Who are the translators of the New World Translation, what are their credentials?

Answer 1

Gotta just love the dishonest JW responses on this question. But lets be charitable and assume that they speak from ignorance and not an intention to deceive.
Dog sneeze Penguin is correct. Those are the names of the gentleman who "translated" the NWT. He is also correct in his listing of their so-called creditials. They had none.
Now, as to some of the JW responses here:
1) Keitchi says they were "unanimous". (I'll try not to be mean). I assume he means annonaymous. Yes they were. For good reason. It wasnt out of humility as was the excuse often given by the Watchtower. It was because the Watchtower did not want the world to know of their lack of creditionals.

2) Jvitne lists a whole slew of "scholars". All of the reputable ones in his list have long since accused the W.T. of taking their remarks out of context, and misrepresenting their views of the NWT. (Dr. Mantey who they used to quote, had to send them a letter threatining a lawsuit.) Most of the people in Jvitne list are not scholars at all. In fact, a person would be hard-pressed to find more than one recognized, reputable scholar in the world who would agree with the idea of the NWT as an Faithful and Honest Translation. Nearly all scholars consider it a joke.

3) Achtung says that trying to identify the members of the Translation Committee are "merely guesses". Now here, it is very hard to be charitable. I would like very much to believe that he is just ignorant, and not being deliberatley deceiving, but the truth is the names of the six man committe have been known since around the 1980's.

4) Linedancer asks, "Have you asked that question concerning your own bible?" A fair question. And the answer is yes. Most Modern Translations have the names of all of the Scholars that are on the various committees. A simple google search is all that is required to ascertain their creditionals. And many of them have served on other committees and are very well known to other scholars, and even the ordinary christian after even a just a cursory search. Also, I hate to be the one to break the news to you buddy, but the "name" Jehovah does not appear in ANY ancient Manuscript. The "YWHW does. But neither the YWHW nor Jehovah appears in ANY copy of the NEW TESTAMENT. Obviously, if that was Gods "true" NAME, He would have preserved it. Also, neither Jesus or the Disciples ever used it. And if anyone WOULD have used it, it would have been an Old Testement Scholar like Paul. The Watchtower changes the Word of God by adding it to the N.T. The people in charge that did that, are at this moment paying the price for it.

5) Someone (cant remember the name now) in one of the answers said basically, "whats the difference" what the creditionals were, after all "God" was the one doing the translating. (I'm paraphrasing from memory). Are you kidding? For years JW's have been saying that "OF COURSE, their Committe of Translators was comprised of the Best Greek and Hebrew Scholars in the world. But out of HUMILITY they wanted to remain unknown. But now that the names have been made public, and none had practically ANY training, now they say it DOESNT matter? What kind of flip-flopping, gobbledy-goook is this?

In conclusion, Princess Yum Yum above is correct when she says that the NWT really had NO translators. You have to be able to read the original to be a legitiment translator. She is also correct when she says that Dog Sneeze Peguin should get the "Best Answer". He answered the question correctly (rats, he beat me to it, lol).
......theBerean

Answer 2

I graduated from a Christian University. For my particular Business major I was required to have 12 units of religious theory and study before I could walk the isle. What I thought was going to be a fancy 12 units of Sunday school classes turned into the best 12 units of scholarly study on any subject, I ever did in college. My point? I would not began to translate the Bible from the original Greek scriptures. Even if I had a religious major with Greek as a minor I would not attempt doing something like that. Doing that would have to be one of my life's ambitions and passions, period.

The JW's will put anyone on the job that they think was inspired by Jehovah, even if they had a grade school education. They also bend the Bible stories to match their religious theories. Even then they still are not allowed to read their Bible without a Watchtower at their side to guide them. They can't have any lambs stray from the flock, even using their own Bible. Anyway, that is why their New World Bible will NEVER be recognized by any of the scholarly Bible translators.

Answer 3

The "New World Translation Committee" which oversaw the translation work request anonymity 'en perpetuity', and are likely all dead since the primary work was completed 45 years ago. Guesses at specific names have always been merely guesses. 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.

Jehovah's Witnesses have distributed more than 145 million copies of "New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures", 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.

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 shaky 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/e/20000622/
http://watchtower.org/e/pr/index.htm?article=article_04.htm
http://watchtower.org/e/na/
http://watchtower.org/e/20020915/article_01.htm
http://watchtower.org/e/20050715/article_02.htm

Answer 4

dog sneeze penguin pride is incorrect.

The people mentioned were on the translation committee but were not among the ones that translated the bible.

The actual translators are unanimous.

Regardless of who the translators were, ALL Scriptures are taken from the same place. Therefore ALL scriptures are
based on the Author who is Jehovah.

