Quite some time ago I acquired several boxes of books from my mother when she sold the house in the country and moved to an apartment in town. Among those books was Introduction to New Testament Textual Criticism, by J. Harold Greenlee. Recognizing it as one of the books on The Master’s Seminary 850 Books for Biblical Expositors list, I put it in the stack of “keepers,” to be forgotten until just a few days ago when I was updating my LibraryThing library. I have been meaning to do some studying of the science of textual criticism for some time now and, having the book in hand, now seemed like the right time.

Everyone who studies the Bible will most likely ask, if there are no surviving original manuscripts, if every manuscript we have is a copy or a copy of a copy, how do we know the available manuscripts are reliable? This is undeniably a vital question. If the ancient texts we possess are not accurate, how can we know the Bible we have is really the Word of God?

In his introduction, Greenlee offers three basic reasons to trust the texts from which our Bibles are translated: the vast number of manuscripts available for comparison, the age of the surviving manuscripts, and the consistency of the surviving manuscripts.

[T]he number of available mss. of the N.T. is overwhelmingly greater than those of any other work of ancient literature. . . . The earliest extant mss. of the N.T. were written much closer to the date of the original writing than is the case in almost any other piece of ancient literature.
. . . The plays of Aeschylus are known in some fifty mss., the works of Sophocles in one hundred, the Greek Anthology and the Annals of Tacitus in one ms. each, the poems of Catullus in three hundred of independent value; while there are a few hundred known mss. of works of Euripides, Cicero, Ovid, and Virgil. In the case of the N.T., in sharp contrast, there are over 4000 extant mss. in Greek, 8000 in Latin, and 1000 in other languages. As regards the time interval between the extant mss. and the autograph, the oldest known mss. of most of the classical Greek authors are dated a thousand years or more after the author’s death. The time interval for the Latin authors is somewhat less, varying down to a minimum of three centuries in the case of Virgil. In the case of the N.T., however, two of the most important mss. Were written within 300 years after the N.T. was completed, and some virtually complete N.T. books as well as extensive fragmentary mss. of many parts of the N.T. date back to one century of the original writings.
   Since scholars accept as generally trustworthy the writings of the ancient classics, even though the earliest mss. were written so long after the original writings and the number of extant mss. is in many instances so small, it is clear that the reliability of the text of the N.T. is likewise assured.

   In the N.T. and in other ancient literature as well, there is no question concerning the reading of most of the words. Textual criticism needs to operate in only a limited portion of the text. . . . the main body of the text and its general sense are left untouched . . . textual criticism engages in turning a magnifying glass upon some of the details.

—J. Harold Greenlee, Introduction to New Testament Textual Criticism (Eerdmans, 1964), 15–17.

Wayne Grudem is smart. He agrees with me on Bible translations.

   All the words of Scripture are breathed out by God for purposes only he fully understood. He put the words there so that we could use them to probe deeper into the meaning of Scripture and even to construct arguments or to answer arguments yet to be invented in the future. But some of these words of God are simply deleted from dynamic equivalence translations. Unless our theory of translation seeks to translate all the words (in some way or another), we will leave out things that we don’t know we are leaving out, and we will leave out part of the meaning of Scripture.
   Are only some words of Scripture breathed out by God?

—Wayne Grudem, Translating Truth: The Case for Essentially Literal Bible Translation (Crossway, 2005), 32–33.

Wayne Grudem offers an example of the editorializing found in dynamic equivalence translations of the Bible:

Generations of Christians have identified with David’s famous words of repentance in Psalm 51:

Create in me a clean heart, O God,
and renew a right spirit within me.
Cast me not away from your presence,
and take not your Holy Spirit from me (Ps. 51:10–11, esv).

All essentially literal translations include the same elements of this prayer: a request for a “clean heart” (or a “pure heart”) and a right spirit from God, and a plea that God not cast the person from his presence or remove his Holy Spirit.
   But look at The Message on this passage:

God, make a fresh start in me,
shape a Genesis week from the chaos of my life.
Don’t throw me out with the trash,
or fail to breathe holiness in me.

   On first reading The Message on this passage people might think, “How creative!” “How Catchy!” “What an interesting way to put it!” But then we realize: creating new ideas is not what translators are to do. We have no business creating things God did not say. Why should anyone think it right to invent new metaphors that God did not use (“Don’t throw me out with the trash”) and omit clear wording that he did use (“Cast me not away from your presence”)? This kind of material belongs in sermons; it does not belong in a book that says “Bible” on the cover.
   Are only some words of Scripture breathed out by God?

—Wayne Grudem, Translating Truth: The Case for Essentially Literal Bible Translation (Crossway, 2005), 44–45.

