Posted on 04/30/2020 5:02:56 PM PDT by spacejunkie2001
I'm looking for recommendations from those of you who are seasoned in studying the Bible. If you use a specific study Bible, which do you like?
I've used Homan and Life Application. Both are good. I also have e Sword which is a good study tool.
Mark
The pastor of the church you're citing as an "authority" has no theological training based on his resume posted by the church.
He received a B.A. degree in Architecture from Iowa State University in 1982 and was licensed to practice Architecture in 1986.
He would benefit from some formal traning....and correcting the mistakes in the website.
Regarding the note about Logsdon....
"The Board of Directors of The Lockman Foundation launched the NEW AMERICAN STANDARD BIBLE translation work in the late 1950's following the completion of the AMPLIFIED NEW TESTAMENT. Dr. S. Franklin Logsdon was acquainted with Dewey Lockman, president of The Lockman Foundation, prior to Mr. Lockman's death in 1974. Mr. Logsdon was never a member of the Board of Directors, nor was he an employee of The Lockman Foundation. Mr. Logsdon had no authority to hire employees or translators for the Foundation, to set policy, to vote, to hold office, to incur expenses, etc. He cannot be considered "co-founder" of the NASB, nor part of The Lockman Foundation, nor part of the NASB translation team, nor did he write the forward of the NASB. According to our records, he was present at board meetings on two occasions -- once to hear a travel report; and once to deliver an "inspirational thought."
Mr. Logsdon last wrote to Mr. Lockman in fall of 1973 that he was moving to Florida. Mr. Lockman replied that he was surprised and saddened by his decision to leave the area. Mr. Lockman passed away in January of 1974, and no further correspondence was exchanged between Frank Logsdon and The Lockman Foundation. He resided in Florida until his passing some years ago.
I cannot find any reference to Logsdon being a member of the translation committee.
You are rapidly losing any credibility in this argument with your citations of these factually challenged websites.
Regarding the note about Logsdon....
"The Board of Directors of The Lockman Foundation launched the NEW AMERICAN STANDARD BIBLE translation work in the late 1950's following the completion of the AMPLIFIED NEW TESTAMENT.
Dr. S. Franklin Logsdon was acquainted with Dewey Lockman, president of The Lockman Foundation, prior to Mr. Lockman's death in 1974. Mr. Logsdon was never a member of the Board of Directors, nor was he an employee of The Lockman Foundation. Mr. Logsdon had no authority to hire employees or translators for the Foundation, to set policy, to vote, to hold office, to incur expenses, etc. He cannot be considered "co-founder" of the NASB, nor part of The Lockman Foundation, nor part of the NASB translation team, nor did he write the forward of the NASB. According to our records, he was present at board meetings on two occasions -- once to hear a travel report; and once to deliver an "inspirational thought."
Dakes Bible, back when we were going to the AOG church, was a badge of honor. You were pretty special if you had a Dakes. One thing I laugh at, is my husband would come up with his jewels of revelation during his studies, and then would go to the Dakes and find out the old man already had it covered...good 2nd witness but very humbling :) We have The Companion Bible which took me 4 hours to read the first 8 pages and if you don’t read those you will never be able to read the rest of the Bible...very intense.
Another word fraught with misunderstanding doctrinally is "believer" which does not discern whether the person in view is regenerated or merely in agreement with Christian principles but not wholly committed to Jesus as Lord and Sole Owner of him, body, soul, and spirit.
Regarding James Stuart's influence on bending the translation to fit his preferences, I would be gratified if you could supply a verifiable citation of the instances regarding "church" and "bishop" that back you up. and the text thereof, especially if it appears on line.
In fact, I very much doubt that the translators could or would have been influenced by James, to lay aside their integrity individually or as members of the centers of knowledge. This was a time when people, even peasants, gave up their lives in flames for their beliefs.
At this point, I don't feel that I can rest on your opinion alone; and I always attempt to provide backup for mine.
