad which sprang from Anthropos and Ecclesia, namely Sophia, and suffered passion apart from the embrace of her consort Theletos. This passion, indeed, first arose among those who were connected with Nous and Aletheia, but passed as by contagion to this degenerate AEon, who acted under a pretence of love, but was in reality influenced by temerity, because she had not, like Nous, enjoyed communion with the perfect Father. This passion, they say, consisted in a desire to search into the nature of the Father; for she wished, according to them, to comprehend his greatness. When she could not attain her end, inasmuch as she aimed at an impossibility, and thus became involved in an extreme agony of mind, while both on account of the vast profundity as well as the unsearchable nature of the Father, and on account of the love she bore him, she was ever stretching herself forward, there was danger lest she should at last have been absorbed by his sweetness, and resolved into his absolute essence, unless she had met with that Power which supports all things, and preserves them outside of the unspeakable greatness. This power they term Horos; by whom, they say, she was restrained and supported; and that then, having with difficulty been brought back to herself, she was convinced that the Father is incomprehensible, and so laid aside her original design, along with that passion which had arisen within her from the overwhelming influence of her admiration. 3. But others of them fabulously describe the passion and restoration of Sophia as follows: They say that she, having engaged in an impossible and impracticable attempt, brought forth an amorphous substance, such as her female nature enabled her to produce.(4) When she looked upon it, her first feeling was one of grief, on account of the imperfection of its generation, and then of fear lest this should end(5) her own existence. Next she lost, as it were, all command of herself, and was in the greatest perplexity while endeavouring to discover the cause of all this, and in what way she might conceal what had happened. Being greatly harassed by these passions, she at last changed her mind, and endeavoured to return anew to the Father. When, however, she in some measure made the attempt, strength failed her, and she became a suppliant of the Father. The other AEons, Nous in

particular, presented their supplications along with her. And hence they declare material substance(1) had its beginning from ignorance and grief, and fear and bewilderment. 4. The Father afterwards produces, in his own image, by means of Monogenes, the above-mentioned Horos, without conjunction,(2) masculo-feminine. For they maintain that sometimes the Father acts in conjunction with Sige, but that at other times he shows himself independent both of male and female. They term this Horos both Stauros and Lytrotes, and Carpistes, and Horothetes, and Metagoges.(3) And by this Horos they declare that Sophia was purified and established, while she was also restored to her proper conjunction. For her enthymesis (or inborn idea) having been taken away from her, along with its supervening passion, she herself certainly remained within the Pleroma; but her enthymesis, with its passion, was separated from her by Horos, fenced(4) off, and expelled from that circle. This enthymesis was, no doubt, a spiritual substance, possessing some of the natural tendencies of an AEon, but at the same time shapeless and without form, because it had received nothing.(5) And on this account they say that it was an imbecile and feminine production.(6) 5. After this substance had been placed outside of the Pleroma of the AEons, and its mother restored to her proper conjunction, they tell us that Monogenes, acting in accordance with the prudent forethought of the Father, gave origin to another conjugal pair, namely Christ and the Holy Spirit (lest any of the AEons should fall into a calamity similar to that of Sophia), for the purpose of fortifying and strengthening the Pleroma, and who at the same time completed the number of the AEons. Christ then instructed them as to the nature of their conjunction, and taught them that those who possessed a comprehension of the Unbegotten were sufficient for themselves.(7) He also announced among them what related to the knowledge of the Father,--namely, that he cannot be understood or comprehended, nor so much as seen or heard, except in so far as he is known by Monogenes only. And the reason why the rest of the AEons possess perpetual existence is found in that part of the Father's nature which is incomprehensible; but the reason of their origin and formation was situated in that which may be comprehended regarding him, that is, in the Son.(8) Christ, then, who had just been produced, effected these things among them. 6. But the Holy Spirit(9) taught them to give thanks on being all rendered equal among themselves, and led them to a state of true repose. Thus, then, they tell us that the AEons were constituted equal to each other in form and sentiment, so that all became as Nous, and Logos, and Anthropos, and Christus. The female AEons, too, became all as Aletheia, and Zoe, and Spiritus, and Ecclesia. Everything, then, being thus established, and brought into a state of perfect rest, they next tell us that these beings sang praises with great joy to the Propator, who himself shared in the abounding exaltation. Then, out of gratitude for the great benefit which had been conferred on them, the whole Pleroma of the AEons, with one design and desire, and with the concurrence of Christ and the Holy Spirit, their Father also setting the seal of His approval on their conduct, brought together whatever each one had in himself of the greatest beauty and preciousness; and uniting all these contributions so as skilfully to blend the whole, they produced, to the honour and glory of Bythus, a being of most perfect beauty, the very star of the Pleroma, and the perfect fruit [of it], namely Jesus. Him they also speak of under the name of Saviour, and Christ, and patronymically, Logos, and Everything, because He was formed from the contributions of all. And then we are told that, by way of honour, angels of the same nature as Himself were simultaneously produced, to act as His body-guard.

