Bible Basics

What About Translations?

We’ve established that the Bible is literally the word of God as men wrote by inspiration the revelation of God. The original text of the Bible was in three languages as the Old Testament was written in Hebrew with some minor portions in Aramaic, and the New Testament was written in Greek. Since most of us do not read these original languages we are dependent upon an English translation to read God’s truth. Can we know that we are reading the genuine word of God even though we are reading a translation? Of course we can. The fact is, Jesus employed the use of a translation of the Hebrew Scriptures into the Greek as the Septuagint is quoted some three hundred times in the New Testament. For instance, Jesus asked, “Have you not read what was spoken to you by God?” He then quotes from the Septuagint Version of the Old Testament, a translation of the Hebrew into Greek (Matt. 22:31, 32). This demonstrates that the process of translating the Scriptures from one language to another does not destroy the revealed word of God. We must, however, use caution to make sure we use a reliable translation of the Scriptures; that is, one translated by many scholars from different backgrounds who have faithfully translated each word from the Hebrew or Greek into English thus preserving God’s truth.

                                                                                                               -- Clark Dugger

Bible Basics