Do you doubt the New World Translation?

Question

There seems to be some accusations that JW's have written their own bible to suit their beliefs. Although they have a translation of the bible, does it "suit" their beliefs?

Jehovah's Witnesses have made adjustments to their beliefs for years, including recently. Why have they adjusted their beliefs according to "their" bible, why not adjust their bible as so many claim they do?

Another point, the New World Translation is published in about 55 languages, yet as an organization are in 235 lands and countries, in fact, the What Does God Require Of You brochure is published in nearly 270 languages.

What bible do JW's in those languages use? They use local versions and translations, including King James, NIV amongst others. JW's across the globe are not all using the New World Translation, yet why do they all know and learn the same thing?

It's not necessarily the particualar bible --- could it be they are taught the truth from whatever bible is used?

I appreciate everyone's answers, however, nobody has answered the question --- Why do the still all believe the same thing across the globe, transcend culture, race, etc. no matter what bible is used?

Jim B --- read all of John 8 before you make statements regarding verse 58, the entire chapter is in reference to Jesus stating that he does not bear witness to himself, how ungodlike of him. Verse 58 is in answer to the religious leaders questioning his AGE, as in you were not around when Abraham was alive --- what you are telling me that in answer to a question of his age, he gives his name?

How old are you? --- I'm Jim B

You still didn't answer the question, though. I really don't care if chimps in circus translated the NWT, how can a bunch of people just throw together a bible and teach God's Word across the globe regardless of race, creed, backgroud, economic situation, culture, etc. without God's spirit backing them. The Catholic church, for example, has been around for centuries with all of the experts and theological education and they can't unite people in 1 country with any bible, plus they still go to war and kill one another.

Answer 1

the Bible is the Bible, I can read the NWT, KJV or any other version and get the same thought. I particularly like telling people to read it from their own Bible, because the theme of the Bible is the sam regardless, GOD'S KINGDOM

THE FUNNIEST THING IS HOW NONWITNESSES LOVE TO EXPLAIN OUR BELIEFS BUT HAVE NEVER VISITED A KINGDOM HALL OR EVEN OPENED THE DOOR TO LISTEN, STOP BELIEVING WHAT YOUR NEIGHBOR OR SOME DISGRUNTLED EX WITNESS TELLS YOU ABOUT SOMETHING THEY DONT LIKE.
IF I DONT LIKE OLIVES, WHAT CAN I TELL YOU ABOUT THEM IF I HAVE NOTHING GOOD TO SAY ABOUT THEM???? JUST A THOUGHT!!!!
One of God's law is that we love one another, especially your brother. Therefore, anyone who becomes a witness, whether you are in omaha or zimbabwe, you are my brother/sister. We are unified in our beliefs when it comes to God, therefore when someone believes the same as you, u become united.

FOR EVERYONE WHO THINKS THEY 'SEND US PACKING' OR RUNNING, THAT IS YOUR TAKE ON IT. WE WILL NOT DEBATE WITH YOU. IF THAT SEEMS TO BE YOUR MOTIVE, WE WALK AWAY. YOU HAVE NOT REJECTED US, YOU HAVE REJECTED THE MESSAGE. JUST SO YOU KNOW, WE NEVER FEEL DEFEATED, BECAUSE ITS NOT A GAME FOR US!!!!!

Sorry Oates, i have not been answering the question!! The only answer to that is that they MUST have God's backing!! There is no way a religion can be organized all over the world, different languages, different backgrounds and races, and united in thought unless God has given these peopl his Holy Spirit. As others have proved on here, it has NOTHING to do with a particular Bible. We have used many!!! So, there must me something else, that can cause such unity as this and his name is JEHOVAH!!

Answer 2

Yes very much so, i doubt any translation.

Sorry , to answer that part of your question : As with any religion / cult they are all based on one belief. JW's are a young religion, and have not had the time to branch much and created new systems... such as how the christians have branches (baptist, catholic, etc..) all from the same bible. So JW's are still practicing under the basic laws that their religion has set.


The thing is that muslims, and many other religions besides christians believe Jesus was a prophet, not a son of god.

