I Samuel chapter 16 King James errors (moral, reject, Moses, translation)

[FFH]

1 Samuel 16: 14-16, 23 (King James)

14 But the Spirit of the LORD departed from Saul, and an evil spirit from the LORD troubled him.

15 And Saul’s servants said unto him, Behold now, an evil spirit from God troubleth thee.

16 Let our lord now command thy servants, which are before thee, to seek out a man, who is a cunning player on an harp: and it shall come to pass, when the evil spirit from God is upon thee, that he shall play with his hand, and thou shalt be well.

23 And it came to pass, when the evil spirit from God was upon Saul, that David took an harp, and played with his hand: so Saul was refreshed, and was well, and the evil spirit departed from him.

I Samuel 16: 14-16,23 (Joseph Smith inspired version)

14 But the Spirit of the Lord departed from Saul, and an evil spirit which was not of the Lord troubled him.

15 And Saul's servants said unto him, Behold now, an evil spirit which is not of God troubleth thee.

16 Let our lord now command thy servants, which are before thee, to seek out a man, who is a cunning player on a harp; and it shall come to pass, when the evil spirit, which is not of God, is upon thee, that he shall play with his hand, and thou shalt be well.

23 And it came to pass, when the evil spirit, which was not of God, was upon Saul, that David took a harp, and played with his hand; so Saul was refreshed, and was well, and the evil spirit departed from him.

[gnostic]

Again, only Joseph Smith is the only source which contradicts all other versions. And I don't mean post-KJV variations. This version by Smith doesn't make it the right version, and it is hardly very convincing, considering that other older versions don't agree with the inspired version.

If God didn't sent the evil spirit to plague Saul, then it would be more logical to not mention God at all in association with the evil spirit. So Joseph's inspired "...an evil spirit which was not of the Lord troubled him" doesn't make much sense.

It also doesn't make sense that God wanted Saul remove, and if he didn't sent the spirit. Who else would have sent this spirit? It was in God's interest to make David ascend, by making Saul looks bad. Someone set this in motion, and from that perspective, it had to be God who send the spirit that made Saul jealous and paranoid. It was the whole point of the story of David and Saul.

Joseph's version change the entire context of the whole book; and the plot for 1 Samuel was the rise of David before he became king and how he became king.

[JayHawes]

Originally Posted by FFH

1 Samuel 16: 14-16, 23 (King James)

14 But the Spirit of the LORD departed from Saul, and an evil spirit from the LORD troubled him.

15 And Saul’s servants said unto him, Behold now, an evil spirit from God troubleth thee.

16 Let our lord now command thy servants, which are before thee, to seek out a man, who is a cunning player on an harp: and it shall come to pass, when the evil spirit from God is upon thee, that he shall play with his hand, and thou shalt be well.

23 And it came to pass, when the evil spirit from God was upon Saul, that David took an harp, and played with his hand: so Saul was refreshed, and was well, and the evil spirit departed from him.

I Samuel 16: 14-16,23 (Joseph Smith inspired version)

14 But the Spirit of the Lord departed from Saul, and an evil spirit which was not of the Lord troubled him.

15 And Saul's servants said unto him, Behold now, an evil spirit which is not of God troubleth thee.

16 Let our lord now command thy servants, which are before thee, to seek out a man, who is a cunning player on a harp; and it shall come to pass, when the evil spirit, which is not of God, is upon thee, that he shall play with his hand, and thou shalt be well.

23 And it came to pass, when the evil spirit, which was not of God, was upon Saul, that David took a harp, and played with his hand; so Saul was refreshed, and was well, and the evil spirit departed from him.

It does not need retranslation it was translated right the first time. Jospeh Smith just did not understand its meaning. Saul had a evil spirit himself, and was trying to seek to kill David, to convince Saul to see the truth, God allowed a bad spirit to posses him. But he planned however to have David to cast the spirit out.

The Hebrew itself does not allow for Jospeh Smith to retranslate it the way that he did. It didn't need it.

[gnostic]

Originally Posted by JayHawes

It does not need retranslation it was translated right the first time. Jospeh Smith just did not understand its meaning. Saul had a evil spirit himself, and was trying to seek to kill David, to convince Saul to see the truth, God allowed a bad spirit to posses him. But he planned however to have David to cast the spirit out.

The Hebrew itself does not allow for Jospeh Smith to retranslate it the way that he did. It didn't need it.

I understand what you are getting at JayHawes.

It is not even translation. Joseph Smith's inspired bible, from literary-point-of-view, is merely editing and adaptation of King James' Version.

Adaptation, in the world of literature, is an author making changes to an existing work, sometimes for editing purpose, but more often defined as an embellished version of the original. The changed copy become a different work of the original.

Joseph Smith didn't do any translation to the bible. KJV was translated from the Masoretic text, and Joseph Smith didn't touch the Masoretic, so it can't be called a translation.

All the variations of the original KJV, are different edition as the result of editing, especially the new editions that came out of the 20th century, was as the result of putting modern punctuations, and adapting for modern readers. Joseph Smith's version, however, is adaptation. This is involved in completely changing the meanings of some passages in some cases, and adding whole passages in other cases.

