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Current bible vs older bibles?

JPR

JPR

Member
I wonder if any of you know about this. This was pointed out by a fellow believer and it is VERY interesting.
I told him I've love to get a hold of one and make a digital copy and then post it online for ALL to access.
I was wondering what you guys think. And no, this is not a test, purely curiosity....
 
He’s a good story teller. George Noory should get him on coast to coast. So, this calendar in a “1775 Bible” is the first time he has ever seen a calendar that lists Sunday as the first day of the week? My first question would be, what bible is it? That would be a good bit of information to know before we Just jump off cliffs of insanity into the nebulous unknown of conjecture. Has the fellow in the video never looked at a calendar? Heck, I would be a lot more intrigued if he had found a calendar that didn’t list Sunday as the first day of the week 😂
 
Well we know many loves to change and adjust things. We know sinful man loves to steer people away from God, so the question is, is it so far fetched that man manipulated the calendar? I dunno, it's something to ponder on though.
 
Mankind is wicked and there are many who love to steer people away from the truth. I think the guy in the video is doing just that, maybe not intentionally, but he seems to not have any interest in citing sources.
 
True! and it is possible that he is, whether intentional or not, but it did get me to wondering, what in the original translations is missing from our current translations. However with that said one could also ask what is missing in the reverse order? What are the differences and have things been left out whether deliberate or not from one version to the next?
This is purely speculation and curiosity as I'm more interested in the truth and uncovering what man has covered up because if we don't go looking for the truth it will not be revealed to us unless someone else uncovers it.
 
JPR said:
True! and it is possible that he is, whether intentional or not, but it did get me to wondering, what in the original translations is missing from our current translations. However with that said one could also ask what is missing in the reverse order? What are the differences and have things been left out whether deliberate or not from one version to the next?
This is purely speculation and curiosity as I'm more interested in the truth and uncovering what man has covered up because if we don't go looking for the truth it will not be revealed to us unless someone else uncovers it.
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I have personally “been around the horn”, so to speak, with the same questions. What I discovered is that the hard evidence has brought me back to the conclusion that the Geneva Bible and the KJV are extremely accurate to the original manuscripts and the other versions such as the NASB and even the ESV are close as well and help to bring across the meaning of the original texts in Hebrew and Greek. I found it to be a rewarding journey! God has preserved His Scriptures for us.

Shalom
 
Good to know, I have heard that the KJV is close but I didn't know about the Geneva or the NASB
 
A good thing to know @JPR is that the vast majority of the proof texts used by KJV-only people to demonstrate the differences between the KJV and other bibles are not actually about the translation per se, but about the Greek text used by each translation. The KJV used a set of New Testament manuscripts that are fairly representative of the majority of the manuscripts that have been preserved by the church (the received text / majority text), while most modern translations use a small selection of shorter and arguably more heretical manuscripts that have been promoted by academics as, in their very debatable opinion, more likely to represent the original text (the Nestle-Aland/UBS text). If the KJV is accurate, it is accurate largely due to selection of an appropriate base text - and any other translation from that same base text will be accurate too for the same reason. Unfortunately, there are few translations from the majority text, but the World English Bible is worth checking out if you'd like something with less archaic English.

Basically all translations are acceptable for casual reading, if you hold them loosely. I find the KJV is most useful for deep study not only because it is reasonably accurate, but due to several centuries of people writing concordances and lexicons keyed to its text the KJV is a window into any number of deeper study tools available for free online or pennies at secondhand bookshops, all of which are based on the received text since that's what's behind the KJV.

The Geneva is good also because it's actually the real scholarly work that the KJV plagiarised. Much of it is near-identical to the KJV, except that it often uses more modern language despite being older (the KJV deliberately used more archaic, religious-sounding terms), but the spelling used makes it more difficult to read.
 
Just look at your calendar, brothers. The last four months never got names, because the Roman senate didn't meet in the winter. Sept-tember. Latin for 7. Oct-tober. Quick, everyone: what number comes after seven? And on to Dec- ember. The 12th month is known as the 10th.
And why is leap day added to the end of February?
And why did Augustus take February 30 to make August as long as July, just because he was "as big as his predecessor"? He literally could have taken any day. But he didn't flaunt his prowess. He simply took the "last day of the year" and redesigned it.
 