Christianity started out as a cult that went mainstream... all religions did. What truly amazes me is that today people do not look at things that way (at least not most here in america). If you look at todays cults in america, many started out with a normal christian church and modified the beliefs to make it seem that the leader was the holy one, the one that would bring them to salvation. And what happens in these cults 9/10? The "holy one" preaches, makes many enemies, then turns the followers against those who do not believe" then gets killed in a very memorable way. Sound familiar? It should.

as for all of the translations, the only true historical documents are the eldest of the writtings, including books left out, dead sea scrolls, etc... if modern day bibles put all of the information in that is historically correct, the christians would have a much different view of biblical religion.

As for the jehova's witnesses, this is a very good example of cult gone mainstream. Some religions catch on, some do not.

Now, "writting a bible to suit their own beliefs" well that is the KJV as well. The king commisioned the KJV in 1611. Words are in there that were only made words in the year 1580-1610. now how are words that did not even exist in biblical times in the KJV? A good example is the law against stargazing. "Stargazing" was not in the original bible. You know why it was placed in the bible? One word - Conformity. Galileo discovered, as you know, that the earth was not the center of the universe. There was a large controversy, much of his work was destroyed. and why? Because the church had been teaching that the bible was the only true word, and that in the bible, they translated that the earth was the center. Now, naturally no where in the bible does it state this. However, at those times galileo was considered wrong and therefore putting that into the bible made him wrong. King James commissioned the bible, to conform the people, which included the mask of pagan holidays as well.

So basically, the only real true historical text is indeed the oldest in hebrew/greek and the other document left out such as the book of Enoch, jubilees, etc..

Answer 3

There are more than 130 million copies of the modern-language bible "New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures" in print, in dozens of languages.
http://watchtower.org/languages.htm

The entire text of NWT is freely available at the official website of Jehovah's Witnesses, and a personal printed copy can be requested at no charge:
http://watchtower.org/bible/
https://watch002.securesites.net/contact/submit.htm
http://watchtower.org/how_to_contact_us.htm


Jehovah's Witnesses certainly like NWT, but they are happy to use any translation which an interested person may prefer, and in fact Jehovah's Witnesses themselves distribute other translations besides NWT. Jehovah's Witnesses attach no particular infallibility or inspiration to NWT.

Since the same manuscripts used by the NWT translators are still widely available for study, and since there are dozens of alternate translations for comparison, anyone who chooses to use NWT does so informedly.

It seems that the vast majority of the criticism against the New World Translation is actually as a proxy for blind hatred against Jehovah's Witnesses. The hatred must be "blind" since secular experts of biblical Hebrew and Greek have consistently refused to condemn any particular verse or phrase as an unacceptable translation. Instead, it is religionists with preconceived theologies who bigotedly insist upon particular wordings, since these are necessary to prop up the shakey tenets of their false worship.

(2 Timothy 4:3-5) For there will be a period of time when they will not put up with the healthful teaching, but, in accord with their own desires, they will accumulate teachers for themselves to have their ears tickled; and they will turn their ears away from the truth, whereas they will be turned aside to false stories. You, though, keep your senses in all things, suffer evil, do the work of an evangelizer, fully accomplish your ministry.

It seems significant that the relatively small religion of Jehovah's Witnesses are the ones best known for their worldwide preaching work. Yet Jesus commanded that ALL who would call themselves "Christian" perform this public work:

(Matthew 28:19,20) Go therefore and make disciples of people of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the holy spirit, teaching them to observe all the things I have commanded you. And, look! I am with you all the days until the conclusion of the system of things.

Learn more:
http://watchtower.org/library/pr/article_04.htm
http://watchtower.org/e/na/
http://watchtower.org/e/20020915/article_01.htm
http://www.watchtower.org/e/20050715/article_02.htm

Answer 4

It appears that many of these people on here who have answered did not understand the question, and the point you are making. Could be due to the following Scripture...

John 14:15-17: "15 “If YOU love me, YOU will observe my commandments; 16 and I will request the Father and he will give YOU another helper to be with YOU forever, 17 the spirit of the truth, which the world cannot receive, because it neither beholds it nor knows it. YOU know it, because it remains with YOU and is in YOU."

Anyway, I used the Good News Catholic Bible when I learned the truth. I also used the New International Version, the King James Version and the New King James Version. I still learned the truth. God will not let those who truly are seeking him to miss the truth because of the Bible version they are using. Of course when I began to see how dishonoring it was to God that so many of the modern translators of the Bible took Jehovah's name out and replaced it with mere titles, I started using the New World Translation. I was very angry that God's name was not being used and that had led to so much confusion over the years. I am grateful that his awesome name has been restored! There are so many Scriptures that using mere titles have distorted, such as...

