Gooding, David: How we got our Bible

Shall we read from the second epistle of Paul to Timothy, chapter three? Second Timothy, chapter three, beginning in verse fourteen. But continue thou in the things which thou hast learned and hast been assured of, knowing of whom thou hast learned them, and that from a child thou hast known the Holy Scriptures, which are able to make thee wise unto salvation through faith which is in Jesus Christ. All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may be perfect, truly furnished unto all good works. I have been asked to talk to you this evening on the topic, how we got our Bible. I want to say two things by way of introduction. The first is that I have with me here on this table a few books and photographs. If you care afterwards to come and look at them, you are very welcome so to do. They are books in which there are photographs of manuscripts of Old and New Testament. Most of you will know what such manuscripts look like, but the younger folks among us may care to come up and look at them. Other folks who want a more serious attempt, uh, uh, to know what scholars do with the manuscripts of the New Testament, might also care to come and look at the book that I hold in my hand, Encountering New Testament Manuscripts by Jack Finnegan. I stress that is a book, uh, in which you would need to know some Greek. But some of you here present tonight will know some Greek, and even if you only know some, that is a book that would explain to you some of the mysteries that textual critics have to deal with. My second introductory remark is to say as follows. I wish to say quite clearly, categorically, before I say anything else, so that you should all understand what I say. I believe in the inspiration of Holy Scripture huh one hundred percent. But in case I didn't say it clear enough, let me now say again, I believe in the inspiration of Scripture One hundred percent. Now, if you're not clear upon what I just said, please ask somebody else or come up afterwards and ask me. Because I shall be saying certain things in the course of this talk that may appear to you to be a little bit strange. I do remember on one occasion when I said such things in public, some people went away and they didn't understand what I said. And they set it about this province that David Gooding only believed that two and a half percent of the scripture was inspired. That'll show you what can happen by people failing to understand what he said. That was, of course, quite wrong, and I must add, seriously wrong. I'm sorry those they so misunderstood me. That was probably my fault for not making it clear. So now this time I'll have a go at making it clear. Can I just repeat, I believe in the inspiration of scripture uh one hundred percent. And with that, we proceed to the topic, how do we get our Bible? And also to some of the problems that are associated with that topic. There are three things that we ought to know about Holy Scripture and how it has come to us. The first of them is that the Bible was written in three different languages. The most part of the Old Testament was written in Hebrew, ancient. Though a small part of the Old Testament was written not in Hebrew, but in the related language Aramaic. The New Testament was written in Greek. Ancient Greek now, but what we would technically call Hellenistic. Bible then originally ri- written in Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek. Second thing we should remember about the Bible as originally written. It was originally written by hand. And the very earliest copies we have of scripture are copies that are written, every word of them, by hand. That is why we call those early copies manuscripts, the Latin word for a something that is written by hand. And the third thing we should remember about the original scriptures is that they were written by hand, not in books, but on scrolls. Now, because of those three major things, there are certain problems in the presenting of the Bible to those folks who speak English, and I'm going to deal with some of those problems now. Let's take, first of all, the fact that the original scriptures were written by hand. That men- that means that every copy had to be individually written, individually copied. Now, I don't know whether you've ever attempted yourself to copy out large and long passages of Holy Scripture. I'm sure if you had occasion to do so, you would do it with the utmost care of which you were possible. But even if you pr- if you use the very best care you possibly could muster in order to make your handwritten copy of scripture, I will guarantee to you that you would never be able to do it absolutely perfectly. You would make mistakes. You'll get a comma wrong here, leave a word out there, add a line twice, or something of the sort, because copying long stretches of material by hand accurately is a very difficult thing. Now then, the original scriptures, both old and new, were written down then by hand and copied by hand. It says much for the zeal of the early Christians that we still have multitudes of copies written by hand of the New Testament. Thousands of copies, in fact, written by hand. I wonder how many of us would possess a Bible if, in order to possess it, we had to write out every word by hand. We get things easily nowadays, don't we? From Riches or Pickering and Englishes or the Cambridge and Oxford University presses. You just imagine having to write out the whole of it by hand. I must now say that the actual copies, the actual manuscripts, the actual manuscripts that the original authors wrote, actual bit of vellum or papyrus upon which, for instance, Paul wrote his epistles, and his secretary wrote them for him. Those original manuscripts have, as far as we know, perished. We don't possess the actual first writing. What we possess are copies of them, handwritten copies. That doesn't make any of us who know the technical facts weep any tears. We would like to have those first manuscripts. We haven't got them, but that is no great disaster. We do have, and here I must divide my talk, we do have for the New Testament, and we'll talk about the old in a minute, we do have for the New Testament, however, hundreds and thousands of handwritten copies of various ages. Some of them go back to the second century AD. The copies that we have as early as that, the early years of the hundreds AD, are of course very small bits and pieces. Then as we come on, we get bigger