Question & Answer
Christopher Armstrong-Stevenson, via the Internet, writes:
Question:
You frequently mention that the Bible was originally written in Greek and is called the Septuagint. I'm not competent to read anything in Greek and wonder if there is an "un-Bowdlerized" translation into English of the Septuagint's language. I'd like to read it as it existed before all the secretaries and clerks, etc. from King James' enormous, and obviously politically-motivated, "Committee" got their hands on it and decided of what the Canon would consist and also before the Roman Catholic Church's "Censors" made their mark on it. So far, my favorite version of the Bible that I've read is the Jerusalem Bible. I'd appreciate your comments and recommendations.
Thank you.
Answer:
Dear Christopher,
You have confused some facts. The Bible, if you mean the Hebrew Scriptures, was originally written in Hebrew. The Septuagint is a translation of the Hebrew Scriptures into Greek, accomplished by seventy scholars, hence the name Septuagint. This translation occurred about the year 250 BCE. The New Testament was originally written in Greek from approximately 51 CE (the 1st Epistle to the Thessalonians), to about 140 CE (the second epistle of Peter). The gospels were written between about 72 CE to 100 CE.One can easily get a translation of the Septuagint in English although the better translations of the Old Testament would be done by scholars who translated the original Hebrew into English without going through a Greek intermediary.
The original Greek New Testament was written with no punctuation, no paragraphs, no capital letters and not even spaces between the words. All of those things were imposed on the texts by people living in a much later time.
The Jerusalem Bible is a good translation and its English is beautiful. It is, however, a Roman Catholic text, and it does reflect the biases of that Church. My favorite translation is the Revised Standard Version which represents the work of a large number of scholars, mostly Protestant, who had to justify every controversial translation decision to their peers. The New Revised Standard Version sought to remove all non-inclusive references to make the text politically correct. I applaud their efforts, but I think they missed some particularly Jewish nuances in the process. So I still prefer the RSV.
The only way to do what you want to do, namely to read it as it existed in the beginning is to learn Greek and to read the original text for yourself. I don’t think that is practical. I have a working knowledge of Greek, but my mastery of this language is nothing like as good as those who translated the RSV. So I trust the scholars and join in the debate.
My best,
John Shelby Spong
Announcements
Now available for purchase or download
Jesus: The Cold Case
Documentary with Bishop Spong
AFTA Award for Best Documentary 2012, Winner Silver and Bronze Medals at The New York Festivals International Film and Television Awards.
In his native New Zealand Bryan Bruce writes, directs and hosts the internationally successful crime show THE INVESTIGATOR in which he re- examines unsolved crimes In 2010 he decided to apply his criminal investigative methods to the ultimate cold case : Who Killed Jesus and Why?
More info here!
Any questions or concerns, please contact us at support@johnshelbyspong.com or 253-507-8678.
Progressive Christianity
Our mailing address is:
Progressive Christianity
708 Broadway, Suite 105
Tacoma, Washington 98402 United States
____________________________
____________________________
No comments:
Post a Comment