23 Jul '05 17:22>
Originally posted by NemesioI'm in general agreement with the principles Nemesio puts forth here, but I've long favored the RSV. It was translated by a team whose doctrinal differences and disagreements prevented any skewing to favor particular interpretations, and the English language employed is better than most.
The KJV is great if you are interested in decorative phrases and
poetry, but it is not useful for a careful study. First, the knowledge
(or even known existence) of ancient sources did not exist in 1611, so
many times, the translations are fundamentally flawed.
But, more importantly, the words themselves connote different
meanings today. The way ...[text shortened]... Greek (with transliteration
and concordance).
Nemesio
Edit: the NAS is pretty good, too.
NIV was favored by most of my college friends because they were engineers, business majors, and literalists. The language employed meets well with the limited vocabulary and unimaginative minds of technicians, and the translation is skewed towards fundamentalist failures of perception.
The Bible is a great work of literature. Many translations, including the KJV and RSV convey this achievement; the NIV, NKJV, and several others do not.