bits and pieces, then quite large manuscripts, then copies of whole letters, then collections of letters, and finally copies of the whole of the New Testament. As we come down the centuries, the number increases. We have, as I say, literally hundreds and thousands of manuscript copies of the New Testament. Now, when we look at those manuscripts and compare one with another, we find, of course, that there are many differences between them. There are, in fact, literally thousands of differences between the individual manuscripts of the New Testament. Let me tell you that. You'd better hear it from me, for if you remember what I said earlier, I believe in the inspiration of the New Testament one hundred percent. So let me tell you that in the manuscripts of the New Testament, when you compare them, there are hundreds, if not thousands, of differences. What does that mean? Does that mean that we cannot trust our New Testament? Why, certainly not. Does that mean that we cannot be sure what the original writers wrote? Certainly not. It means, of course, that in the course of copying out, people have made mistakes. Some copiers made more mistakes than others, of course. Some copies of the New Testament were copied out by fairly humble people, and they did it in a hurry. You just imagine if you hadn't got a copy of Philippians and you went up to, um, Bucknar or somewhere, and your granny had got a copy of Philippians, and all you got to do was all the time you had to live was Sunday afternoon. Well, you'll copy out one as hard and fast as you could, wouldn't you? It might be full of mistakes in consequence. Whereas some learned brother, full-time servant of the Lord, with all the day at his disposal to make a copy of Philippians, would make a masterful job of it. Thank God that in the early church there were men who gave themselves to such very careful copying of the manuscripts. There came to be Christian scholars in Alexandria, as we now think, who likewise brought to bear professional skill on copying out the manuscripts. But for all that there are these hundreds and thousands of differences between the manuscripts, when we get to work upon them, we can work back to what was originally written and ascertain what was originally written with almost a hundred percent certainty, not quite a hundred percent certainty. I quote here the judgment of the greatest textual critics that Britain ever produced. Bishop Westcott and Dr. Hort of the last century, beginning of this, the biggest textual critics that Britain has ever produced. And after a lifetime toiling with the New Testament manuscripts, they gave it as their considered scholarly and professional opinion, that the, the margin of uncertainty, when you come to work back to what was originally written, the margin of uncertainty is less than two percent. And that less than two percent is largely made up of small matters that have very little significance. To that I can add the certain statement that no major fundamental doctrine of the New Testament stands in any doubt. For in God's good wisdom, no major doctrine of Christianity depends on a single word here or an odd comma there. The doctrines of the New Testament are taught us in many places in very clear words, and the fact that there is a two percent um uncertainty spread over the whole of the New Testament manuscripts does not affect any major doctrine of the Christian faith. I haven't the time to say more than that. I believe I am under sentence to end at nine o'clock. If you want to know more, please ask. If you've not understood what I've said so far, please ask in the question time. But what does this, uh, fact that, uh, the Bible was written on manuscripts, there are differences between the manuscripts, and we have to try by scholarly methods to work back to what was originally written. What effect does that have on our English Bibles? Well, it does mean this, that when you pick up, say, an authorized version and read it, and then you pick up, say, a revised version and read it, or some other modern version, you will find sometimes that they disagree. And the reason they disagree is this, that one translation in any particular place has followed one manuscript, and another translation has followed a different manuscript. Let me give you an example of what I mean. You may care to read with me in the authorized version, if you've got one. The authorized version, Revelation chapter twenty two and verse fourteen. The Revelation chapter twenty two and verse fourteen. Now, in the Authorized Version, it runs like this. Blessed are they that do his commandments, that they may have right to the tree of life and may enter in through the gates into the city. That's what the authorized version reads. Let me read you now the revised version of the Revelation chapter twenty two and verse fourteen, that same verse. Blessed are they that wash their robes, that they may have right, the right to come to the tree of life, and may enter in by the gates into the city. So the authorized version says that the right to enter into the holy city depends on doing his commandments. The revised version has it that the right to enter the city depends on washing your robes, that is, in the blood of the lamb. Now, why the difference? The answer to that is not that the revisers have given us a different translation of the same thing. The answer to the difference is this, that the translators of the Authorized Version were following one set of manuscripts, and they read the equivalent in Greek, blessed are they that do his commandments, that they may have right to the tree of life. The translators of the revised version were following a different set of manuscripts, and those manuscripts have the equivalent in Greek of blessed are they who wash their robes. So the translators have to decide before they begin translating, they have to decide, now which manuscripts shall we follow here? You can't follow both at once, can you? And if you have one set of manuscripts that say one thing, blessed are they that do his commandments, and another set of manuscripts read, blessed are they that wash their robes, you can know very certainly that the original didn't have both. One lot of manuscripts has the original reading, the other lot of manuscripts has had the original reading changed by someone. So that you've got to decide which reading, which manuscripts carry the original reading. I give you my opinion as a textual critic, one