Dynamic equivalence translations of the Bible, according to Leland Ryken, not only assume illiteracy in their readers, but also ensure that readers remain at a low literacy level.

   Further assumptions about modern readers fill out the picture of what I call a naive readership. Dynamic equivalence translations regularly assume that contemporary readers struggle with figurative language, so that, in the words of one translation, “at times we have chosen to translate or illuminate the metaphor” (NLT). Incidentally, translating the metaphor is exactly what equivalence translations do not do; they do not translate the metaphor but remove it from sight. Not only is figurative language said to be beyond the ability of modern readers, but so is the ability to enter the ancientness of foreignness of the biblical world. In the preface to the NIV, we read that the translators based two of their renderings on the premise that “for most readers today the phrases ‘the Lord of hosts’ and ‘God of hosts’ have little meaning.” An unstated and perhaps unrecognized assumption in all this is that readers cannot be educated beyond their current abilities—to me a naive and untenable premise. If this were not the operating premise, translation committees would not fix their translation at a lowest common denominator of reading ability and comprehension. In effect, “easy reading” translations ensure that readers will remain at a naive level of comprehension, even if the translators would disavow that this is their aim.
   This, then, is one way in which dynamic equivalence translations are naive: the translators producing them assume an audience with minimal linguistic and theological ability and then produce a translation adapted to the assumed needs of the audience. Essentially literal translations are not naive in this sense. They expect from their readers what we as a society expect of educated adults and even bright teenagers in other areas of life. The reply to the charge of elitism is simple: essentially literal translations make the Bible neither more nor less difficult than it was in the original. Faithfulness to the original is the goal of essentially literal translation; catering to the assumed wants and needs of the modern reader is the goal of dynamic equivalence translations.

—Leland Ryken, Translating Truth: The Case for Essentially Literal Bible Translation (Crossway, 2005), 64–65.

Literate readers are not the only ones insulted by dynamic equivalence Bible translations.

   In the urge to relieve allegedly inexpert readers from the need to make interpretive decisions, and to guard readers from misinterpretation, dynamic equivalence translator overlooked one important thing: in the overwhelming number of instances where these translators believed that they need to change, explain, or clarify the original, the original authors could have said it that way and chose not to. The psalmist had the linguistic resources to say (in Ps. 78:33) that God ended the days of the wicked “in futility” (NIV) or “in emptiness” (REB) or “in failure” (NEB) instead of saying that “their days vanish like a breath” (RSV, ESV, NRSV). At the heart of the dynamic equivalence experiment is the attempt to fix the assumed inadequacies of the Bible for modern readers. This maneuver is not an example of sophistication as opposed to naivete; it is instead and unwarranted affront to the original authors (an extension of the “what the author was trying to say” fallacy that has become so prevalent).

—Leland Ryken, Translating Truth: The Case for Essentially Literal Bible Translation (Crossway, 2005), 68.

And let’s be clear: the “original author” receiving this “unwarranted affront” is none other than God himself.

If I relay a message inaccurately, does it matter how plainly I speak?

   Several ideas ordinarily cluster around the charge [that essentially literal translations are obscure or opaque]. One is the assumption that whenever an English translation is difficult or unclear, the fault can be assumed to lie with the translation and its philosophy rather than being a property of the original text. Related to this is the assumption that when a colloquial or modernized translation is judged by reading tests to be more easily grasped by the population at large, this means that translations that require a higher reading level are obscure.
   It is my belief that all modern translations are accessible to a lower reading level than traditional translations are. Not only has readability been elevated to a status all out of proportion to its legitimate place, but it has also been misrepresented. I have moved among people for whom readability is apparently the primary aim of English Bible translation, an error reinforced by advertising for what I will call “easy reading Bibles.” I will state my critique of the readability fallacy very succinctly: what good is readability if what the reader reads is not what the original text of the Bible says? If it is not what the original text says, the so-called readable translation has actually removed the Bible from a reader, not, as it is claimed, brought the Bible close to the reader. [bold type added]

—Leland Ryken, Translating Truth: The Case for Essentially Literal Bible Translation (Crossway, 2005), 73–74.

While practitioners of dynamic equivalence translation attempt to remove difficulty from Bible reading, Ryken points out that difficulty is, and always has been, a natural quality of Bible study.

   Over against the claims of a naive modern audience that is in a special position in finding the Bible difficult, I incline to the view that there is much in the Bible that is inherently difficult and technical. Surely Anthony Nichols is correct when he writes, “One cannot escape the fact that the Bible contains many concepts and expressions which are difficult for the modern reader. There is no evidence that they were much less so for the original readers. They, too, had to cope with technical terminology, with thousands of OT allusions and Hebrew loan words, idioms and translation must have been very strange to them.”
   In a similar vein, Wayne Grudem pictures the situation thus: “Lest we think that understanding the Bible was somehow easier for first-century Christians than for us, it is important to realize that in many instances the New Testament epistles were written to churches that had large proportions of Gentile Christians. They were relatively new Christians who had no previous background in any kind of Christian society, and who had little or no understanding of the history and culture of Israel. The events of Abraham’s life . . . were as far in the past for them as the events of the New Testament are for us!”

