Posted by fly on April 09, 19100 at 19:52:27:
In Reply to: Re: pre genesis history??? posted by Chris on April 09, 19100 at 09:05:32:
: Dear Fly,
: What about the RSV? I have found that it provides one of the best "literal" translations of the ancient texts especially Hebrew to English.
: Peace
: Chris
Hi Chris,
Am I correct to ume that you are not talking about the RSV:CE(Catholic Edition)? Because this is the same thing as the Ignatius Bible, which incidently is published by Ignatius Press in San Francisco. It too is quite literal, but much more accuraate than the Protestant version. For instance, it refers to the Holy Spirit as "him" rather than "it". While on the surface this may sound trivial, it opens the door enough to allow certain people twist its meaning, thereby placing God's revealed gender in question. We see this social agenda carried out in the NRSV. This is called "gender revisionists language", or "inclusive language". And it is tampering where it has no business tampering.
Unfortunately, the KJV has many,many similar errors. I still use it from time to time. But I keep it on the same shelf as my other poetry books. I also use a great on-line tool called the Bible Gateway. None of the versions are completely trustworthy, but it is quite practical.
Anyway, this is one of the drawbacks of the English language. The English doesn't accomplish what the original languages do. A strictly literal interpretation loses many of the nuances in the translation. A very delicate balance of both is needed. I can truly only recommend the Ignatius Bible. But there is a wonderful New Testament study Bible called The Navarre Bible. You also might consider the Douay-Rheims Bible, which first appeared in 1609, and is still in print as the Douay-Challoner revision. Oh, and just for the record, I forgot to mention that the Gutenberg Bible was in fact a Catholic Bible, containing the deuterocanonical (Apocryphal) books.
peace,
fly