whose job it is to, to consider these things. I have no doubt in my own mind that the manuscripts which carry the original reading that John wrote under inspiration of the Holy Spirit, the, the manuscripts are those that the revised version on this occasion has followed. What John originally wrote was, blessed are they that wash their robes, that they may have right to come to the tree of life. We know that for all sorts of reasons, technical reasons that I cannot now trouble you with, but we know it for theological reasons as well. As all the good gospel preachers have taught us from the year dot, and I'm certain they have taught you here in Ballymena. All the good gospel preachers have taught you that the way to eternal life depends. Well, now, what have they taught you? That the way to eternal life depends on doing the commandments? I hope they haven't. They have taught you one thousand and more times that the way to eternal life is through the blood of Christ. What can wash away my stain? Nothing but the blood of Jesus. So there is one instance where the difference between English translations of the Bible depends on differences in the manuscripts. Now, the Authorized Version is an exceedingly good translation. I say that with all sincerity. It's even better than a lot of modern people think it is. They had a very good grasp of English, did the men who translated the Authorized Version. But when they translated it, the number of New Testament manuscripts at their disposal was very much inferior to the manuscripts that we now have. And therefore they are not to be blamed for following here what we now know to be inferior manuscripts. It wasn't their fault they didn't have better ones. Since their day, hundreds of manuscripts of the New Testament have come to light, and indeed in this century, very, very, very early manuscripts have come to light that have helped us immensely in the task of working back to what was originally written. Some of the most important manuscripts were not known in the days of our grandfathers and great-grandfathers. Some of the most important manuscripts of the New Testament are in fact the Chester Beatty papyri, and it rejoices every Irishman's heart, and some Englishmen as well, to know that those famous manuscripts are deposited in Ireland. Admittedly, they are in Dublin and not Ballymena, but then they are at least in Ireland. And I'm sure everybody who believes in the inspiration of scripture, at least every Irishman, has been down to Dublin, not to look at Schweitzer's or Grafton Street shops, but has gone to the Chester Beatty library where those precious manuscripts are stored, and gone along and actually looked at them, and thanked God for them, or at least if they hadn't gone, they're intending to do it by their next trip to Dublin. It is strange sometimes how folks who profess to believe in the inspiration of scripture are not really interested when it comes to seeing the very early copies of our New Testament. Now I turn to that other point. The manuscripts, the first actual manuscripts written by the original authors, were written in Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek. So in order to get the Bible to us, people have had to translate the Bible from those original languages into English. Now, many of you will know from your school days and beyond the difficulties of translating from one language to another. When we talk of the inspiration of scripture, we are normally talking of the inspiration of the original scriptures as originally given in their Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek. Now, why do I say that? For this good reason. The originals were inspired, of course. But not every translation is as good as every other translation. Some translations of the Bible are excellent, and some are not so good, and some are dreadful. So when we thi- speak of the inspiration of scripture in the first place, we are speaking of the original scriptures written in their Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek. Now we shouldn't exaggerate the problem of translating from ancient languages into English. Take, uh, the worst translation you could lay your hands on. And it's got it straight enough to get the gospel across and lead folks to the Savior. My own special field of study, as some of you may know, is what is called the Septuagint. That is a translation of the Old Testament Hebrew into Greek that began to be made about the years two hundred and fifty BC. Translation into Greek of the Old Testament was complete by about one hundred or hundred and twenty BC. For convenience sake, we call these Greek translations the Septuagint. Now, in some parts they're moderately good, and in some parts they aren't so bad, but in some parts they're awful. Now, when the apostles went out on their missionary journeys, they themselves, of course, at least Paul and company, could read Hebrew. They could read their Old Testament in the original tongue. But when they came to cities where the people spoke Greek and couldn't read Hebrew, then what did they do? Well, of course, they had to use a Greek translation. They could have made one up themselves if they had the time, and now and again in their New Testament writings they do that. But for the most part, because the people already had this Greek translation, the apostles used it. They didn't say, well, this translation is not one hundred percent accurate. No, they used the parts that were accurate or accurate enough, for it was the translation that the people knew. And God used it in those early days to the foundation of multitudes of churches. We should take encouragement from that. It is good to have the very best translation you can get your hands on, but don't go exaggerating the problem. Even a poor translation will have the things straight enough in most of its chapters that could lead a man to Christ, that could guide the believer in holy living. But of course, I know you will want as exact a translation as you can get your hands on. Of course you will. You will understand that there are a few difficulties in translating from one language to another, and particularly from ancient languages into modern languages. Let me, uh, point out to you some of those difficulties. You have translators sometimes that simply make mistakes. No translation is one hundred perfect, and sometimes translators, being merely humans, do make mistakes, simple mistakes. Want to know the kind of