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Worst Bible Translation?

doppelganger

doppelganger

Through the Looking Glass
Which is the worst translation of the Bible into English? Give an example or two of why you think it's bad.

For my money, it's "The Message."

For example, Revelation 2:4-5 is translated in that version as:

But you walked away from your first love—why? What's going on with you, anyway? Do you have any idea how far you've fallen? A Lucifer fall! "Turn back! Recover your dear early love. No time to waste, for I'm well on my way to removing your light from the golden circle.
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ESV has:
But I have this against you, that you have abandoned the love you had at first. 5Remember therefore from where you have fallen; repent, and do the works you did at first. If not, I will come to you and remove your lampstand from its place
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NKJV:

Nevertheless I have this against you, that you have left your first love. 5 Remember therefore from where you have fallen; repent and do the first works, or else I will come to you quickly and remove your lampstand from its place
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And here's a rundown of the Greek text:

Revelation 2 (Blue Letter Bible: KJV - King James Version)

Where did they get a reference to "Lucifer" or find anything that has to do with a "golden circle" in any of that?
 
M

Meow Mix

Chatte Féministe
This is by far the funniest thing I've ever seen.

Conservapedia - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Wikipedia said:
Conservapedia hosts the "Conservative Bible Project", a project aiming to rewrite the English translation of the Bible in order to remove terms described as "liberal bias".[81] The project intends to remove sections of the Bible which are judged by Conservapedia's founder to be later liberal additions.
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Also I don't really know, but it sounds like the ridiculous sounding translation above might be a literal word for word translation, which might explain its strange syntax. I don't know, though. Maybe the translator just sucks.
 
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Mister Emu

Mister Emu

Emu Extraordinaire
Staff member
Premium Member
Where did they get a reference to "Lucifer" or find anything that has to do with a "golden circle" in any of that?
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If I recall correctly... "The Message" is an attempt to make the Bible's language very contemporary...

It is, as far as I know, the loosest "translation" out there, it does not attempt to objectively convey the words, but to tell what the editors understand to be the message of a passage. Thus whether or not a word or phrase is in the text is immaterial to them.
 
A

angellous_evangellous

Guest
It's really hard for me not to hate the NIV.
 
U

URAVIP2ME

Veteran Member
doppelgänger;2364828 said:
Which is the worst translation of the Bible into English? Give an example or two of why you think it's bad.
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Not saying this is the worst, but thought it might fit this category.

John 2 vs12-17

Later, he and his mother, his brothers and his students wend down to Savannah and stayed there a short while. Well, it was about time for the annual convention, so Jesus went to Atlanta. At the convention headquarters at First Church he found preachers politicking, and businessmen wheeling and dealing, and exhibits all over the place. So he got a long-handled fly swatter and a broom and began clearing out the crowd and wrecking the merchandise booths. "Get out of her with all this stuff!", he shouted. "Quit making a racket of my Father's business!" His students recalled the verse of Scripture: " I am eaten up with concern for my Father's fellowship".


-The cotton Patch Version by Clarence Jordan
 
jasonwill2

jasonwill2

Well-Known Member
Sometimes, I think lol' cats sums it up nicely with their translation, one of the verses Song of Solomon just goes something like "boobies and sex!" or somethign liek that, it's all in lol speak.

In one of the lesser prophet books the guy is gonna rescue his wife from prostitution and it says "the bible goes where?!?!", and I recall that actual verse being pretty darn sexual.

And quite honestly, when I compare it to KJV, it isn't actually translating it incorrectly either... just in lol cat memes.
 
LegionOnomaMoi

LegionOnomaMoi

Veteran Member
Premium Member
doppelgänger;2364828 said:
Which is the worst translation of the Bible into English?
Click to expand...
This depends on how one is judging translations. The KJV is a beautiful piece of work. However, I could write a much more "faithful" translation fairly easily. The problem is that trying to ensure the translation is "word for word" will either also ensure that the translation barely qualifies as English, or that it distorts the meaning. Translation always involves a trade-off between trying to get across the distribution of words (one-for-one, order, etc.), the sense of the original, and ensuring that the translation reads like English (or whatever the target language is).
 
Muffled

Muffled

Jesus in me
The Good News version is the worst I ever read. It was written at an 8th grade reading level which at times fails to convey the true meaning of passages.
 
Muffled

Muffled

Jesus in me
I will have to amend that a little because The New World Translation is an abomination. Somehow I can't view this as a translation even though it replaces one languages words for another.
 
sojourner

sojourner

Annoyingly Progressive Since 2006
doppelgänger;2364828 said:
Which is the worst translation of the Bible into English? Give an example or two of why you think it's bad.

For my money, it's "The Message."

For example, Revelation 2:4-5 is translated in that version as:



ESV has:


NKJV:



And here's a rundown of the Greek text:

Revelation 2 (Blue Letter Bible: KJV - King James Version)

Where did they get a reference to "Lucifer" or find anything that has to do with a "golden circle" in any of that?
Click to expand...
The Message isn't a translation. It's a paraphrase. I just about offered the JW version -- but it, also, is a paraphrase.

I'm not too hip on the NIV. Too fundigelical.
 
Quagmire

Quagmire

Imaginary talking monkey
Staff member
Premium Member
By far the worst (and most disturbing) "translation" I've ever seen was an illustrated children's "Bible" put out by a denomination I wont name here. Among a few other out-right agenda-driven interpolations it includes a version of the story of Moses and the wandering Hebrews conquering Canaan and killing all the inhabitants of a certain city because, "The [fill-in-the-blank] were just bad people".

Occurred to me, "What a wonderful thing to teach children: that there are whole races of people who are just bad, and God wants good people to kill them".
 
Falvlun

Falvlun

Earthbending Lemur
Premium Member
If I had just read that OP passage without any context, I definitely would have assumed someone who was not fluent in English wrote it.

I'm just waiting for my txt Bbl to come out.
 
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