Psalms 83:18: (King James Version and NWT) "18 That people may know that you, whose name is Jehovah,
You alone are the Most High over all the earth."

now read this translation (New KJV)
Psalms 83:18: "That they may know that You, whose name alone is the LORD, are the Most High over all the earth."

I don't get it...You whose name is the LORD? When did Lord become a name.
1 Corinthians 8:5 "For even though there are those who are called “gods,” whether in heaven or on earth, just as there are many “gods” and many “lords,” 6 there is actually to us one God the Father, out of whom all things are, and we for him; and there is one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom all things are, and we through him."

God said this...
Ezekiel 38:23: "And I shall certainly magnify myself and sanctify myself and make myself known before the eyes of many nations; and they will have to know that I am Jehovah.'"

So my point is to agree with you in full, and to help you to set matters straight about finding the truth using any version of the Bible. However, after the truth is found, we all would prefer to use a version of the Bible which has restored God's name in full to the Holy Scriptures. I can't even count the times that the importance of knowing his name is stressed in the Bible!

John 17:6: "6 “I have made your name manifest to the men you gave me out of the world. They were yours, and you gave them to me, and they have observed your word."

and what did Jesus help us to realize was the most important thing to pray for...
Matthew 6:9: "“YOU must pray, then, this way:
“‘Our Father in the heavens, let your name be sanctified.'

How many people must say this prayer and not even have a clue what they are saying because they do not know God's name!
Thank you for bringing thiis subject up and I am sorry that I kind of got off track, but I am hoping to show the importance of having an accurate version of the Bible.

Answer 5

Because the truth stands out. What we have learned is the truth, and the truth is the truth no matter what Bible translation, no matter what language, no matter what opposition.

BTW, while I do not doubt the NWT, I also use a KJV, A Living Bible and a Living Insights study Bible in my studies. I like having more than one point of view. I use my God given discernment to find the truth.

Answer 6

If you want to know what the Bible "says," then you need to learn Hebrew, Greek and a knowledge of aramaic is really helpful. (I did and do read those languages, precisely to be able to study Scripture.)

Some translations are faithful to the original text. Some smooth out the language to make it more understandable. Some translations are governed by pre-existing beliefs, so they pick their words accordingly.

If you do not know the original, you have to do a lot of homework to find out which translation does what. And why.

When a translation is made INTO another language, the first question to ask is what was the language from which they are translating? The Jerusalem Bible, for instance, was a very good translation from a group of scholars - and the original language in which this translation was made was French. So the English Jerusalem Bible is a translation from Hebrew and Greek into French and then into English.

So if someone does a translation into Yappese, for instance - what translation from what language do they start with? Very few start back with the Hebrew or Greek.

And each time there is a new translation, the possibility for new errors, new "creative" additions increases.

Answer 7

NO it is not even considered a real bible it is a cult document. Bad Translations of the Jehovah's Witness Bible, the New World Translation (NWT). 1. Gen. 1:1-2 - "In [the] beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Now the earth proved to be formless and waste and there was darkness upon the surface of [the] watery deep; and God's active force was moving to and fro over the surface of the waters," (New World Translation, emphasis added). 1. The Watchtower Bible and Tract Society denies that the Holy Spirit is alive, the third person of the Trinity. Therefore, they have changed the correct translation of "...the Spirit of God was moving over the surface of the waters," to say "...and God's active force was moving to and fro over the surface of the waters." 2. Zech. 12:10 - In this verse God is speaking and says, "And I will pour out on the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem a spirit of grace and supplication. They will look on me, the one they have pierced, and they will mourn for him as one mourns for an only child, and grieve bitterly for him as one grieves for a firstborn son" (Zech. 12:10, NASB). 1. The Jehovah's Witnesses change the word "me" to "the one" so that it says in their Bible, "...they will look upon the one whom they have pierced..." Since the Jehovah's Witnesses deny that Jesus is God in flesh, then Zech. 12:10 would present obvious problems--so they changed it. 3. John 1:1 - They mistranslate the verse as "a god." Again it is because they deny who Jesus is and must change the Bible to make it agree with their theology. The Jehovah's Witness version is this: "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was a god." 4. Col. 1:15-17 - The word "other" is inserted 4 times. It is not in the original Greek, nor is it implied. This is a section where Jesus is described as being the creator of all things. Since the Jehovah's Witness organization believes that Jesus is created, they have inserted the word "other" to show that Jesus was before all "other" things, implying that He is created. 1. There are two Greek words for "other": heteros, and allos. The first means another of a different kind, and the second means another of the same kind. Neither is used at all in this section of scripture. The Jehovah's Witness have changed the Bible to make it fit their aberrant theology. 5. Heb. 1:6 - In this verse they translate the Greek word for worship, proskuneo, as "obeisance." Obeisance is a word that means to honor, show respect, even bow down before someone. Since Jesus, to them, is created, then he cannot be worshiped. They have also done this in other verses concerning Jesus, i.e., Matt. 2:2,11; 14:33; 28:9. 6. Heb. 1:8 - This is a verse where God the Father is calling Jesus God: "But about the Son he says, 'Your throne, O God, will last for ever and ever, and righteousness will be the scepter of your kingdom.'" Since the Jehovah's Witnesses don't agree with that they have changed the Bible, yet again, to agree with their theology. They have translated the verse as "...God is your throne..." The problem with the Jehovah's Witness translation is that this verse is a quote from Psalm 45:6 which, from the Hebrew, can only be translated as "...Your throne, O God, will last for ever and ever; a scepter of justice will be the scepter of your kingdom." To justify their New Testament translation they actually changed the OT verse to agree with their theology, too! The NWT translation is not a good translation. It has changed the text to suit its own theological bias in many places.