thing I mean? I'm not talking now about any major error, small matters that are mistaken in the translation. In Luke chapter twenty three, for instance, there is a very small trans- uh, translator's mistake. Luke twenty three. Luke twenty three verse fifteen. No, nor yet Herod. This is Pilate speaking. For I sent you to him, and lo, nothing worthy of death is done unto him. So the authorized has it that, uh, Pilate is saying that when the Lord Jesus was sent to Herod, nothing worthy of death was done to Christ. That is not what the Greek says. I think the translators perhaps nodded that afternoon. They were worthy men, weren't they? And they did a tremendous task. What they should have put, and what you'll find most other modern translations put, is not nothing worthy of death is done to him. I'm afraid Herod's soldiers did a lot of things to Christ that were worthy of death. They did indeed. Now, what Pilate was saying is nothing worthy of death has been done by him. That is, Herod had found it so, as Pilate had already found it so, that nothing worthy of death had been done by Christ. That is what the Greek says. That is what most other translations say. So that little detail in the authorized there is simply a little mistake. That doesn't offend anybody. That doesn't mean that the Bible is mistaken, for I repeat, when we talk about the infallible word of God, we are talking about the scriptures as originally given. Translations, though on the whole good, can sometimes be mistaken. Therefore, we are wise people to compare one translation with another. Now, sometimes you will find translations differ, and it doesn't matter that they differ. If one translation says our Lord crossed the lake in a ship, and another one says he crossed it in a boat, doesn't matter, does it? Ship is a boat, or a boat is a ship, unless you're going to be very technical and ter- talk in terms of a naval architect when a ship isn't a boat. But for ordinary purposes, a boat is a ship, and a ship is a boat, and it doesn't make any difference which word is used. But now there is a problem, and it is the cause of differences between the authorized version and some of our modern versions. And the problem is what we call technically the problem of translating idiomatic phrases. Let me give you just one concrete example. The Hebrew for how are you is mashalomaka. What is your peace? So in the Old Testament, if you saw one Hebrew man going down the road and he met another one, and the first Hebrew man said to the other chap, what is your peace? He didn't mean, have you just been quarreling with the wife? He meant, how are you? Hmm. To ask in Hebrew, therefore, the Hebrews have a phrase, and to ask in their tongue concerning someone's peace. For instance, if I say, uh, I inquire tonight concerning the peace of Mr. Buik. That in Hebrew simply means I asked how Mr. Buik was, how he was getting on. Well, now, in the book of Samuel, when Uriah comes back to David, sent by Joab, David inquires of Uriah how the war is getting on. Literally in Hebrew, he says, it says he asked Uriah concerning the peace of the war, which is a funny way of talking, isn't it? He asked him concerning the peace of the war. Well, now, if the authorized translators had translated that, uh, literally, that would have caused us a certain amount of confusion, wouldn't it? So the authorized translators, they were very good men, weren't they? They didn't translate it literally, they put it into the modern English of their day, and they said something like they asked, uh, how the war was getting on. I forget their exact phrase. So not every translation in the authorized version is a literal translation. Instead, the translators have given us the meaning of the original, though in English they've had to use different phrases. But sometimes the authorized version have chosen to translate literally. And modern translations have said, no, that's no good doing that any longer, because modern English speakers won't understand it. For instance, you read in the Gospels words by our Lord Jesus. How can the sons of the bride chamber fast while the bridegroom is yet with them? How can the sons of the bride chamber fast? What does it mean? Well, it's a literal translation of the Greek. It is the ordinary straightforward Hebrew term that the Greeks have taken over, sons of the bride chamber, for wedding guests. Now, if you went to a wedding, and I understand Irishmen and particularly Irish women make a habit of doing it, if you went to a wedding and when you came back after having asked what the bride wore, and I s- I said to you, and how many sons of the bride chamber were there? You would think he died, wouldn't you? I don't know that you would know what I meant. You would find it difficult? Of course you would. I wouldn't have, uh, I wouldn't be so foolish as to put it that way. I should ask you how many guests were there? Well, now then, what should we do when we come to the Gospels and find this phrase in Greek, can the sons of the bride chamber mourn while the bridegroom is yet with them? Well, the authorized translated it literally. It makes it difficult for the modern speaker, doesn't it? Therefore, you'll find modern translations will change that. Means the same thing, they'll chan- change it and use a word like wedding guests. So there are problems of that sort, then, in translating the Bible into English. But once more, I say, we should not exaggerate the problem. Whether in some old translation like the authorized version, or in some modern translation, we have, with a tremendous degree of accuracy, what the original languages say. Finally, I reminded you that the books of the Bible were originally written in Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek. They were originally written by hand. Finally, I remind you that they were originally written not in books, but in scrolls. Now, I haven't any scrolls here, but a scroll would be of this formation. A photograph of one. It would have a thing like a rolling pin at that end, and, uh, as you read it, you would undo it, and as you read it, then you would let the thing roll up again. They were little on ro- long scroll. But a scroll, however big, cannot take more, uh, than, say, one largish book. It's got to be a big scroll, for instance, to take the whole of the Gospel of Luke. So if you can imagine the Jews in early times who had copies of their Old Testament, and the early Christians in the first century