Comments on: Speaking of New Bibles…

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 06:17:46 +0000

Ephesians727,
Like I said, I can appreciate where you're coming from and I know that you don't have any bad desires motivating your support of The Voice.
One point I would like to make is that I strongly disagree that we can't continue to dialog (and even see that dialog bear some fruit) simply because we're coming from two different directions. Many Postmodernists want us to believe that because every person is situated in a certain cultural/historical context we cannot reason objectively with one another, but I think this is false. I agree with many of the insights of Postmodernism, but Christians can never accept such radical conclusions because we believe in a God who has created us to reason and to understand the world and how He has revealed Himself in it.
With all that in mind, I would only make a few more points that I would like you to consider:
1. It's possible that SOME children's Bibles do accidentally teach heresy, but that doesn't mean that ALL of them do. In fact, this may be a good time to clear up something that I should have made explicit before: I am NOT arguing that paraphrases are inherently sinful or that they cannot be useful for teaching. The only points I have argued are (1) that a paraphrase should never replace a literal translation, and (2) that The Voice specifically is a BAD paraphrase because it does slip in extra-biblical teaching. So I can completely agree with your spirit and your desire to see evangelicals reawakened to a love for the Word of God, while at the same time strongly disagreeing that The Voice will be able to accomplish that noble task because, one on level, it won't actually be introducing anyone to the real Word of God. Is that clearer, and can you at least see where I'm coming from and why?
2. I'm not qualified to call myself a “Bible scholar” either, but do you really think that matters? Is that a really a good excuse for ignoring these important issues about what the original languages actually say?
3. I'm still a little puzzled by your insistence that I need to somehow show more charity, so may I ask a few questions to better understand your position? (1) What exactly do you mean by “show more charity”? (2) If I have serious criticisms of The Voice and think that it might actually do more damage than good, are you suggesting that I pretend those criticisms don't exist and applaud their efforts simply because their heart might be in the right place? There's a reason they say that the road to Hell is paved with good intentions. (3) Lastly, what, in your opinion, could qualify as a serious enough problem to warrant criticism and not simply blind acceptance?
As one final afterthought, have you considered that often times correction is born out of love? As I said, I fully applaud the spirit which is trying to reawaken a love of the Word of God for people, but if I think that The Voice goes about accomplishing that goal in the wrong way, shouldn't I attempt to correct it, precisely because I do love them as Christian brothers and love what they are trying to do?
Thank you again for engaging in the dialog!

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Mon, 01 Dec 2008 17:33:12 +0000

David, my hope and desire is for people to fall in love with the word of God day after day. If “The Voice” offers a sort of appetizer for the great feast that is the Word of God, then I have no problem serving it and promoting it. I am not a Biblical scholar, so I will not argue about the Greek. All I'm trying to point out is that, we should extend a little more charity for the intentions of the Voice. I understand that you and the other authors of this blog are fairly critical of the Emergent movement (in my opinion for some very good reasons and some not so good reasons), so I imagine that anything that comes out from that movement will be interpreted with a critical rather than a charitable lens. I suppose I probably do that with anything that comes out of the conservative movement.
I have two small children and we have a few “Children's Bible's” that we read with them. Now, I have to be honest, some of these Children's Bibles are pretty heretical when you compare it to the most trustworthy of translations. The “reckless paraphrasing” would probably make you shudder. But my desire for my children at this stage of their lives is not for them to have Biblical accuracy as much as it is for them to understand the love and power of God manifested in Jesus.
Having said that, we live in a culture of evangelicals who need to be retrained and reintroduced to the love of God in a powerful way. Yes, we are kinda like babes. If the Voice offers the appetizer, the first steps. If it allows people to read and explore the scriptures, then let's not be too haste in critiquing it.
We are obviously coming at this from two different directions, and it would seem futile to keep arguing…

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Mon, 01 Dec 2008 06:02:04 +0000

Ephesians727,
Every point I made is arguable and I'm more than willing to be proven wrong. Do you disagree that the intention of The Voice seems quite clearly to be as a replacement for standard Bibles in most contexts? Do you disagree that simply calling it a “retelling” will not make the problems that I and others have outlined in detail go away? Do you disagree that most users of The Message do in fact use it as their primary Bible? Do you disagree that every word of Scripture is inspired by God and therefore such reckless (IMHO) paraphrases make serious interpretation nearly impossible? If so, then please argue your position. That is, after all, the beauty of a blog. (And further, I would like to hear your response to my point that charity and humility does not always mean playing nice and pretending that there aren't serious problems with someone else's position).
And to be clear, I understand that your intention is probably to use The Voice as nothing more than a supplement to an actual translation of the Bible. I was not attempting to ascribe any nefarious or sinful motives to you. I'm sure you respect the Word of God immensely, and I'm even sure that the architects of The Voice think they do as well, I'm simply arguing that their philosophy ends up betraying them.
What it really comes down to for me (and I apologize if this wasn't clear in my first comment) is that it doesn't matter to me whether The Voice is used as a supplementary “retelling” to help explain the Bible rather than an actual translation, because I think it is also a BAD retelling. We already saw in John 1 that theological concepts which are not only foreign to John, but I would argue are foreign to the rest of Scripture, are being added in needlessly (as they are unwarranted by the Greek text). If you can show me how that is actually helpful at explaining the meaning of what's present in the Greek text and not simply an ideology being forced on to the Scriptures, then I will happily concede that The Voice is a good translation (or retelling).
Please don't use frustration as an excuse not to respond to my points. I apologize if I sounded harsh or judgmental, but if I am in fact completely wrong about something, you should be able to show me. As I said at the end of my last comment, I do find it telling when proponents of a certain position can't actually respond to criticisms directly.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Sun, 30 Nov 2008 15:48:52 +0000

