The Bible has been translated by man, so that makes it tainted?

Question

There are over 5,000 copies of the new testament copied in Greek. And 8 to 10,000 copied in Latin. 8,000 more in other languages such as Ethiopic, Slavic, and Armanian. Throw in a few miscellaneous manuscripts and there are over 24,000 copies.

The amazing thing is they all say the same thing! Except for a few variations in spelling and stuff like that. But 99.5% of the manuscripts match up. These translators were serious about their work and regarded the documents to be sacred. The variations in the end turn out to be as minor as a few insignificant words in an entire Sunday newspaper.

So to those who think the Bible has been written wrong, How can you explain 24,000 versions of the Bible all saying the same thing?

No, I haven't read all the books myself. But does that make me wrong?
How do you know the Earth revolves around the Sun? Have you done the calculations for yourself?

Answer 1

Good question. The Bible was written by over 40 men, who were moved upon by the Holy Spirit, over a period of over 1600 years, and is yet consistent in agreement on a variety of life subjects. That is amazing. My Mom and I, and my wife and I, hardly ever agree on everything. This is more proof that God wrote it, using the "holy men of old" as His instruments, yet not overriding their personalities while doing so.

Answer 2

Oh, sure, they all say the SAME thing. So why are there HUNDREDS of different versions in English, and if you compare many of the scriptures side-by-side, they DO NOT say the same thing at all?

Luke 17:37 (NIV) 37"Where, Lord?" they asked. He replied, "Where there is a dead body, there the vultures will gather."

(KJV) 37 And they answered and said unto him, Where, Lord? And he said unto them, Wheresoever the body is, thither will the eagles be gathered together.

Did Jesus mean eagles or vultures? They are two very different birds, and you'd think Jesus would know which is which--you know, with him being God, and all.

Matt.6:7 (Young's Literal Translation) 7`And-- praying -- ye may not use vain repetitions like the nations, for they think that in their much speaking they shall be heard,

(NIV) And when you pray, do not keep on babbling like pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their many words.

Other versions use "empty phrases" rather than "babbling" or "vain repetitions." As these are all different concepts (e.g., one can babble without repeating things vainly), what is it that we are prohibited from doing? The Catholics, with their endless Hail Marys, don't like the idea of Jesus forbidding "vain repetitions," so their versions typically change it to "empty phrases" to let them off the hook.

I could list many other discrepencies between various versions, but this post would be way too long. Suffice to say that, if every single version is equally inspired by God, then it is obvious that God cannot even get the smallest details correct. Why should I trust that he got anything else right?

Answer 3

They don't say the same thing. Many words lose their meaning when translated and further codified by Cultures from Medieval Rome through the Renaissance, through the Inquisition, through Protestantism, etc...

For example, the word SIN is not evil and a tool of the Devil. It meant "to miss the mark". This is simply the same as aiming for a bullseye and missing. But the Catholic Church sees sin as a quantification of distance from God. That's BS, frankly. There are several tricky verses that are well-known as having slightly different translations whether you're looking at the King James version or the New Life version. ALL translations of popular philosophers or ancient kings or foreign folklores are always wrought with words that do not have easy translations. They do not ALL say the same thing... you need to be much much more open-minded than that if you are going to actually pierce the veil of spiritual knowledge. Dogmatism is for monkeys.

Answer 4

Not only was it translated by man, but the four gospels were just a few of potentially dozens of accounts that, a few men decided to select and make into a holy book. Christianity exists because a few men decided to pick and choose which accounts should be followed - hence the contradiction in many of the four gospels.

Plus, people pick and choose which things to take literally and seriously (the website "god hates shrimp" comes to mind). Not mention the manipulation of religion to fit the circumstantial needs in different cultures, periods of time, and so forth.

Many Christians don't believe in evolution, except when it comes to the religion and what constitutes "truth" - it has gone through much more morphing than any strand of DNA.

Answer 5

This is a linguistics argument solved, about the tower of babel crumbling. But it doesn't prove that this untainted book is the truth. How do you know that they all say the same thing? Have you read the Armenian and Ethiopic manuscripts?Who, if anyone has read the manuscript in all of its translated languages? Maybe a computer...

Answer 6

Even if what you are saying were true, why would you find it amazing that ancient people were capable of making accurate copies and decent translations?

However, it isn't true. Many of the mistranslations from Hebrew to Greek and from Greek to Latin to English resulted in the invention of entirely new theologies.

A case in point is the Old Testament prophecy that the Messiah would be called a Nazarite - meaning someone totally devoted to god. The Gospel writers mistranslated this as Nazorean - someone from the city of Nazareth. The entire doctrine of Lucifer as being the devil, and of and eternal place of torture called hell came about from mistranslations as well.

Answer 7

almost all of the original disciples of Jesus were martyred and their texts destroyed, even John who survived, and what is believed, teach Polycarp, only some of Polycarps writings survived after he was murdered, the church fathers that put together the bible around two hundred years after the Crucifixion of Jesus only had the texts that survived persecution to work with, and it's probable that what they decided to include in their bible might not have been exactly what Jesus had taught, sure there are lots of copies now, but they are all copies of only what the early church approved, and that's a shame, even Revelation 22:18-19 warns the scribe not to change what he was copying, because texts were so often changed by well meaning men, translations word for word sometimes don't make sense, ok this is probably not a very good example but, a Spaniard told me that Sangria, the wine, literally translates to blood in English, but in Spanish it means the blood of life, meaning that it induces conversation

Answer 8

The funny thing is that the bible of today is different than the bible that came off Guttenburg's first printing press. Parts have been deleted, and parts added, the whole of revelations for example( and the first few lines of that have been changed to remove the part that said it was a dream in the past 50 years.) Yet many religions base their whole doctrine on revelations.

Answer 9

Because the Bible was translated by King James during a time when religion meant money and power , in fact you could " buy your way into heaven " at that time. So why would'nt someone who had the ability to manipulate the Bible for personal gain do it .Because it's wrong ? Thease are people who cut your head off if you disagreed with them .

Answer 10

Well, the general message is intacted. Jesus's message is to love one another and forgive each other as He would. I've found that in any Bible I've read.

I don't believe the Bible was divinely written, only inspired. Meaning, the writers had the Holy Spirit in them when they wrote it, not taking down the exact word of God. That's just my opinion.

Answer 11

They don't all say the same thing and they do disagree. The details are a mess. The point is the overall message and for all those people out there nitpicking every little aspect of every translation and interpretation I say think for yourselves. Read it, study it as a whole. Find the message. It's a GREAT one.