DAY 71
CHALLENGE
“The Bible has been translated over and over again in history. That’s like making a photocopy of a photocopy—eventually, the image becomes blurry. Why should we trust the Bible, considering how many times it has been translated?”
DEFENSE
Modern Bible translations are made directly from the original languages, not other translations.
There have been many translations of the Bible, but the major translations published today are not based on other translations.
The books of the Bible were originally written in three languages—Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek. These are not mysterious, lost languages. Each is well understood. Knowledge of them has survived down through history. In fact, there are people today who speak dialects of these languages as their native tongues. Hebrew is commonly spoken in modern Israel, Aramaic in various Middle Eastern communities, and Greek in Greece.
Languages change over time, but scholars have access to extensive collections of ancient manuscripts—as well as modern reference works—that enable them to understand these languages and to trans- late the books of the Bible directly from them.
These languages are not particularly difficult, and there are many introductory textbooks and courses that let anyone who wants to learn them do so.
The fact that knowledge of these languages is so widely available means that the major translations serve as a check on one another. As long as no translation has a monopoly, readers can check other translations to see how they render a passage.
There will always be oddball, eccentric translations of the Bible (just as there can be for secular works written in other languages), but these are usually produced by single, eccentric individuals. By contrast, the major translations of the Bible are made by teams of scholars who develop a consensus about how to render a text. They thus do not reflect the views of any single translator.
Many Bible commentaries and other reference works discuss translation issues extensively, allowing individuals to see arguments for and against different ways of rendering a passage.
Finally, modern Bible software is designed to let even an individual who does not know these languages to examine the original language text, look up the meaning of words, understand the grammar, and make an informed assessment.