Don't forget that the KJV translators (and there were many in the consortium) were generally more highly accomplished than most of the authors of today's versions, and that is a matter of record: Here are just a couple of examples that typify what I have said about them:
Lawrence Chaderton (click here)
If The Stuart was to try to influence one of these men of high integrity, he would have had to influence them all, because they stood together on their consensus that the goal was to make that which was already good just a bit better, a Bible fit for adoption as authorized for use throughout the whole British Commonwealth; the official supreme basis for English integrity, not just a nice study Bible to have around when it agreed with one's own opinion as to which was best.
What you are dealing with here is a whole bevy of such learned men, and their national product governing the conduct of the official religion, no matter who was king or queen.
I do not think you do them justice in your tale of their corruptibility.
So they say, regarding the NIV.
I really like the NKJV, too. It reads like the poetry of the KJV, but not the comprehension and old language difficulties.
Many people like the NKJV Open Bible Study Bible. It is packed with information. I found the print to be small, or something, it was just not easy to read. I had to send it back.
The Nelson NKJV Study Bible is great. Personally I liked it much better than the Holman.
I do not like ANY Life Application Bibles. All personal preferences, I know.
I have one that uses both the New American and King James side by side,
and buy study books on occasion on certain persons that interest me such as Job, James, etc.
Your credibility on this issue is toast.
Sure, any Reader of Shakespeaare's woks can tell you that, as well as what the chages were so the meanings of the words at the time can be taken into account when reviewing his writings, or performance of his play.
As far as inconsequential matteres are concerned, standardization of spelling wof the word souns misprints, etc. were all accomplished by 1769, after careful scrutiny over a 60-year period from the first 1611 printing.
But this is just obfuscation, and I'm not going to waste time with you dodging the main issue, which is the value of modern versions to the Spirit-guided Bible student.
Re whether the translators had a dictionary at hand for their work:
Are you sure about that?
From Wiki's "Dictionary"
The first purely English alphabetical dictionary was A Table Alphabeticall, written by English schoolteacher Robert Cawdrey in 1604. The only surviving copy is found at the Bodleian Library in Oxford. This dictionary, and the many imitators which followed it, was seen as unreliable and nowhere near definitive. Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield was still lamenting in 1754, 150 years after Cawdrey's publication, that it is "a sort of disgrace to our nation, that hitherto we have had no… standard of our language; our dictionaries at present being more properly what our neighbors the Dutch and the Germans call theirs, word-books, than dictionaries in the superior sense of that title."
My dear Brother, you've got to come to terms with the issues of lower and higher text criticism. I don't know that you have much of a defense for the NASV exept that it was a sincere attempt with the wrong result. There are many that are able to rightly divide the Word of Truth, but the textual (non)criticism issue wrongly divides the brethren, as Westcott, Hort, and their sycophants found out.
Your credibility on this issue is toast.
I have them, too, as does everyone else. But that is not what I asked of you. I asked you to tell me how you believe, preach, and teach this passage. My response is predicated on having that information from you
The burden is upon you to show the perceived error.
No, obviously it is not at this point, for without you disclosing the substance of your understanding of the passage, there is nothing to discuss. At this point, I do not know whether your assumptions about this passage and those in the Revelation are in error or not, or whether your text basis influences your opinion.
I guess you don't much cotton to the Socratic method.
There’s no ducking about it. I would not begin putting limits on God in how He chooses to use His Word in whatever language it’s written or translation one might use, as He will always draw those to Himself and can be depended upon to reveal HIS truth for those who sincerely seek Him, and to know Him and His word....and it is by the Holy Spirit and through Him as our teacher we can know the truth.
as is written..... But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all things that I said to you...John 14:26
and again.... But the anointing which you have received from Him abides in you, and you do not need that anyone teach you; but as the same anointing teaches you concerning all things, and is true, and is not a lie, and just as it has taught you, you will abide in Him...1 John 2:27
For....Who has directed the Spirit of the Lord,
Or as His counselor has taught Him?...With whom did He take counsel, and who instructed Him, And taught Him in the path of justice?....Who taught Him knowledge, And showed Him the way of understanding?...... Isaiah 40:13-14
My dad used Wuest and Young’s during his “preaching days”. When he died, a couple of my pastor cousins inherited his extensive library, many/most books which can’t even be found any more.
