What sticks out out in my mind of the NWT is 237 mis-translations in the NT.
What is the most secularly acclaimed Bible translation?
by sabastious 86 Replies latest jw friends
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isaacaustin
Truebelieverbob:
The lords prayer says it all "HALLOWED BE THY NAME" ( given 1st priority in the lords prayer )
I am proud to be apart of a group of people that TRULY apply that prayer of our lord. And no he wasnt praying to himself or 1/3 of himself ( rediculous trinity doctrine )
My reply: What does name mean? It has a much deeper meaning than a proper noun. It means the person behind the letters.
Interestingly, Jesus NEVER, even in the New World Mis-translation, used the Divine name in prayer.
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theMadJW
PS summed it up: "It truly depends on what you are looking for."
If TRUTH is what you're looking for, one that actually honors God's Name is a must, heh! (Now comes the Pronunciation Game- as if ANY of the Biblical Names in English are close the how they were said in ancient Hebrew & Greek).
Next is CONSISTANCY of key words- like nephesh (soul), if the translation doesn't have Adam becoming a living soul (Gen 2:7), but reads a living creature,being, etc- then you have a Shell Game, where they translate to go along with church dogma.
Those are two STARTERS- since Christ said (Lord's Prayer) that we must HONOR God's Name, and that we MUST worship with spirit and TRUTH- not as in CHURCHianity, with spirit and church dogma!
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MarcusScriptus
Truebelieverbob,
Where did you get your information about Catholics? Are you one? And you know beyond any doubt that my information is incorrect, how?
I know what I’m speaking of because I not only worked with Catholics and other faiths in their religious education work, I even participated in it for the last decade.
Catholics Don’t Study? Or Is It You’ve Never Studied Catholics?
Catholics not only study their Bible, they read it far more than Jehovah’s Witnesses. Yes, a lot of Catholics might not do much more than hear it read at Mass, but generally speaking Catholics recite or chant the Liturgy of the Hours during the day, each day of the year, or say prayers based on this office. It consists of recitation or chanting of each of the 150 Psalms over a cycle that lasts four weeks before they start over again, four minor reading selections from the Scriptures, one major (large section) reading of the Scriptures, and one reading from the Church Fathers or one of the canonized saints. Each day there is a Mass that has one reading from the Old or New Testament, another Psalm recited or chanted as a responsorial to the first reading, followed by a reading from the Gospels unless it is a Sabbath where an additional reading usually from one of the epistles is added.
Add to this, Catholics are also expected to have the own personal Bible reading schedule which must include an equal amount of time and effort spent in personal research and study. They have an array of scholarly publications that anyone outside of the JW world can attest to. You can just go on Amazon.com to see some of the latest, not to mention the limitless volumes of the writings of the Church Fathers. Their library of study materials goes back a literal 2,000 years.
Lastly, the Catholics are now at the head of analytic research and studies of the Scriptures, and their volumes are thus found in all centers of higher learning around the world. If you would just visit one and see you would know I wasn’t making this up.
If they don’t study, they sure write and publish a lot. Those of us who are of other faiths use these materials ourselves too, and they had to learn this stuff somewhere, somehow by studying.
Saying Not the Divine Name: It’s Because Their Worship Is Related to the Jews
Remember in Scripture where the Christians see themselves as Jews at first, and even Jesus in Revelation says that Christians are Jews but other religions are but a “synagogue of Satan?”
When the Church, both Catholic and Orthodox, was excommunicated from the synagogue, they didn’t really change their worship much. If you’ve ever gone to Temple on Sabbath, you would notice that they have almost an identical set up. The only difference is the Mass (or Sacred Liturgy) is followed by Holy Communion, whereas at Temple it does not, of course. The reason for the similarities is that they were all once the same, worshiping as Jews did in the synagogue arrangement that existed in Jesus’ day.
So when they gather for worship, they don’t utter YHWH aloud. Why? On the High Priest does this. And who is the High Priest for Catholics? Jesus Christ is who they believe to be the High Priest, and they truly believe he is Present at each Mass. He is the embodiment of YHWH, the Word of YHWH, to them he is YHWH. With the great I AM present, they let the High Priest Christ alone witness to the name by the actions of Divine Liturgy or Mass.
But outside this, yes they do use the name. It wasn’t stripped away from their history or their translations, and they didn’t try to hide it to advance the Trinity? Why would the New Jerusalem Bible have it in there some 7000 times in the OT?
The NAB was designed specifically for reading aloud during Mass, so YHWH does not appear in the main section. However it appears throughout from beginning to end on the explanatory pages of each reading as “Yahweh.” Look up it up in the Catholic Encyclopedia on line. If you’re going to try to hide God’s name, surely the largest Christian denomination that baptized each day on average what the JW baptize in a year, could do better than stick it 7000 times in its most widely read version, right? If you wanted to hide the name of God from Catholics, why on earth have it in a plethora of the footnotes of the New American Bible. Surely they could have just not mentioned it at all, but they didn’t.