[Vassal]

Hebrew is very different from English, and words do not have the same meanings. One Hebrew word can have several different meanings that are not synonyms in English, so you can't just pick any one of the words without looking at the context. If it were just that easy, there would be no need for more than one translation of the Bible for each language.

http://www.htmlbible.com/sacrednameb...gs/B09C016.htm

The Hebrew word translated as 'evil' convey the idea of bad or hurtful:

7451;from 'ra`a`' (7489); bad or (as noun) evil (natural or moral):-- adversity, affliction, bad, calamity, + displease(-ure), distress, evil((- favouredness), man, thing), + exceedingly, X great, grief(-vous), harm, heavy, hurt(-ful), ill (favoured), + mark, mischief(-vous), misery, naught(-ty), noisome, + not please, sad(-ly), sore, sorrow, trouble, vex, wicked(-ly, -ness, one), worse(-st), wretchedness, wrong. (Incl. feminine raaah; as adjective or noun.).

The word translated as 'troubled' conveys fear and/or sorrow:

1204; a primitive root; to fear:--affright, be (make) afraid, terrify, trouble.

Linguistically speaking, evil is a correct translation because in English it can also means bad and harmful, but when most people hear the word evil they think sinful. This is obviously not the intent of the passage, so to translate the word as evil, even though it is technically a correct translation, shows a lack of understanding of modern English. Since KJV is an older translation, first published in 1611, it has an excuse. Maybe back then people didn't instantly associate evil with sin, I don't know, but nowadays people usually do, so it is a mistake for modern translations to translate it this way in these verses.

It is very simple to see the most correct meaning. It says that the spirit that God sent on Saul made him afraid and/or sad, so we need to pick a word that describes the spirit that was sent to be causing this. It would be more appropriate to say 'a grievous spirit from the Lord troubled him', 'a spirit of distress from the Lord troubled him', or something else similar because these words cause the reader to think of sorrow and emotional suffering that Saul was going through. Further support of this comes from verse 17 when Saul asks for a musician to be sent to play for him, and people often listen to music when they feel sad or emotionally distressed.

Anyway, the point is this. No where in the Hebrew text is there any words that could possibly support the adding in of the words "which was not of" to these passages. These verses and the context they are used in clearly show that it was God that caused this to happen to Saul. Joseph Smith was clearly not a prophet of any kind and was only trying to take advantage of the fact that most people know little or nothing about translating languages, especially ancient ones. He just went around changing stuff in the Bible that he didn't understand, because of the fact that KJV was over 200 years old and languages change over time, and since other people also did not understand he was able to convince some gullible people that he was more than just a story teller.

[gnostic]

Originally Posted by Vassal

Joseph Smith was clearly not a prophet of any kind and was only trying to take advantage of the fact that most people know little or nothing about translating languages, especially ancient ones.

He is a prophet...but only for those who believe in him to be a "prophet". Whether he is a real one, is debatable and questionable. And so are all prophets; they are questionable and debatable, eg. Moses, Elijah, John the Baptist, Muhammad and that Baha'i chap.

Anyway, the point is this. No where in the Hebrew text is there any words that could possibly support the adding in of the words "which was not of" to these passages.

He just went around changing stuff in the Bible that he didn't understand, because of the fact that KJV was over 200 years old and languages change over time, and since other people also did not understand he was able to convince some gullible people that he was more than just a story teller.

Yes, I agreed with this. The changing of sentence with "not", which would have change the whole theme of 1 Samuel.

Joseph Smith's changes and his excuse of these change are untenable. He can't support his changes with verifiable evidences. He didn't seek out other evidences, except what he had available, namely the KJV.

Originally Posted by Vassal

It is very simple to see the most correct meaning. It says that the spirit that God sent on Saul made him afraid and/or sad, so we need to pick a word that describes the spirit that was sent to be causing this. It would be more appropriate to say 'a grievous spirit from the Lord troubled him', 'a spirit of distress from the Lord troubled him', or something else similar because these words cause the reader to think of sorrow and emotional suffering that Saul was going through. Further support of this comes from verse 17 when Saul asks for a musician to be sent to play for him, and people often listen to music when they feel sad or emotionally distressed.

Whether the spirit is evil, distress, or grievous, it nevertheless drove Saul to become insanely jealous and insanely paranoid. That God sent this spirit that brought about insanity, doesn't seem to make God as god of good or virtue.

I don't like Saul, but was God's action anymore justifable than that of Saul's. Saul's sin was that he didn't carry out complete annihilation of the Amalekites, which was to destroy men, women, children, even of infants, and animals. Saul spared the king and some animals, and that was the cause of God's rejection of him, mere disobedience.

What "good" god would ask for extermination of children, including babies?

Do you remember why Saul went to war against the Amalekites?

It was because of the previous generation, in Moses' time had refused to allow the Israelites to pass through their land. God had initiated a war on generation of people who had absolutely nothing to do with the event that happened couple of centuries earlier. Punishing people for the sins of their father, doesn't show a just god.