ALTER2EGO -to KB COOLMAN:

All Bibles have translation errors—some more than others—because translators were not divinely inspired when they were translating. However, as you observed, some translation errors aka translation blunders are deliberate.

For instance, the King James Version (KJV) contains words and expressions that are known fabrications. The KJV contains 40 fabricated verses of scriptures in addition to dozens of translation blunders. Scholars have identified these fabrications at various secular websites. Not surprisingly, Bible translations that used the manuscript used by the KJV translators contain the exact same translation blunders.


I have had people argue with me that the New World Translation published by Jehovah's Witnesses is inaccurate because it REMOVED the 40 fabricated verses and corrected the translation blunders that are in their Bibles. When I explained to them that the fabricated verses did not belong in the Bible from the get-go (and I always presented them with secular websites where this info is to be found), they would not listen. Even when I quoted other Bibles that had also removed the errors, they kept harping on the New World Translation and proceeded to bash Jehovah's Witnesses—part of their obsession.



FYI: Whenever I quote scriptures from the New World Translation (NWT), I quote verses that can be found in ANY VERSION of the Judeo-Christian Bible. So when I show people scriptures on this forum that they argue against, it means they are literally arguing against what's in their own Bibles. What it boils down to is they just don't want to be corrected from their various false doctrines. They don't care what the Bible really says. It's all about what the Deacon or the Pastor told them and to heck with the Bible.

English Translations of the New Testament
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Ultimately, it is up to the reader or translator to decide whether a translation renders the original text correctly, so if anyone has any doubts, simply learn some basic NT Greek and look at the manuscript evidence.

Almost any English translation will have mistakes. The AENT ( by Andrew Gabriel Roth ) seems to be one of the better translations today, taking into consideration the underlying Aramaic ( note that Roth is an Aramaic primacist ) and corrects many of the problems that exist in the NT Greek manuscripts. The vast majority of English translations will not take into account the underlying Aramaic or Hebrew understanding simply because most of the translators are not thinking from a Jewish perspective; OTOH, Yeshua was Jewish and Shaul was a Pharisee.

In the case of the NWT, the CARM site lists some of the major translation errors ( from: http://carm.org/religious-movements/...ld-translation ):

I got sidetracked with life and forget we were having this conversation. Sorry for the delayed response.

Regarding the bold, this is not my position at all. I grew up specifically assuming God had managed the information, and that it was inerrant. This is the default position of most denominations, not just the hard core fundamentalists, IME. It is because I placed such high importance on this Divine Inerrancy that any convincing evidence to the contrary became a crack that was the eventual demise of the dam.





From a scientific standpoint, Collins obviously understands the implications of HGP more than I. That does not imply that he is a fair appeal for matters of theology. While I have not yet read his book, I have read/watched every interview/lecture I could find. I find him to be a brilliant scientist and engaging interviewee. In matters of his faith, however, I've always been disappointed. I had hoped his reasoning would help me bridge the gap back to faith. That may be a topic for another thread.


I'm not sure I follow. A strict literal reading of the Bible means there was a global flood, that mankind repopulated from 8 people. Geology and HGP specifically reject this claim. How else is it to be interpreted in a manner than doesn't create more theological problems than it solves?

Thanks for your help in this regard. I want my position to be well communicated, and I appreciate your valid criticism.

No worries.

It's worth noting that there's inerrant, and infallible, and many slightly varying descriptions of those two words. This is one of those cases where people sometimes use the same word to mean very different things. (A very good case study of this is Mormonism vs mainstream Christianity. There's a lot of overlap in the types of words used in each subculture, but the specific meaning that is drawn out will vary dramatically.)

This is a true criticism, but I think it's off the mark. I think this perspective changes the emphasis of the words you use. If you say "HGP is in contradiction with theology" it sounds like you're making a scientific argument and if you say "theology is in contradiction with HGP" it sounds like you're making a theological argument.

Bridging between the two is difficult because they use very different types of concepts, and often speak to mutually exclusive ideas. For example, in my beliefs I don't see that "God's existence" is a scientifically testable hypothesis. But that's not really a problem for me because I think many claims are not scientifically testable. I don't think free will isn't testable, for example. Nor is the claim "X is evil" (where X can be very blatant actions). This limits what can be known "scientifically" and limits what types of scientific implications are possible.

Others disagree, on both practical and philosophical grounds, and I'm okay with that.

I have his book, but I haven't read it. I started a while back, but then got distracted by other things.

That might make for an interesting conversation as well.

Reading what I wrote, it looks like I dropped a few words because it doesn't seem to read right.

I was trying to say that you can get a contradiction with a strict literal interpretation of the Bible, but that doesn't mean that HGP is in contradiction with the Bible. It just means that it's in contradiction with that particular interpretation of it.

You're welcome. Although this forum is 95% noise, the remaining 5% of actual conversation that happens is usually insightful and enlightening for all sides.

Good point. In my case, I was brought up in the Church of Christ, which holds that the Bible is without error of any kind, and that the stories are literally true. Ascribe whatever words best fits that description. Infallible/inerrant were thrown around a lot.


I hear what you're saying. It's tricky to word it correctly while making the proper claim. It's more precise to say 'HGP is in conflict with the theology I was taught growing up'. I mean for this statement to be a scientific argument which refutes the theology of my upbringing.

I agree with this, and it all fairness those who claim the is no God based purely on scientific discovery/method are overstepping the bounds of science, as it strictly deals with the natural world.

FWIW, I'm not an atheist. I consider myself more of an Agnostic Deist, but many of my views do align with Atheists in regards to specific religions.


I'll put some thought in to a new thread, linking to relevant interviews, etc.