Learn About Witnesses from the Mormons and Lemons from Apples, Yes?
You just aren’t aware of what Catholics or Protestants or atheists or agnostics believe but you think you are getting all the correct information from the one source you trust.
But is this wise? Would you advise others to learn the truth about Jehovah’s Witnesses from the next pair of Mormon missionaries who come knocking? Can you get a correct understand of what your religion is all about from Baptists?
If you want to know what a lemon tastes like, are you going to pick an apple and base your knowledge of a lemon’s taste by what you were just exposed to? Of course not. You can’t learn what one fruit tastes like by sucking a rock or licking a fish head. If want to taste a lemon then you go to the lemon tree. You go to the source for direct accuracy, not anywhere else.
The same goes for Jehovah’s Witnesses. Are other faiths going to give them a fair shake? Isn’t it best to go to the source and learn from Jehovah’s Witnesses what they believe?
And where did you get you information about Roman Catholics? From Jehovah’s Witnesses? That is like trying to figure out what an apple tastes like by biting into radish.
Sorry, but only you believe you and those who don’t go the actual source believe you.
Why not look up the following and see for a fact that everything you wrote about Catholics is wrong? And once you’ve realized that, ask yourself: Who taught me this false information about Catholics? Here are just some of the sources I got my material from. And see, you don't have to be a Catholic yourself to know this.
It will be the religion that you claim teaches the truth—except when it comes to the truth about what is really going on in the religions they condemn around them.
American Catholic.org: http://www.americancatholic.org/ The Catechism of the Catholic Church: http://www.usccb.org/catechism/text/ The Holy See: http://www.vatican.va/phome_en.htm The Center for Religious Developent: http://secure.cmdnet.org/index.cfm?CFID=675474&CFTOKEN=7227fa9ffae32e76-04D6488B-1517-61B4-487619B8BE4CD8B6
The Catholic Biblical Association of America: http://cba.cua.edu/default.cfm
Catholic Book Publishing Company: http://catholicbookpublishing.com/
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truebelieverbob
Marcus Scriptus - I am a former Catholic , all my relatives are Catholic, 3/4 of all the people I work with are Catholics , I also regularly converse with about 50 Catholics in my ministry on a regular basis every couple of weeks, I also meet on an average about 5 - 10 new Catholics every week. What I said in my post is REALITY. What you said in your reply was NOT REALITY.
It seems to me you are in some kind of dream world , imagining how you would like the average Catholic to be . I was just talking to a fellow workmate recently . When I asked him how was his recent sunday church service he went to he said, " well I listened to the priest , and dipped my fingers in the holy water and made the sign of the cross while I was leaving " , he said he tries to go every week ,but not always . No bible study , no knowledge of the scriptures ( he said his bible is buried somewhere in his house , he needs to find it.) Thats the extent of his worship .
You may fool other people , but you cant fool me . I have REAL WORLD EXPERIENCE of Catholics . You are in a dream world , out of touch with reality .
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MarcusScriptus
Backing up your claims for others here to see whether or not your experience as a former Catholic was really like that of every other Catholic is more efficacious than just coming back at me and telling me I am in a dream world.
I don’t wish to explain so much about myself as to make others feel uncomfortable but I will say that I have been in the publishing business, the religious publishing business, both Protestant and Catholic.
As such my job was responding to the needs of various religious groups based on the type of activity that existed. The book publishing world gets its data on how or what to publish by the type of interest and real life use people in a market are engaged in.
Here is one last link. Since you claim I am in a dream world because what I am describing does not match your limited experience as a Catholic (which up till now I was unaware was the touchstone by which all that is Catholic is obviously to be measured?), I introduce you to this world I am talking about through one of the most important blog of Catholic Bible readers in the entire world.
This one Catholic Bible blog is part of a network of others like him that opens up into tens, hundreds, thousands, and eventually enables the publishing world to understand how the basic Catholic Bible student uses the materials produced.
You’ve claimed that Catholics don’t study the Bible and that all those you associated with and know of don’t and that you didn’t. Compare that to this very interesting world (and you can’t stop at this one blog, you should read all the others linked to this one and so on) and compare that to all the data you’ve been providing so far to back this up... oh right, you haven't done that, have you?
Remember this is the starting point. You need to not only research what this fellow is talking about but what his fellow like bloggers are too and you'll see why (and even see several exanples of) publishers taking note of what they do to serve the Catholic Bible reading/stufying public:
Of course what is true in so many cases about people who are Witnesses can be claimed here too: To those who believe in what actual data says about the NWT, no further explanation beyond empirical evidence is necessary.
But to those Witnesses who accept only the testimony from their own religion as true, no explanation, no matter how empirical and exhaustive the evidence provided, will ever be enough.
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PSacramento
I know a few devote catholics and I knwo MANY MORE "lackadaisical" catholics and the vast majority have never studied the bible per say.
Just as the vast majority of JW have never studied a bible either, but have studied the parts they have been told to study.
The difference?
JW's are in the business of conversion, Catholics are NOT.