THAT BOOK YOU HAVE IN YOUR HAND:
Sunday January 08 2011
Charles e Whisnant, Student
Original ideal from for this series came from Jon Gleason who lives in Scotland, England
Given By Inspiration is the Word of
God. The Study of what the Scriptures are and how they came to us
The Holy Spirit by Whom believers should be
God-taught does not render the Scriptures less necessary. He is not given to us
in order to introduce new revelations, but to impress the written Word on our
hearts; so that here the Word must never be separated from the Spirit. The
former works objectively, the latter efficiently; the former strikes our ears from
without, the latter opens the heart within. The Spirit is the teacher;
Scripture is the doctrine which He teaches us.'
Francis Turretin, Institutes of Elenctic Theology, Vol I, p.59
"The minister
as the chief pastoral agent does not inject food intravenously as it were, but
he provides well-prepared food for the flock. He sets it before the flock and
persuades them to feed themselves as they partake of it. It is like filling the
stomach with food which then must be digested and transmuted into strength and
flesh and blood. Whatever is to do the soul good must pass throught the stomach
of the mind" (Volbeda, The Pastoral Genius of
Preaching, pp. 80-81).
SYSTEMATIC Theology Matters
Parataxis and Hypotaxis: What They Mean and Why It Matters
Languages
are distinguished by many features. One of these distinguishing features is the
way that the syntax is typically arranged in a sentence.
A paratactic language
arranges independent clauses side by side and connects them with coordinating
conjunctions (para--beside; taxon—order
A hypotactic language
arranges sentences by subordinating several dependent clauses under a single
independent clause, connecting them with a variety of devices such as adverbs,
prepositions, conjunctions of both the coordinating and subordinating variety,
participles, infinitives, etc. (hypo--under; taxon--order). Note the following
representative sentence
In order to render Hebrew into natural English,
·
The relentless stream of ands (waw),
must be interpreted and shaped into meaningfully complex sentences for maximum
understanding. Sometimes the and becomes then or so or
but or because. At other times the and becomes a
semicolon or a period. Still other times the and is simply omitted as an
unnecessary deterrent to understanding. The result is that the single Hebrew
sentence that is Genesis 1, for instance, becomes a series of normal,
readable paragraphs made from multicolored English sentences
In order to render Greek into
natural English,
·
The massive web of clauses, phrases,
transitional and connecting devices must be untangled and simplified in order
to qualify as excellent English. The result is that the single Greek sentence
that is Ephesians 1:3-14, for instance, becomes a normal,
readable paragraph of uniform English sentences
·
In doing
this, English translations subject themselves to two criticisms, both of which
are valid, but both of which are also overstated:
Part Two:
Interpreting Ancient Manuscript
Difficulties of Bible
Translation
January 15,
2012
The very thought how the process has developed in bringing us to have our 66 books of the Bible is one unbelievable story.
History of the Bible: How The Bible Came To Us
The New Testament
The New Testament
1.
Autographs
45- 95
A.D. The New Testament was written in Greek. The Pauline Epistles, the Gospel
of Mark, the Gospel of Luke, and the book of Acts are all dated from 45-63 A.D.
The Gospel of John and the Revelation may have been written as late as 95 A.D.
2.
Manuscripts
There are
over 5,600 early Greek Manuscripts of the New Testament that
are still in existence. The oldest manuscripts were written on papyrus
and the later manuscripts were written on leather called parchment.
Papyrus writing material used by the ancient Egyptians, Greek and Romans that
was made from the pith of the stem of a water plant
To begin with, the documents that we have
the Hebrew and Greek words on them we call manuscripts.
- 125 A.D. The New Testament manuscript which dates most closely to the original autograph was copied around 125 A.D, within 35 years of the original. It is designated "p 52" and contains a small portion of John 18. (The "p" stands for papyrus.)
- 200 A.D. Bodmer p 66 a papyrus manuscript which contains a large part of the Gospel of John.
- 200 A.D. Chester Beatty Biblical papyrus p 46 contains the Pauline Epistles and Hebrews.
- 225 A.D. Bodmer Papyrus p 75 contains the Gospels of Luke and John.
- 250-300 A.D. Chester Beatty Biblical papyrus p 45 contains portions of the four Gospels and Acts.
- 350 A.D. Codex Sinaiticus contains the entire New Testament and almost the entire Old Testament in Greek. It was discovered by a German scholar Tisendorf in 1856 at an Orthodox monastery at Mt. Sinai.
- 350 A.D. Codex Vaticanus: {B} is an almost complete New Testament. It was cataloged as being in the Vatican Library since 1475.
3.
Translations
Early translations of the New Testament can give important insight into the
underlying Greek manuscripts from which they were translated.
- 180 A.D. Early translations of the New Testament from Greek into Latin, Syriac, and Coptic versions began about 180 A.D.
- 195 A.D. The name of the first translation of the Old and New Testaments into Latin was termed Old Latin, both Testaments having been translated from the Greek. Parts of the Old Latin were found in quotes by the church father Tertullian, who lived around 160-220 A.D. in north Africa and wrote treatises on theology.
- 300 A.D. The Old Syriac was a translation of the New Testament from the Greek into Syriac.
- 300 A.D. The Coptic Versions: Coptic was spoken in four dialects in Egypt. The Bible was translated into each of these four dialects.
- 380 A.D. The Latin Vulgate was translated by St. Jerome. He translated into Latin the Old Testament from the Hebrew and the New Testament from Greek. The Latin Vulgate became the Bible of the Western Church until the Protestant Reformation in the 1500's. It continues to be the authoritative translation of the Roman Catholic Church to this day. The Protestant Reformation saw an increase in translations of the Bible into the common languages of the people.