I wouldn’t give that poster any more time. He/she relies upon bogus websites replete with errors. The poster has lost all credibility on this issue as a result.
INSTRUCTIONS TO THE TRANSLATORS.
The ordinary Bible read in the Church, commonly called the Bishops’ Bible, to be followed, and as little altered as the original will permit.
The names of the prophets and the holy writers, with the other names in the text, to be retained, as near as may be, accordingly as they are vulgarly used.
The old ecclesiastical words to be kept, as the word church, not to be translated congregation.
When any word hath divers significations, that to be kept which hath been most commonly used by the most eminent fathers, being agreeable to the propriety of the place and the analogies of faith.
http://www.bible-researcher.com/kjvhist.html
So....keep the “old ecclesiastical words”. Sir Thomas More had written a lengthy treatise attacking Tyndale for translating ecclesiastical words in an honest fashion, with examples - so the translators all knew what King James meant.
Consider: http://www.archive.org/stream/tyndalesanswer00tynduoft/tyndalesanswer00tynduoft_djvu.txt
And if in doubt, they were to err on the side of church fathers instead of best translation.
FWIW, I own several KJV bibles and choose to use them sometimes. But I’m under no illusion that it is superior to modern translations. It is hampered more by archaic language “Thou Shall not kill” than it is by politics...but politics DID play a role in how it was translated.
No need to. I've been through this many times. It doesn't take a theological degree to find all the differences between the Byzantine/Majority Greek Textform and the 19th century newly constructed Greek text synthesized from a narrow selection of corrupted "older" codices, and te translated products from them. But attacking the author of the blog does not solve your problem. Someome licensed to practice architecture has to have a pretty keen mind, and though he might not have a degree in theology, he might be pretty good at it, with a bit of study in the 30-odd intervening years and a good library. Good enough to find the work of those who have excelled in Biblical issues, that is, and use that work.
and correcting the mistakes in the website.
And those mistakes are? Believing the testimony of the man who claimed to have been in on the production of the NASB as compared to the disclaimer of the Lockman Foundation whose profitability might be endangered by Logsdon's testimony of involvement. From Moody Publishers, who are reasonably reliable on this issue: Here is Frank Logsdon's recorded testimony of how the NASB came about:
THE NEW AMERICAN STANDARD VERSIONEither Logsdon is a liar, or the Lockman Foundation is lying. Do they have incontrovertible proof that someone else wrote the preface to the first issue of the NASB? Did Logsdon pen a preface that was merely massaged and put into shape by an editor so his words were preserved but his authorship unrecorded or obscured, and thus unclaimable for posterity? I don't know, and neither do you. If they can prove other authorship, they have a contest; but without it, their disclaimer is just factless hearsay.
Back in 1956-57 Mr. F. Dewey Lockman of the Lockman Foundation contacted me. He was one of the dearest friends we've ever had for 25 years, a big man, some 300 pounds, snow white hair, one of the most terrific businessmen I have ever met. I always said he was like Nehemiah; he was building a wall. You couldn't get in his way when he had his mind on something; he went right to it; he couldn't be daunted. I never saw anything like it; most unusual man. I spent weeks and weeks and weeks in their home, real close friends of the family. Well, he discovered that the copyright [on the American Standard Version of 1901] was just as loose as a fumbled ball on a football field. Nobody wanted it. The publishers didn't want it. It didn't get anywhere. Mr. Lockman got in touch with me and said, "Would you and Ann come out and spend some weeks with us, and we'll work on a feasibility report; I can pick up the copyright to the 1901 if it seems advisable. "Well, up to that time I thought the Westcott and Hort was the text. You were intelligent if you believed the Westcott and Hort. Some of the finest people in the world believe in that Greek text, the finest leaders that we have today. You'd be surprised; if I told you you wouldn't believe it. They haven't gone into it just as I hadn't gone into it; [they're] just taking it for granted. At any rate we went out and started on a feasibility report, and I encouraged him to go ahead with it. I'm afraid I'm in trouble with the Lord, because I encouraged him to go ahead with it. We laid the groundwork; I wrote the format; I helped to interview some of the translators; I sat with the translators; I wrote the preface. When you see the preface to the New American Standard, those are my words.