That's what I thought you were saying. But like I said before, how do we interpret these stories in a non-literal fashion which does not create more problems than it solves? This may just be my literalist upbringing trying to fit things into a neat little box, but I've not been able to get around it.


Couldn't agree more.

Jewish thought often revolves around multiplicity of meaning. A good example of how this works is found in Proverbs, where if you read it as a literal instruction for all times and all places, you end up with blatant contradictions. ("Answer a fool... don't answer a fool...") You can also see elements of it in Ecclesiastes ("There's a time for everything... a time for this and a time for that").

So the structure of your question ("creates more problems than it solves") is going to be difficult to respond to. The mindset of Jewish thought isn't really about absolute concrete answers in the first place.

Understood. The Books of Poetry have to be read in a non-literal manner.

What I find to be the major stumbling blocks are items which I was taught were essential to the Christian Faith.

Geology refutes the Biblical Flood with certainty. Geology can confirm 5 distinct major extinction events, and 16 lesser extinction events. None of them were the result of a global flood. An event of this magnitude simply did not happen.

I would assume that up until 100 years ago, almost every Bible believer held the creation story of Genesis to be literal truth. Same goes for Noah and the Flood. But they did not have the benefit of the same knowledge we possess today, namely those of Geology, Evolution, and HGP.

Evolution refutes the scientific validity of both the Flood and Creation stories, as does HGP.

These stories are recorded as historical events. Adam is foundational to the doctrine of Christ, being that through one man sin entered the world, and through one man the world is redeemed from sin. If there is no literal Adam, how does an allegorical interpretation suffice? Furthermore, what's the purpose of the Flood story?

You may think so, but you would be wrong. The following is from a sermon dated June 17, 1855 (as a side note, Origin of Species was published in 1859):

http://www.spurgeon.org/sermons/0030.htm

(If you don't know who Charles Spurgeon is, you should look him up. He's a very famous preacher.)

I know a few Church of Christ people (who are no longer Church of Christ, but still count themselves as Christians), and it seems that there's a general lack of exposure to ideas there. I suspect you're basically in the same boat. What you think Christianity is/has been is probably not very close to the truth.

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This depends on how you interpret "historical." They are not recorded like "historical events" in the modern sense. History was understood through a theological lens, not a naturalistic one.

I'm familiar with Spurgeon, but had never heard the quote. Very interesting.

Regarding Churches of Christ, they run the gamut from extremely legalistic to fairly progressive. There is no centralized oversight. The larger congregations tend to be more progressive (Highland CofC in Abilene, TX, or Northland Hills CofC in Richardson, TX, for example). The small congregations in the smaller towns tend to be very legalistic. I was raised in the latter, but did leave the denomination long before losing my faith. I've been to every type of congregation from Black Baptist to full Charismatic. Granted, these congregations held to the same basic principals of Biblical inerrancy/infallibility as the Church of Christ.

The Messenger of YHWH, Yeshua and the "Trinity":

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QV7UYzvJ4Fo

I couldn't put any odds on it. They're both important.

But at the Fall men were separated from God and spiritual death results from separation from God.

So God's primary concern is in regenerating spiritual life in each and every human being and studying religious subjects like God's nature helps do that.

All the people who have spiritual life in them will in turn work on mankind's situation.

God works through people.

ALTER2EGO -to- EVERYONE:

According to the trinity dogma, Almighty God Jehovah is split up into three persons who are combined into a single "Godhead". Not only does the word "Godhead" not belong in the Judeo-Christian Bible, but the scriptures do not support the false religious doctrine that says the God of the Judeo-Christian Bible is a triune god.

Below is a verse of scripture that demonstrates the idiocy of the trinity dogma.

"The LORD said unto my Lord, Sit at my right hand, until I make your enemies your footstool." (Psalms 110:1 -- King James Version)


"The utterance of Jehovah to my Lord is: 'Sit at my right hand until I place your enemies as a stool for your feet." (Psalms 110:1 -- New World Translation)


According to that scripture, Jehovah is literally talking to himself. During the conversation with himself, Jehovah puts himself on his own right hand and refers to the enemy of the son (Jesus) as "your" enemy (indicating the enemy is Jesus' enemy and not Jehovah's), rather than using the possessive "our enemy"



That verse of scripture alone makes it clear that Jehovah and Jesus Christ could not possibly be part of a 3-prong god.



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

"Jehovah" is a mistranslation of the Tetragrammaton based on a misunderstanding of using the vowel points for Adonai. "Jehovah" is considered by some to be a "false god". For example, see the link: http://www.yhwh.com/asimple.htm

Yahweh or YHWH Elohim is the true "G-d" of Israel. Simply ask any Jewish follower of Yeshua HaMashiach ( "Jesus, the Messiah" ). All the apostles of the Lamb were Jewish. Yeshua is the eternal Miltha/Memra/"Logos" and had the Father's glory before the world was ( Yochanan/John 17:5 ).

Many Messianic believers that do not accept the Trinity do think of the metaphor of "One Tree, Three Branches" with respect to Yahweh, the Ruach HaKodesh and Yeshua. Three parables of Luke 15 speak of the Good Shepherd, the Ruach HaKodesh ( a key word is "sweeping" evoking a well-known passage of the Tanakh; there is also a "remez" to the ten lost tribes of Israel ) and the Father.

A balanced perspective is given in the link of my previous post concerning the Messenger of YHWH, Yeshua and the "Trinity".

The fact that believers in the Christian faith can have divisive views on a concept as simple as the 'Godhead', etc, does not inspire confidence of any real truth.

Would you like to apply the same logic and conclude something about "science"?