BIBLIOGRAPHY
1

Missler, Chuck. Learn the Bible in 24 Hours. Thomas Nelson Publishing. Copy write 2002. pg. 105 Horner, Barry E., Bible Introduction 101 Foundational Studies in the Word of God. pg. 24 http://www.omniglot.com/writing/hebrew.htm http://www.omniglot.com/writing/aramaic.htm Horner, Barry E., Bible Introduction 101 Foundational Studies in the Word of God. pg. 25 http://www.omniglot.com/writing/greek.htm Horner, Barry E., Bible Introduction 101 Foundational Studies in the Word of God. pg. 25

Kenyon, Sir Fredric., OUR BIBLE & THE ANCIENT MANUSCRIPTS., Copyright Sir F Kenyon 1895. First published Eyre & Spottiswoode 1895. fourth edition 1939.Prepared for katapi by Paul Ingram 2003. adapted from http://www.katapi.org.uk/BibleMSS/Ch1.htm#L

Kenyon, Sir Fredric., OUR BIBLE & THE ANCIENT MANUSCRIPTS., Copyright Sir F Kenyon 1895. First published Eyre & Spottiswoode 1895. fourth edition 1939.Prepared for katapi by Paul Ingram 2003. adapted from http://www.katapi.org.uk/BibleMSS/Ch1.htm#PC
10

http://www.earlham.edu/~seidti/iam/papyrus.html Introduction to Bibliology, frankpastore.com., pg. 1

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Kenyon, Sir Fredrick., OUR BIBLE & THE ANCIENT MANUSCRIPTS., Copyright Sir F Kenyon 1895. First published Eyre & Spottiswoode 1895. fourth edition 1939.Prepared for katapi by Paul Ingram 2003. adapted from http://www.katapi.org.uk/BibleMSS/Ch1.htm#L The Letter Of Aristeas., R.H. Charles-Editor., Oxford: The Clarendon Press, 1913

13

Brenton, Sir Lancelot Charles Lee., An Historical Account of the Septuagint Version. First published as The Septuagint Version of the Old Testament, according to the Vatican Text, Translated into English (London: Samuel Bagster, 1844). Adapted from www.bible-researcher.com/brenton1.html Bebe., Medieval Source Book., Ecclesiastical History of the English Nation. Book IV, Ch. 24. extracted from http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/basis/bede-book4.html
16 15

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http://www.bfbs.org.uk/documents/Masoretes.pdf As adopted from British And Foreign Bible Study. Machine Assisted Translation Team. Published May 2, 2002. pg. 5
17

http://www.anabaptistnetwork.com/waldensians http://trinityrcus.com/Sunday%20School/reformationhistory/Bohemia/Bohemia02.htm http://www.religionfacts.com/christianity/people/wycliffe.htm http://www.greatsite.com/timeline-english-bible-history/john-wycliffe.html http://www.digitaljournalist.org/issue0511/heaton.html http://www.greatsite.com/timeline-english-bible-history/john-wycliffe.html

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http://justus.anglican.org/resources/bio/7.html http://www.greatsite.com/timeline-english-bible-history/gutenberg.html Metzger, Bruce. The Text of the New Testament, p. 96103. Cereghin, Dr. John. In Defense of Erasmus. Extracted from http://www.watch.pair.com/erasmus.html Strouse, Thomas, "The 19th Century Baptists, Bible Translations and Bible Societies." Tabernacle Baptist Theological Journal, Summer, 1994, Vol., I, No. 2, pg. 7.

