Anyone ever heard of the "Good As New" Bible?
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shawn
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Do you have a link for it, or can you write something a bit more descriptive please.
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לבעוט את התחת ולקחת שמות
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Never heard of it. I have a Cockney bible... And I am still waiting with baited breath for the Janner Bible.
Well from the link provided, I reckon it's a crock.
From an overview:
Certainly not appropriate to his audience, for both Gentile and Jew, the idea of the Divine was very real and very present ... this is not so much 'appropriate' but 'appropriation' of the text to suit a largely self-obsessed and secular society, so get those old fashioned concepts of God out of the way, with His demands for humility, poverty, disciple and ascesis, and bring out the self-congratulatory, feelgood factor, so we can all read the bible and tell ourselves what frightfully nice chaps we are ... how any god would be as pleased as punch to have people like us for his friends.
Had anyone actually said this, I reckon those who trekked up the mountain to listen to a string of platitudinous, 'little book of ...' type claptrap would have been throwing stones long before he got to number five ...
Thomas
From an overview:
In what context is it 'appropriate'? And why 'non-churchy'?
Certainly not appropriate to his audience, for both Gentile and Jew, the idea of the Divine was very real and very present ... this is not so much 'appropriate' but 'appropriation' of the text to suit a largely self-obsessed and secular society, so get those old fashioned concepts of God out of the way, with His demands for humility, poverty, disciple and ascesis, and bring out the self-congratulatory, feelgood factor, so we can all read the bible and tell ourselves what frightfully nice chaps we are ... how any god would be as pleased as punch to have people like us for his friends.
Had anyone actually said this, I reckon those who trekked up the mountain to listen to a string of platitudinous, 'little book of ...' type claptrap would have been throwing stones long before he got to number five ...
Thomas
Bhaktajan II
Hare Krishna Yogi
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You know what would be so irreverantly cool?
The "Steal-this-Babel-Bible" the King Kong's Pile Version.
The anti-bible Bible. It would be the darkest thing since Hitler's used chamber pot.
It could be an analgory of the 20th Century, with a Philip Glass Sound Track in 3-D, and with tear-out scratch & sniffs of something or other, and an Life-Insurance policy tear-out page and naughty adverts at the end.
It would be the written word of all the neiscence the world has ever witness but was too shaken to retell for posterity.
It could have a forward by Po Pot or Idi Amin.
But the good News is that in the Apocalypse chapter all darkness & evil is overtaken by . . .
The "Steal-this-Babel-Bible" the King Kong's Pile Version.
The anti-bible Bible. It would be the darkest thing since Hitler's used chamber pot.
It could be an analgory of the 20th Century, with a Philip Glass Sound Track in 3-D, and with tear-out scratch & sniffs of something or other, and an Life-Insurance policy tear-out page and naughty adverts at the end.
It would be the written word of all the neiscence the world has ever witness but was too shaken to retell for posterity.
It could have a forward by Po Pot or Idi Amin.
But the good News is that in the Apocalypse chapter all darkness & evil is overtaken by . . .
Actually, from the passages I've read, it seems it might be the closest thing we have to what the Bible is really all about. Sure, it's something of a departure from the stale, archaic language we’re used to (which I personal believe was in some ways created with the intent to be so) and gets down to some sense of reality.
I mean really, what’s more likely, that God would speak to us in excessively formal language out of touch with the people He intended to communicate or that he’d relate to his people more with informal and verbiage as is typical between ones we love?
shawn
Well-Known Member
Call me a purist, but it was meant to be read in Hebrew.
All translations mangle the text.
All of them.
There is so much more to it than just the outer, obvious meaning.
There is an inner meaning which is lost when it is transcribed into another language.
But to get a good feel for the text one needs to read many different translations and have extensive dictionaries, lexicons and word study books to do a proper job of things.
And Jesus spoke Aramaic.
Not Greek or English, so it would be good to get acquainted with it.
Oooh ... I'm not so sure ...
