I think you are right Stucky. As awful as it is, I believe it's a get-out for wives whose husbands have commited paedophile acts, or beastiality, since in the past it wasn't reason enough for a scriptural divorce (as referenced in Ray Franz book)
The subtle , yet massive change of Matt 5:32 in the "New" New World Translation
by stuckinarut2 25 Replies latest watchtower bible
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Tenacious
The governing vermin have changed their bible so much it no longer reads like a bible but rather a WTS book.
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Earnest
In the NWT Bible Glossary it defines Sexual Immorality as follows :
From the Greek por·neiʹa, a general term for all unlawful sexual intercourse. It includes adultery, prostitution, sexual relations between unmarried individuals, homosexuality, and bestiality.
In Questions from Readers (w20060715) por·neiʹa also includes:
oral and anal sex and the sexual manipulation of the genitals of an individual to whom one is not married.
The Greek word used at Matt 5:32 is por·neiʹas and means more than the English term fornication. The change in wording does not include watching pornography or self-masturbation as a scriptural basis for divorce.
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Miss Worldly
Errrrm....aren’t these texts the word of god, Jesus and whoever else proclaimed themselves higher than us mere mortals?....
sorry if I’m being a bit thick... but bit how can it change? Surely what was written all those years ago is gospel (pardon the pun)
don’t the rank and file wonder how/why it could change?
makes me laugh 😂
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Earnest
Miss Worldly, what was written in Matt 5:32 was written in Greek and that has remained unchanged. The understanding of what the Greek word meant has changed and it is to the credit of the NWT translators that they attempt to reflect an accurate translation of what was written.
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TD
sorry if I’m being a bit thick... but bit how can it change?
Because languages themselves change. Take the word, "Pornography" for example. Despite the fact that there are legal, linguistic and literary definitions of the term, the meaning has steadily broadened in day to day speech.
It was a source of considerable irritation that my wife's ultra-JW relatives denounced an art history course my youngest was enrolled in as, "Institutionalized pornography" because in their view, simply nudity was pornographic. (It isn't. Pornography is by definition sexually explicit or obscene.)
Worse, the term has come to include pretty much anything that is pleasant to the eye, with terms like "Earth porn" being used to describe beautiful landscapes.
So yeah. There's nothing wrong with a translator updating the terms in the target language as long as they stay within accepted definitions in the source language.
"Fornication" is not widely used today, especially among the thirty and younger crowd.
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Vidiot
snakeface - "Maybe this is designed to make it easier to divorce an unbelieving spouse even if that spouse is not actually cheating."
This would not surprise me in the slightest.
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Etude
Perhaps the reason would be to eliminate their embarrassment of having to uphold marriage under certain circumstances. If I recall correctly, there was a case when a wife caught her husband screwing the bacon. He was having sex with the farm pig. She refused to be with him from that point onward. But, because it was "technically" not "adultery", she was excommunicated for divorcing the husband. The incident screams of a stupid application to an obviously justifiable moral (ethical) quandary. But the change brings up new problems because now, one can be disfellowshiped for greasing ones pole.
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blondie
I think they are changing it to be more inclusive of their litany of definitions of fornication. I used to think fornication was sex between 2 single people of opposite sex. Adultery then doesn't count and all the permutations, such as fondling a breast has a timeframe for it to be sexual immorality/fornication.
I asked an elder if that meant a man's breast as well as a woman's? He gave me a sour look and walked away.
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waton
If you believe the bible down to it's consequences, there was no " wt scriptural" divorce in the OT, because unfaithful, sidestepping wives were supposed to be stoned (to death). so, The context was for husbands that got rid of their wives for other reasons, to spare them that fate (like jJoseph for Mary) with that peace of paper, or vellum.
anything sexual outside marriage is immoral, but it has to go beyond the eye, the heart to be reason for divorce, current bible terminology fitting or not.