CT Russell - No Need to study Bible languages to know the Bible

by VM44 11 Replies latest watchtower bible

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  VM44

  Charles Russell wrote in the Sep 15, 1914 issue of The Watchtower (pages 286-7):

  As respects my education in Greek and Hebrew: Not only do I not claim very special knowledge of either language, but I claim that not one minister in a thousand is either a Hebrew or a Greek scholar. To be able to spell out a few Greek words is of no earthly value. Nor is it necessary longer to study these languages, in order to have knowledge of the Bible. Our Presbyterian friends have gotten out at great cost Young's Analytical Hebrew, Chaldaic, Greek and English Lexicon Concordance, which anyone may procure. And our Methodist friends have issued a similar work-- Strong's Analytical Concordance and Lexicon. And there is a still older one entitled Englishman's Hebrew, Chaldaic, Greek and English Lexicon and Concordance. Additionally, Liddell and Scott's Greek Lexicon is a standard authority. The prices of these are not beyond the reach of the average man. By these works scholarly information respecting the original text of the Bible is obtainable. I have all four of these works and have used them faithfully. Very few college professors, even, would risk to give a critical translation of any text of Scripture without consulting these very works of reference, which are standard. To merely learn to read the Greek and Hebrew without a six years' course in their grammars is more likely to hinder than to help in Bible study; far better take the acknowledged scholarship to which I have referred.

  Additionally I remind you of the many translations of the Bible now extant--all of them very good. I have all of these and find them useful in comparison in the study of any text--one sometimes giving a thought which another may not. The other day, for curiosity's sake, I counted Bibles in different translations, etc., in my study and found that I have thirty-two.

  http://www.agsconsulting.com/htdbnon/r5543.htm
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  VM44

  No need to study the languages.....so much for linguistic analysis of various portions of OT and NT texts. --VM44
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  TD

  
  

  ....Typical fundy. 

  
  

  Maybe that's why he bought into the idea (Hook,line and sinker) that parousia implies invisibility.
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  luna2

  Noooo, no need to study Hebrew or Greek. Why in the world would you want to be able to do that when you can fart around Egypt measuring pyramids and making up units of measurement (pyramid inches) in order to "prove" your favorite endtime prophecies?

  Who has time to learn a bunch of old languages when you can be out there hawking "Miracle Wheat" like a regular flim flam man and ripping people off?

  There's no need for legitimate scholarship when there's a smorgasboard of doctrines you can pick and choose from a variety of religions as you cobble together your very own weird little sect, with yourself cast in the role of grand high Laodicean something or other, the faithful and discreet dingbat, who Jehootie appointed over...aww, who gives a crap. The guy had an out of control ego, that's for sure.
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  Honesty

  CT Russell - No Need to study Bible languages to know the Bible...

  Especially when you can write and publish your own Bible
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  VM44

  Cygnus sent me a message concerning this thread, and said it was OK to post it for him, so here it is. --VM44

  I can't make a reply because my posting limit has been reached, but I just wanted to say that Russell was basically correct. How many people are fluent in Koine Greek or biblical Hebrew and yet can study enough to find JW doctrine unacceptable? Also, Russell never tried to translate the Bible like Franz did. He shouldn't be held to the same standards. Just my two cents. :)
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  gumby

  Frankly I agree with the guy....accept I don't swallow the bible as a whole like he did.

  If the bible needs Lexicons, Commentaries, Dictionaries, and Concordences, to get gods message across.....then how CLEAR is the message? If I tried my hardest to make many things known to my children in a book, and wanted that message to be understood plainly for two thousands years to come,.... would they need scholarly books to decifer my message to them?

  How are poorer countries to understand the REAL meaning of the bible when they are LUCKY just to have a bible,....let alone a library of theological literature? Is it neccesary to understand all passages in the bible to reap the benifits it offers? If not......why fuss?

  Gumby
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  stev

  
  Certainly the subject of this thread - no need to study Bible languages to know the Bible - is correct. Anyone can know the Bible by reading a translation. That's true.

  It is to Russell's credit that he admitted that he did not know much Hebrew and Greek. BTW, I don't believe he committed perjury in that Rev. Ross trial. I think James Penton somewhere on the internet has answered this well. It is to his credit that he took advantage of lexicons, and concordances, and Bible translations. It seems that he acted responsibly in making up for his lack of knowledge of the original languages. It is true what he said that most ministers were not Hebrew and Greek scholars. Very few would have the knowledge and time to write commentaries, or teach the subjects, or write professional books. Yet they had enough training to use the helps and read the original languages in preparing their sermons. Russell is be commended for doing this to the best of his ability.

  However, in my opinion, his lack of knowledge and training was a liability for him, that no matter how much he tried to overcome, was still a handicap for someone who was looked up to as a great Biblical interpreter, even "that servant" and a special messenger of God. There were great preachers that also lacked the training, but they did not preach unusual doctrines. He had only an 8th grade education, and lacked a college education and a seminary education. Perhaps if he had better training, he would have avoided some of the mistakes that he made, such in chronology, with the 607 B.C. date, and date-setting. He might have been exercised better critical thinking and judgment and avoided following the teachings of others, like Barbour and Pyramidists. It is my impression that when he tries to interpret alone from the Hebrew or Greek, he was prone to make mistakes. He drew many ideas from others who were more fluent than him, and was better off then, but went astray when tried to go it alone. This is my opinion, and others might differ.

  BTW, he considered "parousia" to mean "presence". He wasn't alone in this. Carl Olaf Jonsson explains somewhere in his books that others, like Rotherham, translated it this way. But they were influenced by the doctrine that Christ would return invisibly and be present to rapture the saints.

  Steve
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  TD

  Russell pontificated on the meaning of Greek words with some regularity in his writings. This went far beyond simply "knowing the Bible" in a general sense; these supposed word meanings were sometimes presented as the basis of fairly esoteric theological positions

  "Knowing the Bible" in this sense does require a knowledge of the source languages.
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  TD

  
  

  I think a good example of how the "It's not necessary to learn the source language, I can translate with a dictionary instead" mentality (Which Russell espoused) can lead you seriously astray occurred on another thread started by VM44 a few years ago.

  A participant with the handle, Yadirf (Friday?) said:

  The KIT was helpful in a way that the others weren't by re-enforcing what I had already suspected about the word seismos in Matthew 24:7. All but the KIT translated the word as "earthquakes". Underneath the Greek word in the KIT was "[earth]quakes". In other words, the KIT, by enclosing the word "earth" in brackets, honestly called attention to the fact that the word "earth" is an unauthorized addition to the translation of the word seismos. In other words, Jesus didn't include earthquakes as part of the "sign" that his disciples had inquired about in the 24th chapter of Matthew. Jesus said that there would be "shakings", not earthquakes. As to what he meant by "shakings", that's a discussion for another time.

  It's true that if you go to Thayer's Lexicon, the generic meaning given for the word, seismos is, "A shaking, a commotion" and it's true that the word can have other meanings besides "earthquake." (cf. Matt 8:24) It's also true that topos can mean "An inhabited place, a city, village or district."

  Based on this, the individual I've quoted above formulated his own esoteric interpretation of the text. By combining a general meaning of seismos with a specific meaning of topos, he concluded that Jesus wasn't talking about earthquakes, he was talking about a "shaking" of "governments."

  Although this is a pretty obvious example of losing the meaning of the sentence through preferential definitions of words, this type of hermeneutics in more subtle forms is rampant in the theology of Russell and Jehovah's Witnesses today.