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Scrivener, Frederick, A Plain Introduction to the Criticism of the New Testament for the Use of the Biblical Student, ed. Edward Miller, 2 volumes. London: George Bell and Sons, 1894, 2:226, cited by William Grady, Final Authority, Schereville, IN: Grady Publications, 2993, page 113 and David Cloud, Myths About the King James Bible, op. cit., p. 9.
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Ellicott, Charles John, The Revisers and the Greek Text of the New Testament of the New Testament, by Two Members of the New Testament Company, 1882, pp. 11, 12, cited byDavid Cloud in For Love of the Bible, pg. 52.
30

Metzger, Bruce M.., The Text of the New Testament, Third Edition, Oxford University Press, pg. 1127-1128 http://www3.calvarychapel.com/ccbcgermany/histdoc05.htm http://www.hertford.ox.ac.uk/main/content/view/90/153/ http://www.greatsite.com/timeline-english-bible-history/index.html

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Kenyon, Fredric G., The Story of the Bible A Popular Account of How it Came to Us., Ch. 5, (1936). As taken from http://www.bible-researcher.com/kenyon/sotb.html http://www.reformedreader.org/gbn/igb.htm http://www.greatsite.com/timeline-english-bible-history/index.html http://www.newmanreader.org/works/tracts/douayrheims.html http://www.newmanreader.org/works/tracts/douayrheims.html http://www.newmanreader.org/works/tracts/douayrheims.html

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Kenyon, Fredric G., The Story of the Bible A Popular Account of How it Came to Us., Ch. 5, (1936). As taken from http://www.bible-researcher.com/kenyon/sotb.html Kenyon, Frederic G., Handbook of the Textual Criticism of the New Testament. (London: Macmillan and Co.,1901), pg. 271. Dabney, Robert L., "The Doctrinal Various Readings of the New Testament Greek," in Discussions by Robert L. Dabney: Theological and Evangelical, vol. I, edited by G. R. Vaughn (Harrisonburg, Va.: Sprinkle, 1982 reprint of 1890 edition), pg. 389. Scrivener, F.H.A, A Plain Introduction to the Criticism of the New Testament, Vol. II, pg. 264 Kilpatrick, G.D., Atticism and the Greek New Testament, Neutestamentliche Aufsatze, pg. 130

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Westcott, A., Life and Letters of Brooke Foss Westcott, MacMillan and Co., London, 1903, vols. I, pg.52. http://www.acts1711.com/h_w1.htm Hort, A.F., Life and Letters of Fenton J.A. Hort, MacMillan and Co., London, 1896, Vol.I, pp.78 Hort, A.F., Life and Letters of Fenton J.A. Hort, MacMillan and Co., London, 1896, vols. I, pg.400 Nestle, Erwin and Aland, Kurt, Novum Testamentum Graece, 24th edition, 1960, pg. 62 Westcott, A., Life and Letters of Brooke Foss Westcott, MacMillan and Co., London, 1903, vols. I. pg. 391 http://www.febc.edu.sg/VPP47.htm

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Paul, William E., Development of the English Bible. Impact Publications, Sect. VI. Extracted from http://www.crownhillchurch.com/engbible.pdf Robinson, Ph.D., Maurice A., INTRODUCTION GREEK NEW TESTAMENT., Westcott-Hort text from 1881, combined with the NA26/27 variants. Extracted from http://www1.uni-bremen.de/~wie/GNT/intro.html http://www.usc.edu/dept/LAS/wsrp/educational_site/dead_sea_scrolls/discovery.shtml

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