My Home is in Heaven

    Is it shrewd? Is it sneaky? Is it artful? Is it wily? I have written a lot so far talking about my objections to the MAST process of Bible translation recently adopted by Wycliffe Associates. But I also have other concerns beyond the questionable and highly error-prone translation process they use, and it seems I am not alone in worrying. I have spoken with many people familiar with Bible translation, and many of them have shared alarming things with me. I am not alone in the unrest that I feel about Wycliffe Associates.   Here is a list of 8 strikes against them as pertains to the inner workings of the organization. 1.                 Keeping the Name: The worst example of their poor behavior is their keeping the name Wycliffe Associates . They had 48 fruitful years of assisting Wycliffe Bible Transla...

    I have written about translating the Bible into languages that don’t yet have a Bible translation, but now let’s talk about translating the Bible into English. There are approximately 70 English translations. The New International Version is my favored version and the one that I read the most. I was astounded to learn about the long process that Howard Long went through to get a version that he could use to share Scripture with non-Christians after finding that the King James Version didn’t connect. In 1965, a cross-denominational gathering of evangelical scholars met near Chicago and agreed to start work on the New International Version. Instead of just updating an existing translation like the KJV, they chose to start from scratch, using the very best manuscripts available in the original Greek, Hebrew, and Aramaic of the Bible. To ensure maximum accuracy and readability, the NIV went through perhaps the most rigorous translation process in history. First, each...