Answer 8

No--
The NWT truly has Jehovah's approval. No other Bible has helped millions to learn what his name really is.(Psalm 83:18)
Not only does it give honor to his most Holy name, the NWT acknowledges Jehovah as the one true God.
Other translations, including the KJV replaced the name of Jehovah with common titles like LORD or GOD. People condemn us for our translation, but to them it's ok if their translation deleted God's name.

Answer 9

You can make any bible say anything you like, I have every translation, plus copies of the majority of Judeo-Christian writings excluded from the bible, what I don't possess I can access through one of my universities.

I have had JWs come to my door and sent them packing with nothing more than the NWT. after a half hour on the doorstep I invite them in for a discussion and they run away!

The problem is that most Christians do not study the bible, like a lot of Muslims they remember passages without understanding, and only discuss areas they feel they know. and too often they rely on others to make sense of the text for them instead of giving it serious study for themselves.

I have had many Christians attack me over quotes from the bible, only to apologize when they actually sit down and read the book.

Their are even those who claim to be disciplined students of God's Word since 1990; reading several biblical languages, but have called verbatim texts from the King James version "the absolute most unknowledge piece of garbage I have ever read”.

If this is the attitude of devout Christians to there own Bible. Refusing to believe what it says when it contradicts their own beliefs.
Then can you see how easy it can be to do the reverse, twist any Bible to suit your own interpretation.

Answer 10

ALL and I mean all the other translation reveal their scholarship. All but the New World. Why is that? How is it that verses are omitted and other added without comment. This is seen in passages such as John 8:58...Truly, truly, I say to you, before Abraham was born, I am..In contrast, the NWT has, “Jesus said to them: ‘Most truly I say to YOU, before Abraham came into existence, I have been. Jesus’ words here historically have been
connected to the divine name in the Old Testament, where Yahweh5 is identified as the “I Am.” Critics of the NWT identified
its translation of this passage as a less-than-subtle attempt to mask its indication of the deity of Christ, and the
Watchtower Society responded with a rather muddled attempt at a grammatical defense of the translation. John 8:58 is one of a string of texts where John uses the Greek phrase ego eimi, the emphatic form of “I am,” in the NWT this verse, Isaiah 43:10, reads, “‘YOU are my witnesses,’ is the utterance of Jehovah, ‘even my servant whom I have chosen, in order that YOU may know and have faith in me, and that YOU may understand that I am the same One. Before me there was no God formed, and after me there continued to be none.’” Jesus uses the very same phrase of Himself in John 13:19, which explains how His revelation of the future would aid the disciples to have true faith in Him; for only God can know the future. It likewise explains why the Jews reacted as they did when Jesus used this phrase in 8:58; for only God has always existed. It also explains why the soldiers who would have no knowledge of the Hebrew Scriptures would fall back on the ground when Christ identified Himself as the very I Am; for only God’s own presence could cause this involuntary
reaction. In each instance those who heard Jesus recognized that He was God, Jim