—Leland Ryken, Translating Truth: The Case for Essentially Literal Bible Translation (Crossway, 2005), 74–75.

Is it so unreasonable to expect difficulty in the study of an infinitely difficult subject? And if the difficulty is removed, has not the subject, by and large, also been removed?

During the last week, I’ve been sharing some excerpts from Translating Truth: The Case for Essentially Literal Bible Translation. In Chapter 3, What the Reader Wants and the Translator Can Give: First John as a Test Case, C. John Collins demonstrates how dynamic equivalence translators, in their efforts to make the Bible easily readable and to translate the message, rather than the words, of Scripture, actually lose the message along with the words. The case he makes is quite good, but as it takes us to the outer limits of my ability to follow Greek, I’m not going to try to share it here. I will leave it to you to pick up the book and sort it out for yourselves.

What I would like to address, in an otherwise good chapter, is the idea that different types of translations, including dynamic equivalence translations, might be appropriate for different contexts. Collins distinguishes three different uses that might call for different translations:

(1) a Bible for church; (2) a Bible for family reading, which includes children, and personal study; (3) a Bible for the uninitiated. . . . these different contexts might be best served by different translation philosophies. What kind of translation might suit these various contexts for the English reader?*

Collins goes on to say, quite correctly, that a Bible translation for use in the church ought to be an accurate, essentially literal translation. Furthermore,

. . . I see no reason for the home version to be different from the one used in church . . . One might object, however, that the higher level of language in this version excludes children; but in my own experience I have not found this to be a viable objection. Children—mine, at least—live up to what is expected of them, and aim to expand their language capacity anyhow. I do not find them to be embarrassed to admit that they do not understand something, and the exercise of explaining a passage to young children has done me good. I admit that this puts more weight on parent’s shoulders, but then our churches ought to welcome this, and equip their families for the task.†

So far, so good; but then he continues:

The third category of translation is the one for outreach. Here we might indeed prefer a Bible version simpler than the ecclesiastical one; but if we use such a version, we should explain to people that its purpose is introductory.‡

Collins goes on to emphasize the need for disciples to be challenged intellectually to better things, quoting C. S. Lewis: “[Christ] wants a child’s heart, but a grown-up’s head” — which is quite correct. However, I seriously doubt the wisdom of using second rate translations “for the uninitiated.” My objections are:

1. It has the potential to create confusion, and undermine confidence in the Word of God. What are we saying if we give a Bible one day, only to return later with another, better Bible, explaining that “some of the stuff in the first Bible we gave you isn’t quite right, but this one can be trusted — honest”?
2. It diminishes the role of the Church in the proclamation of God’s Word. The Word of God is not meant to stand alone, outside of the Church. That is not what we mean by sola Scriptura. In addition to simply being read, it is to be explained and taught. Some of it is difficult. That is why we have pastors — preachers, teachers, shepherds — as well as congregations of mature believers: to disciple the young and immature. We are not simply to hand out Bibles and hope for the best; we are to preach it, teach it, and live it out among our neighbors. In the same vein, but far more importantly,
3. It fails to recognize the role of the Holy Spirit in illuminating God’s Word. God chose the words he wanted us — all of us, simple and wise — to read. If God doesn’t intend for us to receive the word independent of teachers, it is even more true that he does not intend for us to receive it independent of himself. “But a natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually appraised” (1 Corinthians 2:14). No matter how simple the translation, none of us can understand it adequately unless we are filled with the Spirit. The Holy Spirit will make the Word understood, if we bring it accurately.

This particular point seems to contradict everything I’ve read in this book so far. In addition to these objections, I can’t help remembering and repeating Leland Ryken’s words from the previous chapter: “what good is readability if what the reader reads is not what the original text of the Bible says?” Accuracy has got to come first, regardless of the target audience.

I’ve begun reading The Canon of Scripture by F. F. Bruce. The logical place for a book with that title to start is with a definition* of the word canon, and so it does. First, it’s not a really big gun. That would be a cannon. Scripture is, of course, a really big gun—the big gun—of religion and theology; but that’s besides the point.