AD, they wouldn't have had them neatly parceled up in a book form like this, where you can get the whole Bible in one book. They would have had individual books on scroll. Came the days, however, when the technologists invented materials that made possible a large book. That, of course, raised the question, didn't it? How many of these scrolls should be put into the one book? In other words, the problem of what we call the canon. Which book should be in the Bible and which shouldn't be? Now that's a big question. I have to answer it very briefly because of the time. Let me say this, first of all, about the Old Testament. The authorized translators, and many others since, have given you the books that were in the Jewish canon. They are the only books that the Jews ever regarded as inspired. The books that are nowadays called apocryphal, the Apocrypha, the Old Testament Apocrypha, or deuterocanonical or pseudepigraphal. Those books that you will find in certain Bibles, those books were never regarded as inspired by the Jews, nor by our Lord, nor by his apostles. I myself personally believe that those apocryphal books should not be regarded as inspired books. I follow personally the testimony of our Lord Jesus and his apostles, as they in turn accept the Jewish canon that gives you the books of the Old Testament, such as you have in your Old Testament, and not the Apocrypha. About the New Testament, Christians down the centuries have been almost totally agreed, and there is no current problem. There hasn't been one for many, many centuries. I have covered, therefore, the three things that we need basically to know as to how our Bibles came to us. I trust I have said it simply and clearly, but I'm grateful for the fact that after the cup of tea, there will be a time for questions. If I have raised any uncertainties in your mind about the inspiration of scripture, let me now say once more that having told you all I have told you, I believe in the inspiration of scripture one hundred percent. I say that as my personal testimony. I say it also as one whose professional task it is to engage in this matter of the study of the manuscripts, particularly of the Old Testament. It is my daily concern, so to speak, all these variants in the manuscripts and the problems of translating them. Far from shaking my faith, I stand before you and before God this evening, and as someone who works on the, the manuscripts of Bible, I tell you that the differences in them doesn't cause me any doubt as to the inspiration of scripture. I believe in the inspiration of scripture one hundred percent. Little word of advice in your ears. One frequently comes across people and they say, but look, how can you possibly believe the Bible is the word of God? It has been copied out so many times that it is no longer reliable. Well, if you hear somebody talk like that, treat him with courtesy, as you would always as a Christian. Try to refrain from telling him that he's talking as an ignoramus. For, without knowing it, he is. He's talking piffle and nonsense, sheer nonsense. And he isn't being scientific, though honestly he may imagine he is. He is being desperately unscientific. People who know about the manuscripts don't talk like that. I speak to you, therefore, as a textual critic, and I repeat, I believe in the inspiration of scripture one hundred percent. I also believe that given any English translation, almost, some are better than others, but given any English translation, almost, you have in your hands, for all practical purposes, substantially what God intended you to have. You may trust your Bibles, though study them carefully and with the ma- greatest accuracy and scientific care that you can bring along with your spiritual design. But because it's Old English, a modern English speaker is liable to misunderstand it. For instance, Romans cha- chapter six: knowing this, that our old man is crucified with Christ, says the authorized version. Now that translation is perfectly accurate. If you remember that it is the English of centuries ago. For the phrase is crucified with Christ, in the days when the authorized translation was made, meant has been crucified with Christ. There's nothing wrong with the authorized, but if you forgot for a moment that's Old English and read it as if it were new, uh, modern English, you might think the verse meant our old man is crucified, is crucified every day of the week, is being crucified, and that wouldn't be right. So if you are a very young believer, you know, under twenty five, uh you might be well advised, in addition to your authorized version, to get a modern translation. And among the modern translations of the New Testament, I would myself strongly advise the New International Translation. That is a translation in comparatively modern, though very careful English. It is done by men, the whole of whom are believers, and believers in the inspiration of scripture. As yet, the whole of the Old Testament doesn't exist in that translation. But for up-to-date but reverent English, you will find the new internet. As yet, the whole of the Old Testament doesn't exist in that translation. But for up-to-date but reverent English, you will find the new international translation as accurate and more accurate than most. If you are in between, neither young nor old, like me, you might well prefer the revised translation that is based on better manuscripts and is somewhat more modern English than the authorized. Alas, its English is very much out of date that, but then to some extent I am too. Does that satisfy your, your Thank you. Now that's not a bad thing, uh, in one way. Does show a tremendous interest in this modern world in Holy Scripture to start. But one of the disadvantages of having so many translations is this, that for many people, if they read one and it says this, and they read another and it says that, they feel a little bit lost if they cannot go back themselves and personally consult the original languages behind them. And since most people are in that position, my advice would be, uh, to limit the number of translations that you normally use. Uh, my advice would be to take one translation that you have grounds for thinking is reliable. As I say, no one translation is a hundred percent correct everywhere, but take a translation that has been proved, or you have reasons for believing is substantially reliable. Such a translation is, of course, the authorized version or the