2Ti 3:16 All scripture [is] given by inspiration of God

Some bibles have clear cut errors in them such as KJV using the word Unicorn and describing birds as insects however every bible should be used:

2Ti 3:16 for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness:

Answer 5

There were no translators. Those Jehovah's Witnesses who were tasked with coming up with a version of the Bible to suit their beliefs took Westcott and Hort's translation, modified it and called it their own. The 'panel' are un-named, therefore their credentials cannot be examined, never mind challenged. I doubt 'they' have a single credential between them. They do not have a single scholarly leg to stand upon between 'them'. Need I say more?

Dog Sneeze Penguine gets my vote - do the comparisons!

Answer 6

that is translated by different brothers n Jehovah's organization so that people would easily understand the bible in their mother tongue.their credentials?they are filled with God's Holy spirit and they where guided by it.and if you would only read the original manuscript of the bible you will see the name Jehovah or YHWH appears more than 7,000 times wherein you cant read in other translation

Answer 7

What difference does it make? Have you asked that question of the Bible you or your friends use? Or is your question based on prejudice stirred up by your local clergyman? Before you accuse the NWT of not being a legitimate Bible, are you aware that your Bible has removed the personal name of God that has existed in the most reliable Bible manuscripts? In those manuscripts, God's name appears almost 7,000 times. Does that bother you? Probably not.

Answer 8

There were five or so tranlators. Only one had training in Koine Greek. This amounted to 2 credit hours. The rest had no language training. In other words, not a single person had nearly enough qualifications to begin translating the Bible. You would do as well by picking off five people on the sidewalk.

Compare this with other translation. They have several dozen traslators, each being academic specialists in the languages they are translating.
___________

1) Frederick W. Franz: Main translator. Partially completed a two-hour survey course in Biblical Greek in junior year; course titled "The New Testament--A course in grammar and translation." Left in spring of 1914 before completing junior year.

2) Nathan H. Knorr: No training in biblical languages.

3) Milton G. Henschel: No training in biblical languages.

4) Albert D. Schroeder: No training in biblical languages. Took 3 years of mechanical engineering

5) Karl Klein: No training in biblical languages.

6) George D. Gangas: No training in biblical languages.

Answer 9

When you have god's spirit, what else do you need ?

That's what they used to tell me

Answer 10

The most important thing here is how accurate the Bible were translated from the original Hebrew and Greek Scriptures. Jehovah God is their credentials. He is the most intelligent creature in the universe follow by His son Jesus Christ. Take a look at the other Bibles claimed to have PhD degree people translated them but have the most errors and are not helping people to come to ACCURATE knowledge of the only ONE true God Jehovah.

Here's a book written by not a JW. You can check it out in your local library or buy it from the book store and read it.

Book:"TRUTH IN TRANSLATION: ACCURACY AND BIAS IN ENGLISH TRANSLATIONS OF THE NEW TESTAMENT"

Author: Jason David BeDuhn is the Associate Professor of Religious Studies at Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff. He holds a B.A. in Religious Studies from the University of Illinois, Urbana, an M.T.S. in New Testament and Christian Origins form Harvard Divinity School, and a Ph.D. in Comparative Study of Religions form Indiana University, Bloomington.

The Nine English Translations Compared in BeDuhn's book are :
- The King James Version (KJV)
- The Amplified Bible (AB)
- The Living Bible (LB)
- The New American Bible (NAB)
- The New American Standard Bible (NASB)
- The New International Version (NIV)
- The New World Translation (NW)
- The (New) Revised Standard Version (NRSV)
- Today's English Version (TEV)

Excerpts from his book :

Chapter Four : Examples of translation of the Greek word "proskuneo", used 58 times in the New Testament. The word is translated various ways as worship, do obeisance, fall down on one's knees, bow before. Scriptures discussed include Matt. 18:26; Rev. 3:9; Mark 15:18,19; Matt 2:1, 2, 8,11; Matt 14:33; Matt 28:9, "... in our exploration of this issue, we can see how theological bias has been the determining context for the choices made by all of the translations except the NAB and NW... translators seem to feel the need to add to the New Testament support for the idea that Jesus was recognized to be God." Regarding Matt. 28:16, 17, where all versions except the NW use "worship" where the NW uses "did obeisance": "Here all translations except the NW have recourse to "worship" -- a rendering which makes no sense in this context... This contradiction seems to be missed by all the translators except those who prepared the NW."

Chapter Five : A discussion of Philippians 2:5-11: "The NW translators... have understood "harpagmos" accurately as grasping at something one does not have, that is, a "seizure." The literary context supports the NW translation (and refutes the KJV's "thought it not robbery to be equal)..."