Mark's Gospel, for example, is not 'excessively formal language', it's quite a breathless account, actually, lots of "and then ... and then ... " a British actor used to do a one-man presentation of Mark, and it was a big success.
Matthew's follows the Rabbinic style of his contemporaries, so it is not unusual in its language (although very trick in construction).
Luke, I'll grant you, is educated Greek, but again he employs the journey motif to tie his gospel together, which was a common Greek literary figure.
John is steeped in Jewish mystical language (people used to assume it was gnostic, but now that's been revised).
So if someone actually spoke like that, no-one would be at all surprised.
(Paul is bloomin' technical! But I bet he spoke like that, anyway)
... so all in all I don't think the language of scripture is excessively formal, I rather think that common English today is excessively sloppy.
That's not peculiar. Scholars have noted that the dialects often continue 'proper' English. In the UK for example, in the North (Yorkshire/Lancashire) they still used 'thee', 'thou, and 'thine' which has now been dropped in common vernacular, the less accurate 'you' replacing everything.
Among the Arabs, scholars noted that nomad Bedouin tribes who have minimal contact with 'the outside world' actually spoke beautifully-construed Arabic.
So in response I might say that whilst on the one hand we can see this translation is a dumbing down of language, it's also a dumbing down with regard to God, who is only minimally present, whereas His presence saturates Scripture.
And again, in those days God was very real, very present ...
I would suggest the author of the present translation is actually rather embarrassed to mention God at all.
Thomas
I myself am very much a student of the English language. My college degree is in journalism with a minor in English. I’ve published two books thus far and work with organizations assisting with writing and editing needs.
When I go into a bookstore, I seek out classic works typically from several hundred years ago. However, I still see the average translation of the Bible as excessive. Translations tend to be written in language that is hard for the average person, of any era, to understand. This leaves only the elite to be able to comprehend things on their own, if even they can do so.
I have no doubt this is done by design. It intentionally confuses people so that they have to rely on somebody else for the information. These people typically have some sort of agenda. How can I say that? Simple, it’s human nature.
When we relinquish that human tendency in exchange for a search for truth and accuracy, only then can we have a truly sufficient attempt at translation.
In my opinion, it seems that this is exactly what the collaborators on this Bible where intending to do.
OK. Well here's another angle on the topic.
Such texts were written in such a way, as to only become intelligible when received along with oral instruction. I mean we are talking about God here.
There is a discreet assumption in modernity that, unlike any other strand of literature, 'I' should be able to see and understand everything there is to be seen and understood in Scripture, because 'I' can read, and because Scripture is magic like that ...
The idea that Scripture should be self-explanatory is a nonsense, and a nonsense of relatively recent provenance, put about by people who are patently not scholars of the subject. No scholar says such.
+++
From the very beginning there was the Disciplina Arcani — the Discipline of the Secret — and the catechumen, those undergoing instruction, were forbidden to speak of the things they were told, and were not told of certain things until their baptism, a process that could take years.
So it's self-evident that the things the catechumen were instructed in, which were considered secret, would not be recorded in the texts of Scripture, else the rule would be pretty pointless.
The Disciplina Arcani covered the instruction in the Mysteries of the Liturgy — remember the Christian community was a liturgical community before it was a Scriptural one (In fact the Liturgy is the real engagement with what is promised in Scripture).
So whilst the Scriptures contain clear and evident data, they also contain layers of meaning, not only in word, but in structure — the authors were Hebrew, and the Hebrew heritage is rich in literary prowess.
How can you read and understand the deeper meaning of Matthew if you are unaware of chiastic or ring structure composition, for example? You can't.
So personally, I thank God for 'excessive' texts, whether they be Scripture, or prose, or poetry ... I like texts that stretch me, inform me, grow me, draw me out of me into it ...
... and I am pretty certain that the practice of writing down, or translating to make the thing easily accessible, means the reader is even less likely to put any effort into putting into practice what is said in the text, if they can't be bothered to put into practice the necessary concentration to read it.
