Examples of Bias/Discrepancies in the New World Translation

by Londo111 83 Replies latest watchtower bible

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  designs

  PSac-

  It is an interesting development both anthropologically and from the point of view of some who consider the Bible inspired in some form or another.

  The Torah is basically telling people to be good because God says so and the reward is your progeny and your land, and the later developments coming from outside culturals telling the Jews to believe in something beyond the grave. Jesus picks up on the Pagan ideas that have infiltrated the Jewish culture and taught in the Schools of the Pharisees and the Essenes community.
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  PSacramento

  It is an interesting development both anthropologically and from the point of view of some who consider the Bible inspired in some form or another.

  Indeed.

  The Torah is basically telling people to be good because God says so and the reward is your progeny and your land, and the later developments coming from outside culturals telling the Jews to believe in something beyond the grave. Jesus picks up on the Pagan ideas that have infiltrated the Jewish culture and taught in the Schools of the Pharisees and the Essenes community.

  That is a tad over simplistic.

  The Torah COMMANDS to be good and sets out the punishments for failure to not only be good but for incorrect worship of God.

  To say that it simply states to be good and God will reward you and your progeny with land /reward your land, is pretty much stating that it was NO different than any other of the typical religions that promised the same thing ( being good being subjective and part of being good was correct worship as per the deity in question).

  If that is all the Torah was/commanded, then the Hebrews were no more or no less than anyone else.
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  designs

  Most of the Cultures and civilizations in the surrounding region believed in an afterlife this makes early Judaism different, although there is evidence that this group of Tribes held multiple concurrent beliefs picked up from outside. So if the Hebrews were seriously following the edicts of The Torah then they were early exitentialists.

  Jesus, in Matt. 25., sounds like the radical Essenes who went beyond the Pharisees and absorbed some outside groups idea of 'perpetual' punishment.
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  PSacramento

  Most of the Cultures and civilizations in the surrounding region believed in an afterlife this makes early Judaism different, although there is evidence that this group of Tribes held multiple concurrent beliefs picked up from outside. So if the Hebrews were seriously following the edicts of The Torah then they were early exitentialists.

  See, you are saying that it was picke dup from the outside, but there is no more evidence of that than there is that it was a natural progression from where they were.

  You are making the comment that the Hebrews that believed in the afterlife ( in whatever fashion) got that from the pagan influences but you are basing that on NOT accepting that it could have been a progressive understanding on their part.

  Jesus, in Matt. 25., sounds like the radical Essenes who went beyond the Pharisees and absorbed some outside groups idea of 'perpetual' punishment.

  WHich doesn't make him wrong, or the Essenes for that matter. Not any more wrong than the pharisees and thier different views from the Saudesses or the Zelots.
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  designs

  It is Jewish Historians who document this development pointing particularly to the Second Temple period.
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  PSacramento

  And historians have never been know to be bias ;)
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  Leolaia

  'Sadducees differed from the Essenes and Pharisees by not believing in any postmortem existence' correct, I missed you in Synagogue the other day. My children and grandchildren and the trees I've planted will carry on my legacy. The small grove of Sequoias I planted in 1978 are now over 100' tall.

  designs...I don't understand your comment. I'm not questioning your faith; I'm simply stating the historical fact that the Pharisees and Essenes both believed in postmortem existence, resurrection, and eschatological punishment of the wicked. Rabbinical literature is filled with references to these concepts.

  Vidqun....Again, I don't agree. The Hebrew apocalypse of Daniel fits very well together with the literature of the Seleucid-Hasmonean era in a wide range of conceptual and literary motifs, which set apocaclyptic literature as a whole apart from the prophets of the earlier Babylonian and Persian eras. The belief in the resurrection is one facet of this, and it is more closely associated with works from that era such as 2 Maccabees and 1 Enoch. It is a sign of lateness, just as referring to angels as "watchers" (in the Aramaic apocalypse) with personal names. The absence of a belief in immortality of the soul is not an indicator that a text is pre-Hellenistic; sources varied in their eschatological outlook.

  Also there was no huge gulf between the belief in resurrection and the immortality of the soul. The two concepts were often syncretized to each other, with resurrection being characterized as the souls or spirits of the dead being resurrected bodily.
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  designs

  Leolaia

  I stated what you stated and what you quoted from Josephus which I backed up with the quote from The Book Of Jewish Knowledge. Are we talking past each other or some other confusion like saying the same thing only differently. Let me go at this again, the Sadducees and other Jewish Sects who hold strictly to the Torah alone do not believe in an afterlife whereas groups like the Pharisees and Essenes and many Reformed Jewish groups accept the idea of an afterlife.

  For me Faith wise I am not a practicing Jew, I would identify myself as a practicing humanitarian/envrionmetalist. Do I beleive in an afterlife, no. If there is one we'll all greet each other warmly I'm sure. I do like the act of placing earth on the casket and pebbles on the grave as we have done at Services for my Jewish relatives, I may request that for my Service.

  You take a lot of interest in textual scholarship of the Bible where are you Faith wise these days.

  Regards
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  Vidqun

  Then we agree to disagree. I can assure you there is no other book, prophetic, apocalyptic, or otherwise that can compare with the book of Daniel. I do have a problem with the terminology of modern scholars and critics though. Seeing that these view Daniel as a fraud and a charlatan, they should rather speak of Pseudo-Daniel, his pseudo-prophecy, as well as his pseudo-apocalypticism.

  I have read an interesting pdf dissertation by A. Y. Reed, "Body, Soul and Immortality in Hellenistic Judaism." Therein he discusses Hellenistic Judaism "reserved for those forms of Judaism that most actively absorbed, reworked and integrated ancient Greek traditions and the Hellenistic culture of the time." He sees some of these tendencies in the LXX. His dissertation concentrates on Enoch I, II, the Wisdom of Solomen, Ben Sirach and Philo.

  In addition, the term "watcher" came from Nebuchadnezzar, the Babylonian king. The possibility exists that these Jewish apocalyptics copied the book of Daniel, and not the otherway round.

  What bothers me, is that we have gone off the rails with this thread, completely off the topic. Perhaps we should continue this discussion under the Daniel-thread.
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  designs

  Vid- Its an easy bridge back to the NWT. As an xJW you realize the Society never acknowledged that the Jews believed in an immortal soul or eternal punishment and so take the Rich Man and Lazarus and the Chaff that burns forever in the Gospel accounts as Hyperbole or Illustrations. Were the account's wording altered in the NWT to reflect that interpretation in comparison to the ancient Texts available.