revised version. Among the moderns, the one I mentioned, the New International. They are also not only good translations, but they are fairly literal translations. Now, as I have earlier said, there is a problem when you come to translate. Let me just give you another example. First Peter chapter one says, wherefore gird up the loins of your mind. Gird up the loins of your mind. What does it mean? That is a literal translation of what the Greek says. It is, as we all know, a metaphor. The background of the metaphor is this, that in those days, men in the Middle East didn't wear suits, jackets, and trousers like we did. They wore those long nightshirt things that some of them still wear, which tended to get in the way of their feet, uh, when they wanted to run, and in their way generally when they wanted to do some work. So if one of these fellows was going to do some hard work or run hard, he had to tuck up this nightshirt thing, do you see, and put it in his belt, in his girder, so it didn't get in the way of his feet and his arms. So if you saw a chappy girding up his loins in those days, you would, uh, say to yourself, well, he's going to do some work, I suppose. And therefore it became a saying among those people to gird up the loins means to get ready to do some hard work. Gird up the loins of your mind. It means, in ordinary straightforward English, get ready to do some hard thinking. Now, what shall we do when we come to translate that? Shall we leave it, leave it gird up the loins of your mind? Your modern heathen who's never read the Bible before and doesn't know anything about the Middle East will find it a bit difficult. When he, for instance, wants to do a spot of work, if his wife, um, wants him to do some work, she says, take your jacket off, roll up your sleeves. That's what we do, should do. So what do you do with this translation? Do you translate it literally? Gird up the loins of your mind. Or do you say, no, in a modern world, we must use the English equivalent? Prepare yourself to do some hard thinking. Well, people will differ. It's not a bad idea, therefore, to have one translation that is fairly literal. In this passage, say the authorized or the revised or someone like them that will tell you what it literally says, gird up the loins of your mind. And if you know your Old Testament, you say, cool, look at that. That's a flashback to Exodus chapter twelve, when they ate the Passover and they had to eat it, their loins girded and their staff in their hand, ready to go forth tomorrow. And you say, that's, I see what Peter is talking about. You've been redeemed with the blood of a lamb. Now you are to gird up your loins and begin your spiritual journey. So a literal translation, very good. But you would be advised perhaps to have by your side a more modern translation that would help you to see what the modern English equivalent of that is. So far, so good. But now comes a snag. Some of the modern translations haven't been content with that kind of thing, but they have indulged in what we call paraphrase to a great extent. Paraphrase meaning means putting the original meaning in other words, all right, but sometimes it goes far too far, and instead of conveying the original meaning, it distorts the original meaning. So things like the Living Bible, they may be good to read, but you've got to watch it. It is, it confesses to be, not a literal translation, but a very, very wide paraphrase. So if you use those wide paraphrase, para- paraphrases, then my advice would be this: use them, enjoy them, but don't found your doctrines on them. When it comes to close study of the Bible and formulating the doctrines of your faith, then for that purpose, rely on a fairly sober and a fairly literal translation. Older folks authorized and revised, modern folks something like the New International, which doesn't indulge in wide paraphrase, but is a fairly literal translation. Now, always check paraphrases. Good News for Modern Man, for instance, Living Bible. I'm not saying don't read them. They have their place, they do their job. Read them, enjoy them, but don't, um, fund your doctrines on them. And then there's another practical point to be considered. You are wise, it seems to me, to generally to take one translation as your main reliable translation, so that your mind gets stored and your memory helped. One of these days you might find yourself sitting in a communist jail up the Belfast Road somewhere, who knows? Without a Bible near you. And you'll need to comfort yourself by recalling passages of scripture. Now, if you have constantly used many different translations, you may not be able to remember exactly what scripture says. So my advice would be, use one main translation, one that you like, one that you have reasons for believing is reliable. Use that as your main thing of study. Use the other things occasionally and where it is appropriate. The words in italics in the authorized version do not exist in the original manuscripts, in the original languages. They are words which the translators have had to put in, in order to convey the sense in English, but have nothing to represent them in the Greek or in the Hebrew. So the translators, being honest men, call your attention to this. Look, it means this, we think. We think the, the best way of putting it in English is to add this word in, in English. Uh, but we want to tell you that that word, the, there is no equivalent, exact equivalent for it in, in the Greek or Hebrew, so we put it in italics. Well, now you ask me how reliable are they? You should always take them seriously. They are the work of exceedingly scholarly men, but you are not obliged necessarily to accept them as being one hundred percent accurate. So check them with other translations, you'll see, uh, and see what the other translators say. All right, does that answer your- Oh, exceedingly so, sir. Um, uh, all sorts of, uh, problems. It's a fascinating thing if you are interested in the, um, science of translating and some of the tremendous work that has been put into it in recent years, uh, you should perhaps consider getting yourself a copy or getting your grandmother to buy you a copy for Christmas of the book by Eugene Nida, NIDA, Towards the Science of Translating. That is a very heavy technical book. Don't spend the seven quid, i- i- you know, unless you're prepared to read some very heavy stuff, but it is exceedingly interesting. For instance, what do you