I got one of the fifty deluxe copies which were printed; mine was number seven, with a light blue cover. But it was rather big and I couldn't carry it with me, and I never really looked at it. I just took for granted that it was done as we started it, you know, until some of my friends across the country began to learn that I had some part in it and they started saying, "What about this; what about that?" Dr. David Otis Fuller in Grand Rapids [Michigan]. I've known him for 35 years, and he would say (he would call me Frank; I'd call him Duke), "Frank, what about this? You had a part in it; what about this; what about that?" And at first I thought, now, wait a minute; let's don't go overboard; let's don't be too critical. You know how you justify yourself the last minute. But I finally got to the place where I said, "Ann, I'm in trouble; I can't refute these arguments; it's wrong; it's terribly wrong; it's frightfully wrong; and what am I going to do about it?" Well, I went through some real soul searching for about four months, and I sat down and wrote one of the most difficult letters of my life, I think.
I wrote to my friend Dewey, and I said, "Dewey, I don't want to add to your problems," (he had lost his wife some three years before; I was there for the funeral; also a doctor had made a mistake in operating on a cataract and he had lost the sight of one eye and had to have an operation on the other one; he had a slight heart attack; had sugar diabetes; a man seventy- four years of age) "but I can no longer ignore these criticisms I am hearing and I can't refute them. The only thing I can do--and dear Brother, I haven't a thing against you and I can witness at the judgment of Christ and before men wherever I go that you were 100% sincere," (he wasn't schooled in language or anything; he was just a business man; he had the money; he did it conscientiously; he wanted it absolutely right and he thought it was right; I guess nobody pointed out some of these things to him) "I must under God renounce every attachment to the New American Standard. "I have a copy of the letter. I have his letter. I've shown it to some people. The Roberts saw it; Mike saw it. He stated that he was bowled over; he was shocked beyond words. He said that was putting it mildly, but he said, "I will write you in three weeks, and I still love you. To me you're going to be Franklin, my friend, throughout the course. "And he said, "I'll write you in three weeks." But he won't write me now. He was to be married. He sent an invitation to come to the reception. Standing in the courtroom, in the county court by the desk, the clerk said, "What is your full name, Sir?" And he said, "Franklin Dewey.." And that is the last word he spoke on this earth. So he was buried two days before he was supposed to be married, and he's with the Lord. And he loves the Lord. He knows different now. I tell you, dear people, somebody is going to have to stand. If you must stand against everyone else, stand. Don't get obnoxious; don't argue. There's no sense in arguing. But nevertheless, that's where the New American stands in connection with the Authorized Version. I just jotted down what these versions, translations, and paraphrases are doing. Consider:
One, they cause widespread confusion, because everywhere we go people say, What do you think of this; what do you think of that? What do young people think when they hear all of that?
Two, they discourage memorization. Who's going to memorize when each one has a different Bible, a different translation?
Three, they obviate the use of a concordance. Where are you going to find a concordance for the Good News for Modern Man and all these others? You aren't going to find one. We're going to have a concordance for every one; you're going to have to have a lot of concordances.
Four, they provide opportunity for perverting the truth. There are all these translations and versions, each one trying to get a little different slant from the others. They must make it different, because if it isn't different why have a new version? It makes a marvelous opportunity for the devil to slip in his perverting influence.
Five, these many translations make teaching of the Bible difficult. And I'm finding that more and more as I go around the country. I mentioned this thing the other night. How could a mathematics professor or instructor teach a certain problem in a class if the class had six or eight different textbooks? How about that? How could you do it?