Chapter Seven : A discussion on Col. 1: 15-20: "It is a tricky passage where every translation must add words." "The LB translator is guilty of all the doctrinal importation discussed above with reference to the NIV, NRSV, and TEV, and even surpasses them in this respect. So it is the NIV, NRSV, TEV and LB -- the four Bibles that make no attempt to mark added words - that actually add the most significant tendentious material. Yet in many public forums on Bible translation, the practice of these four translations is rarely if ever pointed to or criticized, while the NW is attacked for adding the innocuous "other" in a way that clearly indicates its character as an addition of the translators... But the NW is correct. "Other" is implied in "all", and the NW simply makes what is implicit explicit... It is ironic that the translation of Col. 1:15-20 that has received the most criticism is the one where the "added words" are fully justified by what is implied in the Greek."

Chapter Eight : A discussion on Titus 2:13; 2 Thess. 1:12; 2 Peter 1:1, 2: "... the position of those who insist "God" and "Savior" must refer to the same being... is decidedly weakened."

Chapter Nine : A discussion of Hebrews 8:1: "so we must conclude that the more probable translation is "God is your throne..., " the translation found in the NW... It seems likely that it is only because most translations were made by people who already believe that Jesus is God that the less probable way of translating this verse has been preferred."

Chapter Ten : A discussion on John 8:58: "Both the LB and the NW offer translations that coordinate the two verbs in John 8:58 according to proper English syntax, and that accurately reflect the meaning of the Greek idiom. The other translations fail to do this." "There is absolutely nothing in the original Greek of John 8:58 to suggest that Jesus is quoting the Old Testament here, contrary to what the TEV tries to suggest by putting quotations marks around "I am.""
"The majority of translations recognize these idiomatic uses of "I am", and properly integrate the words into the context of the passages where they appear. Yet when it comes to 8:58, they suddenly forget how to translate." "All the translations except the LB and NW also ignore the true relation between the verbs of the sentence and produce a sentence that makes no sense in English. These changes in the meaning of the Greek and in the normal procedure for translation point to a bias that has interfered with the work of the translators." "No one listening to Jesus, and no one reading John in his own time would have picked up on a divine self-identification in the mere expression "I am," which, if you think about, is just about the most common pronoun-verb combination in any language." "The NW... understands the relation between the two verbs correctly... The average Bible reader might never guess that there was something wrong with the other translations, and might even assume that the error was to be found in the... NW."

Chapter Eleven : A discussion of John 1:1: "Surprisingly, only one, the NW, adheres to the literal meaning of the Greek, and translates "a god." "Translators of the KJV, NRSV, NIV, NAB, NASB, AB, TEV and LB all approached the text at John 1:1 already believing certain things about the Word... and made sure that the translations came out in accordance with their beliefs. ... Ironically, some of these same scholars are quick to charge the NW translation with "doctrinal bias" for translating the verse literally, free of KJV influence, following the sense of the Greek. It may very well be that the NW translators came to the task of translating John 1:1 with as much bias as the other translators did. It just so happens that their bias corresponds in this case to a more accurate translation of the Greek" "Some early Christians maintained their monotheism by believing that the one God simply took on a human form and came to earth -- in effect, God the Father was born and crucified as Jesus. They are entitled to their belief, but it cannot be derived legitimately from the Gospel according to John."
"John himself has not formulated a Trinity concept in his Gospel." "All that we can ask is that a translation be an accurate starting point for exposition and interpretation. Only the NW achieves that, as provocative as it sounds to the modern reader. The other translations cut off the exploration of the verse's meaning before it has even begun."

Chapter Twelve : A discussion of holy spirit: "In Chapter Twelve, no translation emerged with a perfectly consistent and accurate handling of the many uses and nuances of "spirit" and "holy spirit." The NW scored highest in using correct impersonal forms of the relative and demonstrative pronouns consistently with the neuter noun "holy spirit," and in adhering to the indefinite expression "holy spirit" in those few instances when it was used by the Biblical authors."

Summary : "... it can be said that the NW emerges as the most accurate of the translations compared...the translators managed to produce works relatively more accurate and less biased than the translations produced by multi-denominational teams, as well as those produced by single individuals." "Jehovah's Witnesses... really sought to re-invent Christianity from scratch... building their system of belief and practice from the raw material of the Bible without predetermining what was to be found there. Some critics, of course, would say that the results of this practice can be naive. But for Bible translation, at least, it has meant a fresh approach to the text, with far less presumption than that found in may of the Protestant translations."

"...Most of the differences are due to the greater accuracy of the NW as a literal, conservative translation of the original expressions of the New Testament."

Commenting on bias in translation : "To me, it expresses a lack of courage, a fear that the Bible does not back up their "truth" enough. To let the Bible have its say, regardless of how well or poorly that say conforms to expectations or accepted forms of modern Christianity is an exercise in courage or, to use another word for it, faith."