do in Valiente? Uh. One missionary reports trying to translate the hymn, Just as I am, all tossed about, with many a conflict, many a doubt. Now, how do you put that into Valiente? Thank the Lord, it ain't scripture, but it's just a hymn. It illustrates the point. Because in Valiente, you've got to say the nearest thing you can get, so I'm told, to saying that tossed about with many a conflict, many a doubt, is to say, just as I am, with a swollen spleen I come to thee. Because that's their metaphor. You see, in their country, they suffer from a kind of malaria, so I'm told, that is of such kind that eventually it injures your spleen, and, uh, when you've got your spleen injured, you get very anxious and restless and feverish and all that kind of thing. And so these good folks use it as a kind of a metaphor for being tossed around and feverish and whatnot and whatnot. They say so-and-so's got a swollen spleen, and I don't mean it literally, but that's their expression. What do you do in a country where they've never seen snow? You'll say, to translate it, uh, into their language. What do you do when they don't know what a lamb is? There are all sorts of problems there in other languages. Uh, the work that has gone on in this last twenty five years is utterly phenomenal. Sometimes one hears the expression that, uh, you know, this is a degenerate world, as though God's work were going downhill or something. It is a thing to be remembered. There is more study now of Holy Scripture than ever there was. There has more work been done on the problems of translating scripture in this last twenty five to thirty years than ever there was. And very able linguists, men and women, have given themselves to the study of language for the purpose of missionary work, to get translations accurately done. Allow me, for I can't resist it. When I've got a few evangelicals, uh, potential students in front of me. Evangelicals have been strong, haven't they, as missionaries? Thank God for them. It is an interesting thing that in more modern years, the people engaged in many foreign, backward, uncivilized tribes in learning their languages, reducing them to scientific grammar, and then translating the scriptures into their tongue have been women missionaries. God be praised for them. Sometimes makes you ask where the men have got to. Moreover, when it comes to the matters that we were talking of earlier, the manuscripts of the Bible. Now, it's not everybody's job, of course not, to give himself to such study. It has been a very unfortunate thing, it seems to me, that, uh, evangelicals have allowed this kind of study to be done almost completely by modernists. That is not because it is excessively difficult. Evangelicals have among them first class engineers, first class medics, first class accountants. Men whom, if God had called, could very easily have coped with the kind of learning that is necessary to study and to, uh, to guard and, uh, to keep and to interpret the manuscripts of Holy Scripture. It is curious that those Christians who say, yes, I believe every word of the original scripture is inspired, it also seemed curious to me that not more of them have given themselves to the study of those things, and have left it largely in the hands of modernism. That's a pity. Now, as I say again, it's not everybody's job to do it, but who knows tonight, there might be somebody here with curly hair, like I once was, who might, uh, consider preparing himself. You see, I have said, and I say it again, I have said that I believe in the inspiration of scripture one hundred percent. But there are problems. I should be dishonest if I didn't tell you there were problems. One of the major problems in the Old Testament facing us nowadays is this. That the book of J- take the book of Jeremiah, for instance. The Hebrew manuscripts on which your English translations of Jeremiah are founded have been with us many, many centuries. We know them well. The Greek translation of Jeremiah that was made somewhere about, uh, two BC, we had manuscripts of that, we've had them for centuries. But when we look at the Greek, the ancient Greek translation of Jeremiah, we find that it is one-eighth shorter than the manuscripts on which your English versions of Jeremiah are based. One-eighth shorter. Why? Hitherto we were inclined to say, ah well, but the Hebrew manuscripts we have are more likely to represent the original than this Greek translation. But in Cave four at Qumran by the Dead Sea, we have found a manuscript, or rather three little pieces of a manuscript. We call it affectionately four Q Jeremiah B. It is a very ancient manuscript, going back to the second and third centuries BC. It is three fragments of a manuscript of Jeremiah in Hebrew, than it does with the Hebrew manuscripts that we have had hitherto. So we face the problem. Now, which among these manuscripts represents better the original? It may be that the Bibles that you will be reading thirty years from now will have a translation of Jeremiah that is somewhat shorter than the one you now have. Who's going to decide? I hope it won't be left completely to liberals to decide it. If, however, it comes to it that, uh, people decide that the shorter version of Jeremiah is more likely to be original, I hasten to add that no fundamental doctrine is involved. Well, if you look at your English translation of Jeremiah, you will find that there are passages that are repeated, and repeated almost word for word. So a passage occurs, say, in chapter six, the same passage occurs almost word for word later on. There are many such repetitions in Jeremiah. Normally, the Greek translation only has one, but it has one, but it doesn't have the repetition. There are therefore technical problems to be faced. We could do with a few more men and women who believe with all their hearts in the inspiration of scripture to face and help us solve problems of that dimension. The word inspiration that you are a hundred percent in for the sake of the younger one. I can best say that by, uh, quoting the New Testament truth. One, uh, second Peter chapter one, which tells us how the Old Testament, uh, prophecies came to us. For prophecy came not in old time by the will of men, but holy men of God spoke as they were moved by the Holy Spirit. I understand Peter to be saying, and he also was an inspired apostle and had experienced this experience, that when the prophets of the Old Testament, the Old Testament writers