I would have responded at length but obviously that as one who may even encourage my flock to read the voice, I am encouraging a whole generation to not respect the word of God. Fine.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Sat, 29 Nov 2008 21:14:41 +0000

Ephesians727,
“Having said that, if we read “the Voice” as a retelling, I think we can extend a little more charity toward what it's trying to accomplish.”
I don't think so. For one thing, it seems pretty clear that this “retelling” is meant to REPLACE normal Bibles in many contexts, especially in daily devotional reading. The whole purpose of this “retelling” is for people who complain that “normal” Bibles are too boring or difficult to read.
Furthermore, you can't simply dismiss the publishers' marketing of The Voice as an actual translation as merely “unfortunate.” They are doing so purposefully, and the average person will not be able to make the distinction you have made between a “translation” and a “retelling.”
“Second, as with most paraphrases, they are never meant to be the primary way that scripture speaks into the life of a person.”
Really? Tell that to the people who use the Message regularly as their main Bible and don't think that it's any different than a normal translation. Even Rick Warren boasts to have used the Message as the main Bible at Saddleback for at least an entire year. Like I said, in the minds of most modern evangelicals there is no real distinction between translation and retelling. And that makes this “retelling” all the more dangerous.

“The last thing I would say is that rather than quickly critiquing it, what may be the better theological, charitable and humble response is this: What does this retelling tell us about how people perceive the Bible? The church? the Culture?”
It tells me that there is a whole generation of “evangelicals” who were not raised to respect the Word of God or the historic doctrines of the church.
You seem to think that if we critique this new translation we are somehow being uncharitable or lacking in humility. First of all, when something is so clearly opposed to traditional Christian teaching and obviously swept away in Postmodern rhetoric, there is not too much room for charity. Secondly, from my perspective, there can be nothing more humble than to submit fully to the Word of God, which means doing the hard work of actually trying to produce the most accurate and faithful translation of the Bible from the original languages. The Voice does not do this. Your complaint sounds like the complaint of the relativist (note: I'm not saying that you are a relativist) who thinks that the Christian is not being humble because he claims that there is only one objective truth. But the opposite is actually true, for the relativist denies that there is an objective standard that he must submit himself to and effectively says, “I will do what I want.” In a way, I think the same can be said for movements like this one. These translators do not see the Word of God as an objective standard by which all reality is to be viewed and submitted to, and instead they choose to submit God's Word to the current cultural shifts. They may want to make the Bible “relevant” to a new generation, but a short study of history will show that every movement that tries to be relevant quickly ends up being totally irrelevant.
To be fair, I think your last suggestion is a good one. I think we can learn a lot about our current culture and how it views the church and the Bible from The Voice. Sadly, I don't think it shows us anything good. And even sadder still, The Voice is not simply some cultural “temperature-taking” experiment, it's meant to be used as an actual Bible. And this is definitely not a good thing.
One last word: Read the comments on the post that Roger linked to on extremetheology.com. Several people have said the same things you have. “It's not supposed to be a translation.” “Don't judge it too quickly.” Etc. But no one is actually responding to the critiques being made. The author actually sets The Voice out in a 3-column setting next to the ESV and the original Greek and compares them word-for-word. I think he shows quite clearly the dangers (and cult-ness) of the Voice. And I find it very telling that no one can muster a substantive response.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 05:26:40 +0000

“Paraphrases have been controversial and popular throughout the ages–The Living Bible, the Good News Translation (which is my favorite), The Message have all tried to offer more interpretation toward the scriptures.”
Actually, paraphrases are a very recent phenomenon – the Living Bible was published in 1971, the Good News Bible in 1976, and the Message published in segments from 1993-2002 – and not at all popular, much less controversial, though the ages (though they have, to some extent, been both of those over the past 40 years). Prior to that, paraphrasing was only common in sermons and commentaries, and the distinction between that and Holy Writ was, I think, a bit more clearly held than what we have today with these various paraphrases floating around. Nothing wrong at all with paraphrases (or paraphrasing), but don't call it a Bible (in my opinion).

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Thu, 27 Nov 2008 19:16:42 +0000

I think there are a couple of things to note before anyone quickly dismisses “The Voice.” First it would be unfair to characterize it as a straight out translation (and it is unfortunate if it's dubbed that way even by the publishers). At http://hearthevoice.com/books/profile/27722 , they write that it's a retelling of the scriptures. I think that's a helpful distinction. While even translations have biases and certain theological bents, retellings and paraphrases are even moreso. In my opinion, every sermon is somewhat of a retelling that fits within a pastor's theological bent. It's not bad or good, it's just is what it is.
Having said that, if we read “the Voice” as a retelling, I think we can extend a little more charity toward what it's trying to accomplish.
Second, as with most paraphrases, they are never meant to be the primary way that scripture speaks into the life of a person. I find that these sorts of books are helpful in expounding in a particular way. I don't fault them any more than I fault the writers of study bibles. They are not meant to replace scripture, but to offer a bit more interpretation (according to their theological bent).
Paraphrases have been controversial and popular throughout the ages–The Living Bible, the Good News Translation (which is my favorite), The Message have all tried to offer more interpretation toward the scriptures. The voice is hoping to add it's 'voice' (pardon the pun) to the world of interpretations.
The last thing I would say is that rather than quickly critiquing it, what may be the better theological, charitable and humble response is this: What does this retelling tell us about how people perceive the Bible? The church? the Culture? … What are the strengths of such a retelling? Are there ways that the voice will advance the Kingdom of God? What place does/should this book have in my witness?
Just some thoughts…