In regards to the calendar, is there a better, more accurate calendar than what we use today?
My understanding is that the calendar year used to end at the end of winter and spring began a new year.
However biblically there are only two seasons, the warm and the cold seasons.
 
The KJV only debate. LOL.

Having studied this topic for years, I contend most modern evangelical word for word translations are trustworthy and reliable for deep study. And thought for though translations for casual or big picture reading. I've read many books on both sides of the textual issue. I come down on the Nestle Aland, UBS as being a better manuscript text than the TR/Majority text, but I don't have any problem with the KJV other than the issues of readability, and understanding. I can prove there are hundreds of words that are not understood by modern readers, because the meaning of such words has changed in the past 400 years, and people do not realize they have changed and assign modern interpretations of the word when reading rather than it's intended 1611 meaning. I personally want to know every word of God (or as close to it as I can get). An understandable modern word for word translation does that for me.

If you are convinced the TR is the better manuscript line, then read the NKJV and MEV as well. I contend no modern man can understand every single word in the KJV in its original 1611 intent (at least without serious, serious help), and I believe this is provable. The KJV has it's place as a revered translation, however as years continue to go by from 1611, gets less and less understandable to the average reader. This doesn't have to be.

You are safe reading the KJV or NASB or other like minded word for word translations. No translation is totally word for word because that would be impossible from one language to another. Modern translations bracket off passages that may not have been original, if you are going by the oldest available manuscripts. The thought line goes that over the centuries, marginal notes made it into the TR text line and into the KJV, because no one wants to delete text, and the critical text line gets back closer to the original by using older manuscripts closer to the time of Christ.

Both sides can be argued, I have heard both, but no one, or almost no one is trying to deceive you by giving you a faulty Bible. Translators take great care to try to render the original intent. Translations are not perfect, they are human translations of the perfect originals, using manuscripts copied down through the centuries by hand until the printing press. And as such contained human errors. But by comparing the mountain of manuscript evidence, we know exactly what the original authors said.
 
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NBTX11 said:
The KJV only debate. LOL.

Having studied this topic for years, I contend most modern evangelical word for word translations are trustworthy and reliable for deep study. And thought for though translations for casual or big picture reading. I've read many books on both sides of the textual issue. I come down on the Nestle Aland, UBS as being a better manuscript text than the TR/Majority text, but I don't have any problem with the KJV other than the issues of readability, and understanding. I can prove there are hundreds of words that are not understood by modern readers, because the meaning of such words has changed in the past 400 years, and people do not realize they have changed and assign modern interpretations of the word when reading rather than it's intended 1611 meaning. I personally want to know every word of God (or as close to it as I can get). An understandable modern word for word translation does that for me.

If you are convinced the TR is the better manuscript line, then read the NKJV and MEV as well. I contend no modern man can understand every single word in the KJV in its original 1611 intent (at least without serious, serious help), and I believe this is provable. The KJV has it's place as a revered translation, however as years continue to go by from 1611, gets less and less understandable to the average reader. This doesn't have to be.

You are safe reading the KJV or NASB or other like minded word for word translations. No translation is totally word for word because that would be impossible from one language to another. Modern translations bracket off passages that may not have been original, if you are going by the oldest available manuscripts. The thought line goes that over the centuries, marginal notes made it into the TR text line and into the KJV, because no one wants to delete text, and the critical text line gets back closer to the original by using older manuscripts closer to the time of Christ.

Both sides can be argued, I have heard both, but no one, or almost no one is trying to deceive you by giving you a faulty Bible. Translators take great care to try to render the original intent. Translations are not perfect, they are human translations of the perfect originals, using manuscripts copied down through the centuries by hand until the printing press. And as such contained human errors. But by comparing the mountain of manuscript evidence, we know exactly what the original authors said.
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Just to clarify, when you talk about a mountain of manuscripts to rely on, that would be the TR family of manuscripts. The Critical Text relies on essentially just two manuscripts who’s origins seem a bit shaky, definitely not a “mountain” of manuscript evidence. Bibles translated from the critical text usually also include portions from the TR and majority text, with foot notes.
 
