Did Jason B Dunn say the "New World Translation is the most accurate translation there is?" Why make a new Bible than?

MagicMItchJensen

The circuit overseer mentioned something about the NWT being the most accurate translation according to Professor Jason B Dunn, I heard this nonsense before but never really dug deep in to this topic because non of us really had a choice as JWs but to accept all their random musing of our uneducated leaders as factual.

1. If the New World Translation was the picture perfect translation of all the Bibles and we went door to door telling everyone we had the "most honest Bible", why did they change it to a paraphrased version? What success have you had getting Jehovah's Witnesses to address why they tinkered with the New World Translation, it was suppose to be the best translation and now it's turned in to a very loose paraphrased version.

b. The excuses given are all the people willing to listen to them are having problem with native languages so the Watchtower had to dumb-down their Bible version so new converts could understand what's being said.

2. How do you establish the message preached by Jehovah's Witnesses is not the Gospel taught by the First Century Christians, it was developed by the 2nd Adventist Religious movement of the 1800s. Has anyone gotten JWs to answer this question that their Gospel is not the same Gospel taught by the Early Christian movement?

3. Is there any good reason why the leadership of the Watchtower Society does not have "Question and Answers" like other religions willing to put their teachings up for debate? Are the Jehovah's Witnesses so afraid people writing on this site could destroy their teachings if they did have a "Town Hall" Question and Answer session? Why can't they have debates like other religions, is there nobody qualified to stand up for their teachings?

sloppyjoe2

In his book "Truth in Translation" he disputes that the watchtower should not have used Jehovah 237 times in the New Testament. Of course they aren't going to bring that part up.

the comet

It's Jason BeDuhn. I have his book truth in translation, he makes some interesting points. He basically says the nwt is one of the more accurate translations of John 1:1. (I've spent the last 10 minutes looking for it but can't find it right now) I wanted to quote the part where he talks about how the nwt is, at least in the verses he tested for accuracy, mostly bias free. I'll keep looking for the book

dropoffyourkeylee

I have heard that his book uses a selected number of verses which are used as test cases for doctrinal bias. If that is so, could someone who has the book list what verses were used? And how they were selected?

wizzstick

BeDuhn devotes the entire Appendix to the use of Jehovah in the NWT.

And makes it very clear that Jehovah should not be inserted instead of Kyrios.

Those muppets won't mention THAT from the platform.

MagicMItchJensen

Why did they make a new Bible if the NWT was perfect in the views of Bible Scholars like Jason b Dunn(that's what they claim, we know better). The fact is nobody is getting any rational answers on their new loose paraphrased Bible, the very same style they attacked the NLT, and other Bible Societies for creating such Paraphrased versions. How come it's ok, its good for them to "do as we say, not as we do!" method of theology? Nobody has provided any sound reasons why the NWT was discarded and replaced with a loosely altered version full of bias, have you heard why the NWT was considered "out dated or "out of service"?

Pubsinger

Wow I must have missed this in all the excitement. I was aware of the revised translation which is not an unusual thing in itself (there has been a revised NIV within the last 10 years) but I had totally missed that it was a paraphrase!

Wow. Just wow.

Phizzy

Here is the Jason BeDhun quote, not just the phrase that the JW Org likes to use :

BeDuhn: "Having concluded that the NWT is one of the most accurate Englishtranslations of the New Testament currently available, I would be remiss if I

did not mention one peculiarity of this translation that by most conventions of
translation would be considered an inaccuracy, however little this inaccuracy
changes the meaning of most of the verses where it appears. I am referring to the
use of 'Jehovah' in the NWT New Testament. 'Jehovah' (or 'Yahweh' or some other
reconstruction of the divine name consisting of the four consonants YHWH) is the
personal name of God used more than six thousand times in the original Hebrew of
the Old Testament. But the name never appears in any Greek manuscript of any book
of the New Testament. So, to introduce the name 'Jehovah' into the New Testament,
as the NWT does two-hundred-thirty-seven times, is not accurate translation by
the most basic principle of accuracy: adherence to the original Greek text."
(p. 169)
http://en.allexperts.com/q/Jehovah-s-Witness-1617/2010/8/Prof-Jason-BeDuhn.htm

millie210

I dont think the new one is a paraphrased.

At least not by definition is it?

What makes it a paraphrased?

Phizzy

The basic definition of Paraphrase is " express the meaning of (something written or spoken) using different words, especially to achieve greater clarity."

Which is exactly what the Revised NWT claims to do. This would be fine if the original N.W T were actually a "Translation", but it was NOT, it was simply a re-working of many Translations that had gone before, so was itself a Paraphrase.

Nobody, including Fred Franz, who was involved in the production of the original NWT had the education, knowledge or ability to Translate from the original languages.

Did Jason B Dunn say the "New World Translation is the most accurate translation there is?" Why make a new Bible than?

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