KJV Only? How About The Original Hebrew And Greek?
Mar 26, 2014 1:31:23 GMT -5
hearingGod, Saltandlight007, and 2 more like this
Post by Deleted on Mar 26, 2014 1:31:23 GMT -5
In the modern church, there is a giant debate going on about which translation to use. Some argue that modern translations are better because they are "easier to read" and fix translation errors. Others argue that only the King James Version should be used because other versions are corrupted.
As the wonderful creationist, Kent Hovind once said, "God said that He would preserve His Word, not the translations." Kent Hovind himself is mainly a KJV Only believer. He doesn't seem to put his trust in other versions but keeps a collection of them for reference, mainly to show others the changes made within recent versions. However, doesn't that statement mean that ALL translations could be corrupted? Doesn't that mean that even the King James Version could have some errors?
The answer is "yes"! The debate on which version to use is silly because truthfully, all translations are simply translations. They seek to provide the best interpretation but translations are rarely perfect and it is difficult to properly convey the message once something is translated from its original language to another language.
This is a simple fact that most of the great Bible teachers know of. Take Derek Prince for example. Derek Prince studied Greek and often times would come up with his own translations based on his knowledge of the language. But the late, great, Derek Prince isn't the only one to make reference back to the original languages of the Bible. Many (if not all) of the Bible teachers that I've seen make great discoveries all referenced back to the Hebrew and Greek. Win Worley, Brother Mike Smith from the House Of Healing (HouseofHealingAZ on Youtube), and a few others that I'll be posting about on the forum from time-to-time, all checked the Hebrew and Greek. It's not uncommon for people to do such things.
"But I can't learn Greek or Hebrew. I don't have enough time. I'm busy. I have to work. I have to go to school. How can I expect to learn two languages in my lifetime?" - There's a simple answer to that. You don't. You don't need to spend years studying the two languages in an attempt to understand what the Bible says. You don't need to become a scholar either (although your studying will often take you to many different places and allow you to acquire much knowledge, making you like a scholar). In the modern world it has been made much easier to make reference to the languages WITHOUT knowing a single thing about them. In fact, if you're looking to learn the two languages perfectly, you're looking for the wrong thing. Hebrew has evolved over the years (so has the Greek language, but not as much), making Hebrew nearly impossible to learn completely and even Derek Prince has said many times that no one can know everything about Greek. The purpose isn't to know everything about the language but to use the language to better our understanding.
So what references do we have to aid us in knowing about the Greek and Hebrew?
Above I listed some of the most popular references for Greek and Hebrew but realistically, the list just keeps going on and on. You've got various Bible dictionaries (Smith's Bible Dictionary, Webster's Bible Dictionary etc.), articles discussing this and then the works of actual scholars that you could look at to increase your insight. The point of this thread isn't for me to tell you what resources you should use or not but rather to actually get you looking at them. It's actually good to look at as many resources as you can and cross-reference them all. Might I add, many of these resources are available on different websites for free (and I'll be making a post about one way soon).
In order to take our understanding to the next level, I believe that it is not only an opinion but a fact that we need to start observing the original Hebrew and Greek. You'll see how beneficial it is as I make more posts in the coming days, weeks and months that use the Hebrew and Greek.
God bless,
- Jake
As the wonderful creationist, Kent Hovind once said, "God said that He would preserve His Word, not the translations." Kent Hovind himself is mainly a KJV Only believer. He doesn't seem to put his trust in other versions but keeps a collection of them for reference, mainly to show others the changes made within recent versions. However, doesn't that statement mean that ALL translations could be corrupted? Doesn't that mean that even the King James Version could have some errors?
The answer is "yes"! The debate on which version to use is silly because truthfully, all translations are simply translations. They seek to provide the best interpretation but translations are rarely perfect and it is difficult to properly convey the message once something is translated from its original language to another language.
This is a simple fact that most of the great Bible teachers know of. Take Derek Prince for example. Derek Prince studied Greek and often times would come up with his own translations based on his knowledge of the language. But the late, great, Derek Prince isn't the only one to make reference back to the original languages of the Bible. Many (if not all) of the Bible teachers that I've seen make great discoveries all referenced back to the Hebrew and Greek. Win Worley, Brother Mike Smith from the House Of Healing (HouseofHealingAZ on Youtube), and a few others that I'll be posting about on the forum from time-to-time, all checked the Hebrew and Greek. It's not uncommon for people to do such things.
"But I can't learn Greek or Hebrew. I don't have enough time. I'm busy. I have to work. I have to go to school. How can I expect to learn two languages in my lifetime?" - There's a simple answer to that. You don't. You don't need to spend years studying the two languages in an attempt to understand what the Bible says. You don't need to become a scholar either (although your studying will often take you to many different places and allow you to acquire much knowledge, making you like a scholar). In the modern world it has been made much easier to make reference to the languages WITHOUT knowing a single thing about them. In fact, if you're looking to learn the two languages perfectly, you're looking for the wrong thing. Hebrew has evolved over the years (so has the Greek language, but not as much), making Hebrew nearly impossible to learn completely and even Derek Prince has said many times that no one can know everything about Greek. The purpose isn't to know everything about the language but to use the language to better our understanding.
So what references do we have to aid us in knowing about the Greek and Hebrew?
- Strong's Concordance (comes in Hebrew and Greek versions)
- Thayer's Greek-English Lexicon
- Liddell-Scott-Jones Greek-English Lexicon
- Brown-Driver-Briggs Hebrew-English Lexicon
- And many more...
Above I listed some of the most popular references for Greek and Hebrew but realistically, the list just keeps going on and on. You've got various Bible dictionaries (Smith's Bible Dictionary, Webster's Bible Dictionary etc.), articles discussing this and then the works of actual scholars that you could look at to increase your insight. The point of this thread isn't for me to tell you what resources you should use or not but rather to actually get you looking at them. It's actually good to look at as many resources as you can and cross-reference them all. Might I add, many of these resources are available on different websites for free (and I'll be making a post about one way soon).
In order to take our understanding to the next level, I believe that it is not only an opinion but a fact that we need to start observing the original Hebrew and Greek. You'll see how beneficial it is as I make more posts in the coming days, weeks and months that use the Hebrew and Greek.
God bless,
- Jake
