Can the bible be mistranslated, or is every person who translates the bible divinely inspired?

Question

What is the original written language of the bible?

Answer 1

The Bible can and has been mistranslated.

There are differences in the four accounts of the crucifixion

There are differences in the accounts of Judas' suicide

Numbers misquotes Israel's population compared to Exodus and Deutoronomy.

Yes, people inevitably made mistakes. That is why it is often difficult to take the Bible literally. You have to read between the lines, understand the cultural and situational background, and appeal to original meanings of hebrew and aramaic words.

The Mormons claim that the Book of Mormon is the most correct of any book... mostly because it has only been translated twice- first to English from the original egyptian or whatever, and then into the various languages it is published in. They claim that Joseph Smith was divinely inspired in translating it into English the first time, but they still allow him room for error, as he didn't have the greatest grammatical understanding of the English language. There have been spelling and grammar corrections. Take it for what it's worth.

In any case, I believe the Bible is the word of God. I do recognize that it has errors, but they are merely semantic errors that don't dramatically change meaning. If the original Catholic church hadn't condemned so many books as 'spurrious' (unreliable), a larger variety of books might help us discern exactly where all of the mistranslations are. Unfortunately, however, many books supposedly written by apostles and disciples during and immediately after Christ's time have now been lost because they were burned in the years 230-900 AD. Many books are still around but are locked up in the Vatican Library and aren't available to anyone but the high clergy of the Church.

Answer 2

Certainly the Bible can be mistranslated. It can also be misinterpreted and misapplied. This is true of any source of knowledge in this corruptible world. Thankfully enough scholars have undertaken the challenge of properly transmitting the truth that the errors have been kept to a minimum.
As for the original languages, most of the Old Testament, or Tanakh if you are Jewish, was written in Hebrew, with some later portions written in Chaldee. There was a major translation into the Greek language around 150-200 BC known as the Septuagint. The New Testament was written originally in Greek, although some believe Matthew may have first been written in Aramaic or Hebrew. The science and practice behind translating the Scriptures is highly developed and been cultivated over literally thousands of years. No other Book or collection of books in history has been more widely distributed or closely scrutinized as the Bible. What convinces me of its authenticity is not so much the scholarship behind the translators, but the end product. Some sent to arrest Jesus one day returned to those sending them with this report: "No one ever spoke the way this man does." (John 7:46) That is my conviction - nothing else in all the world is like what I find when I read the Scriptures.

Answer 3

Yes, there are several versions of the Bible that are quite unreliable due to mistranslations. The New World Translation (only used by Jehovah's Witnesses) tops that list. Other Bibles contain a few translation difficulties, but are generally accurate. For example, the KJV mistranslates Ezekiel 39:2 horribly.

The Bible was originally written in Hebrew, Aramaic and Koine Greek.

Answer 4

The Old Testament is written in Hebrew (with a couple short sections in Aramaic). The New Testament is written in Greek.

All translations are normally made from the same Hebrew and Greek texts, which in the case of the Old Testament date back to (at the latest) 400BC. For the New Testament, the text date back to late first century (about 40-60 after the time of Christ, some within 20 years of the originals). Of the New Testament alone, over 2,300 manuscripts still exist from the first 150 years of the church existence, that all agree word for word with each other. So that idea that it has been changed by "copying and recopying" - like a game of "telephone" - is wrong.

I am not aware of any translation that claims "divine inspiration". Normally a translation is done by a committee of scholars, usually from different groups (some Catholics, some Protestants, some Jews to help with the Old Testament), and then submitted to other scholars for review before publication. So every effort is made to keep the translations as accurate and reliable as possible.

There have been some translation (such of the New World translation by the Jehovah's Witnesses) that are poorly done or like Thomas Jefferson's "edited" Bible which deliberately drops whole sections and alters anything he did not believe (and he boast that he did that). But most translation are well done.

However any time you translate anything between two languages, there are going to be questions with vocabulary and grammar. Words may have shades of meaning that are not completely covered with a single English word. Also both the Hebrew and Greek use every different word arrangements, (such as the say "house yellow" instead of "yellow house" or they rarely use pronouns, but add a ending to the verb to show the subject) So sometimes the sentence has to be "rearranged" to make the meaning easily understood in English.

Because of this, you will find some difference in style and vocabulary chooses. But if you compare several versions side by side, you will find that the meaning of the verses remains consistent across them.

Answer 5

Hello Sara,

I hope this will help you.

When the bible was first written it was written in Hebrew. And following this it was written in Greek. The Bible is the inspired Word of God. The first translations were hand written in a type of calligraphy. It was done by monks. They labored over each page and the pages were quite beautiful. But the big answer here is that if they messed up one word by even misspelling it or by omitting it or changing it in any way the whole page was thrown out and it had to be completely redone.

Today the best versions of the Bible are the King James version and the NIV version. Both hold true to the original translation of the Bible.

An interesting note is that when the Dead Sea Scrolls were found there was not one mistake from them to these two versions of the Bible. So we can rest assured that if we have the proper translation we are reading what God has for us to learn in His Words to us.

Answer 6

Different parts of the Bible were written in different languages. There were three to be exact Hebrew, Greek, and Aramaic.

I strongly feel that The Message translation is mistranslated. It was done by one man instead of a group of scolars that thus becomes more commentary than translation. I'd suggest you also be careful who writing the study notes if you have a study Bible

Answer 7

Yes it can (see John 1:1 in the New World Translation [JW ] and compare it with other versions). You may want to consider the theme that is hard to misinterpret; that God loved us enough to come down and show us a better way to live and give us a way out. All valid versions teach the same thing Love, forgiveness, non-judgment, Sin and consequences, and how to live in a way that creates more harmony. I wish we could all obtain it and avoid what is to come, but ... oh well As I was typing this a man on the radio was on the KJV as the only valid translation bit. I still after all these years have a hard time reading old English. Personally I use many different versions if I am really trying to understand. It is called legalism when we nit pick over semantics.

Answer 8

Yes, the bible can be mistranslated. Then it isn't the bible anymore. A person who translates the bible, must be divinely inspired, to correctly translate it for the people it is meant to be the readers.

The Torah & OT books are mostly old Hebrew. Moses was raised in Egypt, so learned to write in Egyption (is my guess). But the 10 commandments were originally written by the finger of God on two tablets of stone. I believe in Hebrew. The oldest New Testament books are in Greek. But Jesus was Hebrew and Yeshua is His Name. Yeshua means "He will Save". So Yeshua means Savior.

My understanding is that God speaks all earthly & heavenly languages. The most complete human language was at the time of Babylon before God divided up the languages.

Answer 9

Yes, the Bible can be mistranslated. Otherwise, all the translations would say the same thing. The Hebrew Scriptures were mostly written in Hebrew. The New Testament was mostly written in Greek (and a little Aramaic). We do not have original copies of the Bible, although some copies are VERY old. Copies have errors in them as well.

Answer 10

You do not need to be divinely inspired to translate something correctly.
The Bible has not been translated from one language to another,throughout 2000 years,to get the copies we have today.
The Bibles are translated,directly,from the Hebrew and Greek.
Of all 6000 copies of the original New Testament,they are 99.5% textually pure.The .5% is made up of such things as a mispelled word or differences in grammar.
That's why we know the translations are extremely accurate.
http://www.carm.org/questions/rewritten.htm