Six, they elicit profitless argumentation. Because everywhere we go they say this one is more accurate. Which one is more accurate? How do they know? And this is not a reflection against those saying this, because I would have done this a few years ago. Lest I forget, in one of these questions somebody said, "How can we know that we have the whole truth?" Well, just simply by believing God. And what do I mean by that? John 16:13--"When he the Spirit of Truth is come he will guide you into" how much? Tell me. Tell me, now. "All truth." And if we don't have all truth, the Holy Spirit isn't doing His work. We have to have all truth for Him to lead us into all truth. And there are many, many other passages which teach this. If we could hear His voice we would have no trouble learning His Word from the Authorized Version. Let me tell you this: You might not be able to answer the arguments, and you won't be [able to]. I can't answer some of them, either. Some of these university professors come along and say, What about this; what about that? They go into areas that I haven't even had time to get into. As I said to you a couple of minutes ago. You don't need to defend yourself, and you don't need to defend God's Word. Don't defend it; you don't need to defend it; you don't need to apologize for it. Just say, "Well, did this version or this translation come down through the Roman stream? If so, count me out. Whatever you say about Erasmus and Tyndale, that's what I want." And besides this, we've had the AV for 362 years. It's been tested as no other piece of literature has ever been tested. Word by word; syllable by syllable. And think even until this moment no one has ever found any wrong doctrine in it, and that's the main thing. He that wills to do the will of God shall KNOW the doctrine.
Well, time is up. Let's be people of the Book. It took my mother to heaven; and my dad, my grandfather, my grandmother. It was Moody's Book; it was Livingstone's Book. J.C. Studd gave up his fortune to take this Book to Africa. And I don't feel ashamed to carry it the rest of my journey. It's God's Book. "Our Father, we thank Thee and praise Thee for Thy Word. Help us to love it, and preach it, and teach it, and tell everybody we can the Good News through thy Word. In Jesus' name. Amen."
At the time of Logsdon's oral testimony, did they come forward and dispute him? Apparently not, but that is moot now, I guess.
But at the root, the NASB follows the Westcott/Hort/UBS/Aland/critical text approach, not the Majority Text one, and is therefore highly suspect as to value, in my estimate.
I cannot find any reference to Logsdon being a member of the translation committee.
You won't. In the above testimony, he said, "I helped to interview some of the translators; I sat with the translators; . . .". He didn't say that he did any of the translating. That was well over a hundred years ago. Records for that time may well be non-existent, or at least not available to the casual fdault-finder.
You are rapidly losing any credibility in this argument with your citations of these factually challenged websites.
With you, maybe. So? What about the NASB or other modern versions? Did the RSV or a requirement for MDiv help the Methodists or not? Maybe they needed a few ordained ministers with some other breadth than just a Seminary training. But that's getting away from the core issue. Is reliance on the KJV/AV as the premier reference Bible bad?
Kind of interesting to hear your opinion on those matters. The sites to which I have referred are not bogus at all, and for you to say so is incredible, if credibility is in question.
You continue your loss of credibility now trending in the negatives. You really are displaying a lack of knowledge on this topic.
But attacking the author of the blog does not solve your problem. Someome licensed to practice architecture has to have a pretty keen mind, and though he might not have a degree in theology, he might be pretty good at it, with a bit of study in the 30-odd intervening years and a good library.
You're making a lot of assumptions about your blogger. Do you know this person? Is he a friend?
And those mistakes are? Believing the testimony of the man who claimed to have been in on the production of the NASB as compared to the disclaimer of the Lockman Foundation whose profitability might be endangered by Logsdon's testimony of involvement.
You have one man making a lot of unsubstantiated claims. And you continue to link from what are at best fringe websites.
This was your asseration: lf you doubt the truth of this statement, consider the following quote from Dr. Frank Logsdon, the theologian and Bible scholar who assisted in the development of the New American Standard Version (NASV):
The Lockman Foundation repudiates it.
They list no record of this man being involved in the development of the NASB....but, I have no idea how loosely you define "development". Considering your other posts I really call it into question.
I do seriously call into question his credentials...whatever they may be.
From their website:
Right away he became an eager student of the holy Bible and felt the call to preach and teach God’s Word. Within six months. he had printed his first book on a biblical theme.
And to be clear...I didn't single out this website.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.