So really such texts are consumer soporific. They are offensive in that they say: 'You can't understand it, you can't be arsed to make the effort, you can't be bothered to find the commentaries to show you the way ... and I can make a packet out of you... '
Thomas
Such texts were written in such a way, as to only become intelligible when received along with oral instruction. I mean we are talking about God here.
There is a discreet assumption in modernity that, unlike any other strand of literature, 'I' should be able to see and understand everything there is to be seen and understood in Scripture, because 'I' can read, and because Scripture is magic like that ...
The idea that Scripture should be self-explanatory is a nonsense, and a nonsense of relatively recent provenance, put about by people who are patently not scholars of the subject. No scholar says such.
+++
From the very beginning there was the Disciplina Arcani — the Discipline of the Secret — and the catechumen, those undergoing instruction, were forbidden to speak of the things they were told, and were not told of certain things until their baptism, a process that could take years.
So it's self-evident that the things the catechumen were instructed in, which were considered secret, would not be recorded in the texts of Scripture, else the rule would be pretty pointless.
The Disciplina Arcani covered the instruction in the Mysteries of the Liturgy — remember the Christian community was a liturgical community before it was a Scriptural one (In fact the Liturgy is the real engagement with what is promised in Scripture).
So whilst the Scriptures contain clear and evident data, they also contain layers of meaning, not only in word, but in structure — the authors were Hebrew, and the Hebrew heritage is rich in literary prowess.
How can you read and understand the deeper meaning of Matthew if you are unaware of chiastic or ring structure composition, for example? You can't.
So personally, I thank God for 'excessive' texts, whether they be Scripture, or prose, or poetry ... I like texts that stretch me, inform me, grow me, draw me out of me into it ...
... and I am pretty certain that the practice of writing down, or translating to make the thing easily accessible, means the reader is even less likely to put any effort into putting into practice what is said in the text, if they can't be bothered to put into practice the necessary concentration to read it.
So really such texts are consumer soporific. They are offensive in that they say: 'You can't understand it, you can't be arsed to make the effort, you can't be bothered to find the commentaries to show you the way ... and I can make a packet out of you... '
Thomas
Interesting theory but again I would have to disagree.
Has in not been said that God’s message is for all people? If this is indeed the case, there would be no reason for the message to be obscured in overly intellectual terminology which would only be understandable to a select few, if anybody.
If the text where clearer to begin with, and not distorted by man in the first place, we would not have so much infighting among different sects within the Christian faith.
A dozen different so-called Bible scholars can read the exact same book and will likely come up with several different understandings of what that book actually says. And, these are people who are students of history, language and religion.
We also have to consider the fact that there is evidence that some parts of the Bible have been added to the original texts, perhaps centuries later. There is also speculation that some parts may have been deleted. So, this undoubtedly makes for an interesting situation.
Well, quite a bit of it is fact.
What was said was that the Apostles and their successors were charged with preaching the evangelium The Good News, to all people. Two of the Evangelists, and possibly a third, were not first hand witnesses of the testimony they offer, but rather were in receipt of an oral tradition.
But they were also given firm instruction:
"Give not that which is holy to dogs; neither cast ye your pearls before swine, lest perhaps they trample them under their feet, and turning upon you, they tear you."
Matthew 7:6
Not only firm, but quite purposefully abusive. As the audience was primarily Jewish, to equate a Jew who will not heed the message to a pig, is utterly offensive.
The catechumen were obliged to leave the gathering before the celebration of the Sacred Mysteries, it is highly unlikely the authors would have consigned its secrets to a book for all to read.
And furthermore that:
"He that hath ears to hear, let him hear." In Matthew, Mark and Luke, which in context is given as an exhortation to acknowledge the implication of what is being said, and furthermore:
"Because to you it is given to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven: but to them it is not given." Again in Matthew, Mark and Luke, which means that it was given to the holders of the Tradition to explain the meaning of Scripture, and indeed the meaning of the Liturgy, which is nowhere recorded in Scripture, but alluded to.