JPR said:
In regards to the calendar, is there a better, more accurate calendar than what we use today?
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The Roman-derived calendar we use today is not universal, the Catholic/Protestant and Orthodox branches of the church use different versions (hence why they have different dates for Christmas and Easter). And neither are the Biblical calendar of the Old Testament, where the feasts are defined etc. While even the Jews likely don't use that calendar either, theirs appears modified somewhat. So people who want to get the feasts absolutely correct try and fix the calendar by referring to different sources like the dead sea scrolls, and end up with a plethora of different calendars each that someone claims is the original. Which is confusion. Is there more value in attempted perfection, or more value in practical consistency?

So what do you mean by "better", or "more accurate"? Better in what way? More accurate to what standard? You need to be more specific.

And why does it matter? That's not a rhetorical question, trying to find an answer to it will help you to work out what your purpose is and what you mean by "better" and "more accurate".
 
Well when I say better, more accurate, I mean a calendar that has a biblical base vs the roman-derived calendar.
A calendar that has the feasts, Sabbaths, biblical holidays, ect.
 
There was a time when I would endlessly obsess about the calendar. Then I accepted the fact that it's just a generally accepted way to mark time much like a mile or a kilometer is a generally accepted way to mark distance.

It is what it is.
 
Asforme&myhouse said:
Just to clarify, when you talk about a mountain of manuscripts to rely on, that would be the TR family of manuscripts. The Critical Text relies on essentially just two manuscripts who’s origins seem a bit shaky, definitely not a “mountain” of manuscript evidence. Bibles translated from the critical text usually also include portions from the TR and majority text, with foot notes.
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Its more than two manuscripts. I guess your referring to Sinaiticus and Vaticanus, but there are more.

When i say mountain, I am referring to the over 5,700 total Greek New Testament manuscripts. The critical texts compares ALL available manuscripts by comparing and contrasting them to try to come up with the original rendering. That's what is important after all, not what one particular subset of manuscripts say.

The TR relies on much later manuscripts that have had over a century of time pass between them and the writing of the New Testament. Yes there are more, but they are also later giving rise to more textual variants, marginal notes making their way into text, etc.

But the bottom line is both texts agree a vast, vast majority of the time, other than a few passages such as the long ending of Mark and the Pericope Adulterae. Other than that it's just onesies and twosies. Very minor. And no major Christian doctrines are affected by either text.
 
NBTX11 said:
Its more than two manuscripts. I guess your referring to Sinaiticus and Vaticanus, but there are more.

When i say mountain, I am referring to the over 5,700 total Greek New Testament manuscripts. The critical texts compares ALL available manuscripts by comparing and contrasting them to try to come up with the original rendering. That's what is important after all, not what one particular subset of manuscripts say.

The TR relies on much later manuscripts that have had over a century of time pass between them and the writing of the New Testament. Yes there are more, but they are also later giving rise to more textual variants, marginal notes making their way into text, etc.

But the bottom line is both texts agree a vast, vast majority of the time, other than a few passages such as the long ending of Mark and the Pericope Adulterae. Other than that it's just onesies and twosies. Very minor. And no major Christian doctrines are affected by either text.
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It’s mainly those two that are used, and a few others. Personally I think those two are older because they were unused (probably with good reason), unlike the manuscripts that were actually used by the church. Older doesn’t necessarily mean better. The TR is something like a 99% match with the majority text whereas the critical text is somewhere around 97%. There was a fellow who had all three set up in a fully searchable and comparable data base and was running analysis on it. It was interesting, but it was a long time ago that I was studying it and I haven’t been able to track down where it was. The conclusion I ended up coming to was that I prefer the TR over the critical text, but I’m not a kjv only’er.
 
JPR said:
Well when I say better, more accurate, I mean a calendar that has a biblical base vs the roman-derived calendar.
A calendar that has the feasts, Sabbaths, biblical holidays, ect.
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There are many that claim to have that base. If this is important to you, pick one and use it. It will probably be wrong, but I honestly don't think God will care. He cares about the intent of your heart. If in doubt, just use the standard Jewish calendar - it's almost certainly wrong but will mean you're keeping those feasts at the same time as other people, which is practical for fellowship.
 
I have stated on more than one occasion that some KJV only are guilty of idolatry. They raise up the printed page and ink HIGHER than worship of God. Others will make it a weekly hobby-horse and are only partly idolaters. Our baptist-cultural heretage demands to be right (dammit!).
 
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