   The word ‘canon’ has come into our language (through Latin) from the Greek word kanōn. In Greek it meant a rod, especially a straight rod used as a rule; from this usage comes the other meaning which the word commonly bears in English—‘rule’ or ‘standard’. We speak, for example, of the ‘canons’ or rules of the Church of England. But a straight rod used as a rule might be marked in units of length (like a modern ruler marked in inches or centimeters); from this practice the Greek word kanōn came to be used of the series of such marks, and hence to be used in the general sense of ‘series’ or ‘list’. it is this last usage that underlines the term ‘the canon of scripture’.
   Before the word ‘canon’ came to be used in the sense of ‘list’, it was used in another sense by the church—in the phrase ‘the rule of faith’ or ‘the rule of truth’. In the earlier Christian centuries this was a summary of Christian teaching, believed to reproduce what the apostles themselves taught, by which any system of doctrine offered for Christian acceptance, or any interpretation of biblical writings, was to be assessed. But when once the limits of holy scripture came to be generally agreed upon, holy scripture itself came to be regarded as the rule of faith. For example, Thomas Aquinas (c 1225–1274), says that ‘canonical scripture alone is the rule of faith’. From another theological perspective the Westminster Confession of Faith (1647), after listing the sixty-six books of the Old and New Testaments, adds: ‘All which are given by inspiration of God, to be the rule of faith and life.’ These words affirm the status of holy scripture as the ‘canon’ or ‘standard’ by which Christian teaching and action must be regulated. While the ‘canon’ of scripture means the list of books accepted as holy scripture, the other sense of ‘canon’—rule or standard—has rubbed off on this one, so that the ‘canon’ of scripture is understood to be the listof books which are acknowledged to be, in a unique sense, the rule of belief and practice.

—F. F. Bruce, The Canon of Scripture (InterVarsity Press, 1988), 17–18.

That is what the canon is. If Scripture is to be our “rule of faith and life,” it behooves us to know how it is that we came to recognize our Bible, in its present form, as the Word of God. And that is what this book is about.

F. F. Bruce titles a chapter in in his book, The Canon of Scripture, “The Old Testament becomes a New Book.” By this he means that with the coming of Christ it became a Christian book. Its meaning was illuminated so that it was no longer understood as merely a Jewish book, but as a book explicitly about Christ. And the Apostles plainly stated that this was so.

   According to the Acts of the Apostles, the early preaching of the gospel to Jews and God-fearing Gentiles was regularly marked by the appeal to the fulfillment of Old Testament scripture in the work of Jesus. It is to him, Peter assures Cornelius, that ‘all the prophets bear witness’ (Acts 10:43). When Philip is asked by the Ethiopian on his homeward journey from Jerusalem to whom the prophet is referring as he describes the suffering of the Isaianic Servant, Philip does not hesitate: ‘beginning with this scripture he told him the good news of Jesus’ (Acts 8:35). The impression given in Acts is confirmed by Paul: ‘the gospel of God . . . concerning his Son’, he says, was ‘promised beforehand through his prophets in the holy scriptures’ (Rom. 1:1–3), and throughout his exposition of the gospel in the letter to the Romans he shows in detail what he means by this. Thanks to the illumination thrown on them by their fulfilment in Christ, the ancient scriptures became a new and meaningful book to the early Christians. The prophets themselves, we are assured in 1 Pet 1:10–12, had to search hard to find out ‘what person or time was indicated by the Spirit of Christ within them when predicting the sufferings of Christ and the subsequent glory’; they had to learn that their ministry was designed for the generation which witnessed the fulfillment of what they foretold.
   Various figures of Old Testament expectation were now identified with Christ—the prophet like Moses (Deut. 18:15–19), the son of David (2 Sam. 7:12–16), the servant of Yahweh (Is. 42:1, etc.), the righteous sufferer (Ps. 22:1, etc.), the stricken shepherd (Zech. 13:7), and others. It is not simply that a number of texts out of context are given in a Christian significance: the New Testament interpretation of a few Old Testament words or sentences actually quoted often implies the total context in which these word or sentences occur. Moreover, different New Testament writers will quote different words from the same context in a manner which suggests that the whole context had been given a Christian interpretation before those writers quoted from it. It has been pointed out, for example, that from Ps, 69:9 (‘zeal for thy house has consumed me, and the insults of those who insult thee have fallen on me’) the former part is applied to Jesus’ cleansing of the temple in John 2:17 and the later part to his patient endurance verbal abuse in Romans 15:3. While no one is likely to maintain that the one writer has influenced the other, ‘it would be too much of a coincidence if the two writers independently happened to cite the two halves of a single verse, unless they were both aware that at least this whole verse, if not any more of the Psalm, formed part of a scheme of scriptural passages generally held to be especially significant’. This implies something more substantial in the way of primitive Christian exegesis than a chain of isolated proof-texts of ‘testimonies’.

—F. F. Bruce, The Canon of Scripture (InterVarsity Press, 1988), 56–57.