So my short answer is no, the text itself declares that there are mysteries concealed within it, and indeed that it is not for everyone.
I suggest there's nothing theologically or philosophically obscure about the Sermon on the Mount, and it is easily understood by everybody, but I would further suggest that its theological and philosophical implication is profound, and deep, and infinite in its teaching.
But living it is another matter ... and what this translation has done is reduced that moral demand to a series of platitudes.
I doubt that.
And hundreds of scholars will arrive at the same understanding.
And the saints and sages are all in agreement on the text.
But I think all scholars of note would agree that this translation does in no way do justice to the original.
A few years ago scholars worked across a hundred of the earliest canonical texts, in a number of languages (Greek, Syriac and others), and whilst there is evidence of textual differences that scholars can wrangle over, the theological implication of the birth, ministry, arrest, trial and execution, resurrection and ascension, and the commission to the twelve, is beyond dispute.
Then again, the text sufficed simple souls down through the centuries, as the testimony of the saints evidence.
Thomas
There are some obvious inaccuracies in your argument but I would except such. The point is, this has been fun but I'm moving on.
I've learned what I've learned through a recent, shall I say, enlightenment. But, it seems nothing one can say can convey this to others as that we have to experience it for ourselves.
The bottom line is God is love, pure and simple. Every single commandment not of man comes down to this. And man's law is worthless in comparison to God's.
This Bible seems to convey the true spirit and meaning I've now come to understand as the all encompassing truth. And, it doesn't matter what this person or that person says. Once they have an awakening for themselves, they'll know what is true. Not believe, but know.
I endorse your sentiment, but please do not assume that belief — in this context faith — is a deficient form of knowledge; faith then is reduced to the predication of an object or thing or concept, but without any actual data of the thing predicated.
But faith is not the opposite of knowledge (which is ignorance), faith transcends knowledge, faith is prior to knowledge in that it is faith that holds that things can be known.
Without faith in God, there would be no knowledge of God.
And, as the saying goes, "faith is its own reward" and what is that reward, but something that can be objectified, first as reward as such, and subsequently as the nature of the reward.
All inquiry begins in faith and ends in knowledge; it begins with an absence and ends with a presence; it begins in darkness and ends in light. But God is a super-abundant darkness, and therein only faith can dwell.
"Thou hast prompted him, that he should delight to praise thee, for thou hast made us for thyself and restless is our heart until it comes to rest in thee." Says Augustine in his Confessions.
Thomas
Hard to be read in Hebrew when MOST of the books in the bible were originally written in Greek.
And if it were to be in Hebrew, then why did Jesus speak "Aramaic" as opposed to the original Hebrew language?
Things to consider...
shawn
Well-Known Member
Hard to be read in Hebrew when MOST of the books in the bible were originally written in Greek.
And if it were to be in Hebrew, then why did Jesus speak "Aramaic" as opposed to the original Hebrew language?
Things to consider...
A short history lesson for you Q:
The rest of the lesson can be found here:
http://www.pe****ta.org/initial/aramaic.html
And the commentary on the Tenahk which is known as the NT is just that, commentary on the Mosaic covenant, which hasn't changed, notwithstanding all the Christian opinion to the contrary.
They were written in Greek and there are lots of lexicons available and word study books to put the same method into practice there as well.
That is the point I was driving at is not to rely on translations, but to go back to the original language and do the homework necessary for any good scholarship, so as to show oneself approved, so to speak.
At least the due diligence part in any case.
Thank you for the history brief as you perceive it, however my question was not answered.
shawn
Well-Known Member
Aramaic is the original language.
Modern Hebrew is derived from it.
Maybe you didn't read the brief.
Actually my friend, I studied the history of languages (I like languages and history of all kinds)...Hebrew was displaced by Aramaic. That means Hebrew preceeded Aramaic... or to put it bluntly Aramaic came after Hebrew.