wrote, it wasn't that they gathered the facts merely themselves and then debated them and thought about them and decided to write and put it down. They did gather the facts. They did think. They did give careful thinking to the order in which the things should be said. But in addition to the reverent use of their own faculties, there was this added dimension. It was God speaking. God spoke. And these men, these prophets who spoke and wrote, they spoke from God. That is, God spoke, and they were the channels through whom God spoke. And if you say, by what mechanism did that happen, Peter tells you that these men spoke, as they spoke, they were being carried along by the Holy Spirit. That, sir, is what I understand by inspiration. Does that mean that the actual words that they were given, that they wrote, not so much the ideas, but the actual words? I'm thinking of the Corinthian passage, in words which the Holy Ghost teacheth. Oh. My good brother here is asking me now to tell you what I believe about verbal inspiration. Is the Bi- Bible verbally inspired, or is it merely given by plenary inspiration? And you can tell the man is a theologian in the very fact he asked the question. This is a topic that I haven't dealt with tonight because I gather you're going to talk about it in subsequent weeks, but my own personal belief is that the Bible, as originally given, was verbally inspired. I know that it has gone out of fashion to believe in verbal inspiration. The reason why it has gone out of fashion is this, that people say, quite rightly say, that say here you've got Hebrew and you want to put Hebrew into English. Well, you can't just translate word for word. You'll have to change the words and use other words. And what you're always taught as schoolboys and schoolgirls in school, and you have to observe it even more at higher levels of translation, you translate not words, you translate meaning. Let me give you a very simple, straightforward example. There is a phrase in the Authorized Version that runs God forbid. God forbid. Two good English words, God and forbid. The Authorized Translators used it many times. Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? God forbid. Well, now, if you look at the Greek behind that, the Greek doesn't say God forbid. Doesn't say anything like it, in actual words. In Greek, it is two words, me gnoito, meaning may it not be so, I fancied they said to themselves, but the ordinary Irishman and Englishman, if we were to put, may it not be so, wouldn't think that was strong enough. As you'll see, to a Greek, may ganoita is an exceedingly strong expression, but may it not be so in English, that wouldn't be very strong, would it? So the authorized gave us what they felt to be the meaning, but they didn't keep the same words. They said, God forbid. Or if you wanted to put it in now, uh, modern colloquialism, you'd say, not on your life. Or certainly not. You'll say, right now, I'm making the point that when you translate from one language to another, you go for the meaning, you translate meaning rather than the literal words, and very often you have to do that. That has led some people to say, well, what does it matter which words were used in the Old Testament? It doesn't matter which words were used, it's the meaning that God was getting across. So they have said, no, we we don't believe in verbal inspiration, we believe that God inspired the general meaning. With due respect to them, it seems to me that they have committed an error of logic. Yes, certainly meaning is the important thing, but not even God himself, when he was getting his meaning across to the original authors, not even God himself got it across without words. It is therefore exceedingly important to observe, as Mr. Hutchinson has quoted, the understanding of these things by our Lord and his apostles was that not only did God give them the general meaning and leave them to put it in their words, but rather God gave them the meaning, and as he gave them the meaning, he gave it by choosing certain words. Mm. I believe that the words were inspired as originally given. And if you come to me and say, yes, but the same meaning could have been got across in other words, I shall say, so what? That doesn't prove that the words that were actually chosen were not inspired. And the New Testament gives us ground for thinking that, uh, it was not just the general meaning, but the words themselves also that were chosen of God. God spake all these words, says Exodus twenty. And our Lord said, I have given them thy word. Ah, but more, the words that thou gavest me, I have given them. So my answer to you, sir, is that I personally believe in the verbal inspiration of Holy Scripture. Thanks, Neil. Thank you very much. All the letter of Aristeas to Philocrates, written about one hundred and twenty BC by a Jew in Alexandria, who refers to the Old Testament sacred scriptures as the Bible. I believe that is the first reference to the term. It is not a term used in the scripture itself, as far as I'm aware. In the New Testament, you will find the Old Testament referred to, uh, under uh three headings: the Law or Moses. That is the first five books, the Law, Torah, or Moses as the author thereof. The prophets, and in Hebrew, the prophets include not only the ones that you would regard as prophets, Isaiah, Jeremiah, and the minor prophets, for instance, but the former prophets as well. Books like Samuel and Kings were regarded as being given us by prophets. They are not just records of history, they are prophetic interpretations of history. And thirdly, the division called either the Writings or the Psalms, because the Psalms is the biggest group in that third division. You'll find such terms used in the New Testament, Luke twenty four for instance, uh, to compass the old. That's how they refer to it. Or they refer to it as scripture. Whether the individual scriptures, as our Lord in John chapter ten in quoting a psalm, I said you were God's, he adds, and the scripture cannot be broken. Quotes that bit of the psalm as scripture. Or Paul writing to Timothy, from a child I was known the Holy Scriptures. The New Testament, uh, from time to time speaks, uh, uh, occasionally of itself. Peter, for instance, talking about Paul, says that the unlearned rest Paul's writings as they do the other scriptures, implying, it seems to me, that Peter regards Paul's writings as scripture likewise. Does that, uh, answer your question?